MHW Magazine News and stories from the Materials Handling Industry
European supply chain specialist Total Logistics has provided a solution to the on-site storage needs of Coca-Cola Hellenic, a leading European producer of non-alcoholic beverages. The project, at Ploiesti, Romania, will enable the bottling company to handle current capacity and to accommodate future development plans.
Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company S.A., which operates in 28 countries, engaged Total Logistics to advise on the building of a storage facility in Romania that would meet its high standards of environmental protection and its needs for efficiency, cost-effectiveness and flexibility.
Total Logistics undertook analysis of the processes at the bottling plant which currently operates six production lines, and developed a planning model, taking into account the peak production and despatch volumes and the projected demand of 198,000 units per hour.
Working with local management, the Total Logistics team considered several manual and automated options before finally recommending an automated high-bay storage solution. Total Logistics provided an initial design, taking palletised products from existing production lines via a main conveyor and into a storage area with the capacity for 35,000 pallets. The high-bay clad-rack warehouse will be served by 11 automated cranes to create an efficient retrieval system.
Peter Roan, partner at Total Logistics, said, "Coca-Cola Hellenic identified its plans to expand capacity in the future and needed to know if its existing site could facilitate its projected development and have the capacity for additional storage. Our specialist team examined the existing processes at the Ploiesti plant and looked at various options for providing increased storage and the associated benefits. We identified the optimal solution and subsequently ran an invitation to tender which led to the appointment of FKI Logistex as the solution provider."
The new automated high-bay system, which opened in October 2009, is thought to be the first in Romania and enables the facility to handle 24,000 returnable glass bottles (RGB) per hour, 120,000 plastic bottles (PET) per hour, and 71,000 cans per hour across the six production lines. The system can handle up to 290 pallets per hour on intake and 490 pallets per hour for despatch.
George Macovei, national logistics manager, Coca-Cola Hellenic Romania, said, "We wanted a highly sophisticated solution to our existing and future storage needs that complement the technologically advanced bottling operations at Ploiesti, and Total Logistics provided the answer and professional support we needed.
Impressively, the high-bay storage system they designed and helped to implement allowed bottling operations to continue without interruption."
Following the success of the project, Total Logistics has been appointed by Coca-Cola Hellenic to carry out further projects, in Romania and in other countries.
