York, PA: McCain Foods is one of the strongest brands in the frozen food industry in Europe. Since the spring of 2010, the french fry maker has been operating France’s largest refrigerated automated warehouse, with a capacity of over 68,000 pallets.
In the high bay warehouse, six Westfalia storage and retrieval machines (SRM) operate in the frozen -24 °C environment, with all product movements managed by Savanna.NET Warehouse Management Software.
This single high density warehouse allows McCain to merge the storage and distribution of eight regional warehouses in Béthume, Harnes and throughout northern Europe. In addition to savings on operational costs, such as electricity, the automated warehouse reduces transportation costs and supports McCain’s declared strategy for sustainability.
The logistics service provider Kloosterboer runs the warehouse exclusively for McCain and handles between 5,700 and up to 7,000 pallets daily. While this is nowhere near its capacity, it is designed to handle the anticipated growth of McCain’s well-known frozen products throughout Europe.
McCain decided to build the new warehouse and distribution center close to its production facility in order to accommodate its expanding storage requirements. The warehouse is 328 feet long, 368 feet wide and 125 feet high, and is capable of storing up to 16 pallets in a single storage lane.
Its six SRMs are equipped with double lift satellites, capable of handling both retail and Euro pallets up to 1,000 kilograms. Westfalia’s Savanna.NET software controls and manages the pallets throughout the system, handling up to 250 pallets per hour.
In this project, Westfalia demonstrated its expertise in designing automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS) to fulfill each client’s specific needs. “We are very proud that we were able to implement these customer requirements”, explains Andreas Gartemann, managing director.
