Garment sorting innovation

WE Fashion has more than 250 shops and over 3,000 employees in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, France, Luxemburg, Austria and Switzerland. The international distribution centre and headquarter is located in Utrecht, The Netherlands.

The current shop delivery method is based on a push flow. For this operation WE has used a pick 2 light system for the last 10 years. The E-com flow is not done in house but is out-sourced to an external logistic partner.

With the E-com flow increasing in recent years and expected to grow further in the upcoming years, costs for the external handling of the E-com orders will rise in step with increasing volume.

Together with WE Europe, Distrisort set up a business case based on handling the shop delivery flow and E-com flow in house. Combining WE's knowledge of its operation and the know-how of Distrisort regarding sorting technology, a way forward was found. After a thorough exercise, it was determined very clearly that a flatsorter would be a worthwhile investment.

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Another result from the revamp, is that with the flatsorter, the shop delivery could be ended earlier during the day allowing the trucks to leave earlier. As a result of that the E-com operation can start immediately after the shop flow has ended.

The sorter had to be implemented on the existing floor and the position was chosen so the current operation can continue while the sorter will be built up. This way no valuable production time is lost and a smooth start of operation with the flatsorter is guaranteed. Also it reduces the pressure on the staff to work immediately from day one on full production speed.

From the business case Distrisort determined that a dual split tray sorter with 1 induction platform with 6 induction operators was enough to offer the required speed for WE Europe. Based on the fact that WE Europe wants to perform two flows on the same machine, Distrisort offered a sorter with exits that are able to handle totes (shop delivery) and offer the ability to pack E-com orders at the sorter exit.

With one sorting system WE Europe is able to handle multiple logistic flows. Besides sorting the shop flow at day time and the E-com orders in the afternoon and evening the system is also used to sort collections for the shops. In the future the system can be adjusted to handle even more flows like the returns flow or incoming goods.