DC Velocity - April 2017

BY DAVID MALONEY, CHIEF EDITOR

STORAGE SYSTEMS
Material Handling

THE DIS TRIBU TION BUSINESS RAREL Y S TANDS still for long, especially when your major clients alter their own distribution patterns. Growth often spurs change.

Requirements for greater accuracy and throughput can also be drivers. So can concerns about the availability of a suitable workforce. And sometimes, it is all of the above.

Such was the case with Itochu-Shokuhin Co. (ISC), a Japanese wholesaler founded in 1886. Among its leading clients is Seven & i Holdings, which is the largest retailer in Japan and fifth largest in the world. In addition to department stores, grocery stores, and restaurants, Seven & i owns convenience stores, including Japan’s 7-Eleven stores, a familiar brand in the United States. Seven & i also added the U.S. 7-Eleven stores to its fold in 2005.

As Seven & i has grown over the years, ISC has had to
adjust its network to keep pace. One example of that is the
upgrade ISC made to the facility it manages in Sagamihara
City in Kanagawa prefecture. The building, a grocery dis-
tribution center dedicated to the supermarket chain Ito-
Yokado (a company within the Seven & i Holdings group),
is relatively new, having opened in 1999. Nonetheless, it
has already undergone a renovation. A few years back, the
center was outfitted with new automated systems to accom-
modate its client’s rapidly growing volume demands.

“We were stretched before, and we knew we needed the automation to maintain quality while handling more customer orders and a wider range of products. Automation reduces the risk,” says Logistics Manager Shintaro Kakoi.

The multilevel facility covers a footprint of nearly 22,000 square meters (237,000 square feet) and serves 80 grocery stores in the Tokyo area. The new technologies have increased speed and accuracy, but they were also implemented to address the shortage of available labor in Japan’s aging population.

“Automation makes the work simpler, so it opens jobs up to a wider range of workers,” says Kakoi. It also makes

For a Japanese wholesaler, automated storage systems and other sophisticated technology speed up the distribution of food and household goods to the nation’s biggest grocery chain.