Russian and Ukrainian inbound operations comparison

A few years ago I had a chance to analyze whole warehouse operations done in Russian Warehouse of the company and I was supposed to set up the same operations for Ukraine warehouse.

After analyzing the whole warehouse processes, I decided to develop and implement totally different system than in Russia. The main reason to develop and implement a new system was high financial expenses and low efficiency of the Russian warehousing.

One of the robust operations that consume a lot of manpower and time was inbound operation. The time consumed during the inbound is crucial because it directly affects the sales in the stores. The quicker new truck taken into the stock of Warehouse, the quicker it is sent to stores, the more sales will be done. For example, analysis of sales lost was carried for a truck coming on first week of December 2006 and taken into the stock in 48 working hours. The truck consisted of 100% of Winter season merchandise and %90 percent of these merchandise was already opened to the stores. 30% of the stock was missing in the stores and in warehouse stock. That is %30 percent of the new truck to be sent to the stores by the first delivery. Calculation show that every 24 hour delay on receiving the new truck costs a lost in sales by 25 000 USD.

Russian warehouse was supposed to take new truck into the stock in 48 working hours. A shift consisted of 3 PC operators, 12 pickers/checker, 1 shift leader, 1 warehouse administrator. There were 4 shifts. On total: 48 pickers/checkers, 12 PC operators, 4 shift leaders and one administrator. 24 hours of the day warehouse was functioning. Because there was not any address system, merchandise had to be sorted in a way so it could be found in future and picked for the stores.
In Russia it takes 48 hours for minimum 8 workers to take into the stock a truck of 15 000 piece merchandise. The same process takes maximum 14 hours for 5 workers in Ukraine. In Russian operations, even the truck is checked and taken into the stock, pickers are unable to pick items to the stores until put-away is done. This operation takes another 4 working hours for 5 workers. This is done because there is no addressing. In Ukrainian operations as soon as stock is taken into the system, it can be collected without put-away operation and put-away takes 1-2 hours .