Take A Tour

Let’s take a walk through one of NFI’s Central Region distribution centers. This particular distribution center was specifically built for a customer’s grocery business.

The first thing we see when we walk into the center is the endless square feet of ambient warehouse space – strikingly clean space. And it isn’t that clean just because it is a food grade warehouse; superior cleanliness is an NFI standard.

After passing through security, we are greeted by a Management team representative who will guide us through our tour of the facility.

This warehouse has been engineered for maximum storage capacity of dry products. Racks with products are even stored overhead. Each rack and pallet is bar-coded for accurate inventory tracking. This particular customer already had a basic inventory system in place, so we interfaced our advanced warehouse management system with their system. However, our customer also needed a unique inventory pick system, so we designed a customized IT solution for them. Thanks to that customized solution and our state of the art on-board wireless forklift RF/ scanners, we are able to pick items off the racks more efficiently, with minimum down time and real-time inventory accuracy.

As we move to another part of the distribution center, we pass a fenced-in, guarded area that contains wine and beer. A warehouse manager is going through our multi-layered security procedures before he is allowed to take a case of wine to fulfill a store order.

The next section we see is our freezer section, where 40,000 square feet of space is committed to frozen food. Warehouse workers wearing full arctic gear work in the freezer for 20 minute shifts, filling orders until the next shift of workers relieve them. Workers inspect, wrap and load product when outside of the freezer. To avoid thawing, the freezer process has been designed for rapid pick and transfer to Reefers, and our WMS directs forklifts to move product into locations before the picker even arrives with the product.

Near the freezer section is the temperature controlled area. It has three temperature zones. One is for confection products, one for meats and processed foods, and one for produce and flowers. Electronic thermometers at the end of every aisle assure that the ideal temperature does not vary. Pick orders from these sections are also scheduled and handled to maintain each product’s optimum temperature from pick to loading into refrigerated trailers.

Now it’s back to the main cross dock floor which is almost as long as a football field. By early morning, the trucks that delivered the perishable items such as bread, flowers and produce have already been unloaded. Armed with the store orders that our WMS system coordinates daily, workers fill trays by region and line the trays up for efficient loading on the cross dock floor. For the next few hours, the floor and warehouse aisles are a mass of synchronized forklifts, people and order sheets, as the trays and pallets fill up with store orders. By 6am trucks are pulling away from the docks, loaded and dispatched with a route designed to maximize on-time delivery and eliminate potential delays.

There will be two additional store deliveries after this one. Everyday, stores will receive deliveries two to three times a day from this distribution center. Each of these routes deliver to multiple stores across eight states and they must make their deliveries within fifteen minute delivery windows. We designed this delivery system for this grocery customer to allow them to minimize in-store inventory and increase the fresh product on their shelves.

As we end our tour at the back of the warehouse, we see a large trash compactor and used packing material segregated by item. This is a green facility - recycling every piece of plastic, wood and cardboard. All other trash is disposed of in the self- contained compactor.

The distribution center never closes, and is just one of NFI’s many customized warehouse solutions that we operate for our customers across North America. We would welcome the opportunity to really walk you through any of our facilities! They are much more impressive in person.