In 2015, the rapidly expanding e-commerce fashion brand boohoo.com selected BS Handling to semi-automate its UK distribution centre in Burnley. The system was installed last year to speed up and increase the accuracy of the company’s despatch process, it comprises a sortation carousel conveyor, five infeed belt conveyors and 100 packing stations.

Global player

Founded in 2006 boohoo.com is one of the UK’s largest pure-play online, own brand fashion retailers. The company sells its own brand clothing, shoes and accessories through the company’s websites to 16-24 year old consumers in the UK and into over 100 countries around the world.

Although the company’s head office is in Manchester, all of the e-commerce orders for the UK and worldwide are processed in Burnley at the warehouse and distribution centre. Due to the continued expansion of the company – it has been experiencing 35% growth year on year – a more efficient method of handling finished parcels was required

We chose BS Handling Systems for this project because we already had good experience of the company delivering quality projects for us, on time and in budget.”

David Moores, Head of Operations – Logistics, boohoo.com

A cost effective solution

David Moores is Head of Operations – Logistics for the company, he explains why BS Handling Systems was awarded the contract for the new parcel handling system. “Boohoo.com is growing at a fast rate; we now handle around 30,000 orders a day which is 90,000 units. Our requirement was for a carousel conveyor that would act as a despatch sorter for finished parcels.

“We wanted to have a degree of sortation – albeit manual, to an increasing number of service sorts. Previously we were using a more manual system where the parcels had to go through two separate sorting processes and that meant there was more potential for human error. With the new system we wanted to have one sort straight off the carousel conveyor to make the handling process more efficient.”

Quality projects delivered on time

He continues, “We chose BS Handling Systems for this project because we already had good experience of the company delivering quality projects for us, on time and in budget. These included the installation of a rack supported mezzanine and four goods lifts. During the installation of these projects they also demonstrated their ability to work around a very busy operation.

“When we were considering the alternatives for this particular project, they offered us a very cost effective solution which we knew would give us exactly the option we needed, so naturally they were given the contract.”

Safe and efficient handling of finished parcels

At peak season there are up to 1,500 people working in the boohoo.com distribution centre. Once an order has been received it is picked and then brought into the despatch area. Here the orders are packed and labelled by an operative working at one of the new packing stations. BS Handling has installed a total of 100 packing benches which are situated ten on each side of the five infeed conveyors.

The finished parcels are placed onto one of the infeed belts which rise up at the end to drop the packed products onto the sortation carousel. This has been fitted out with 29 chutes on the sortation side. As the parcels travel around the carousel, operatives remove the parcels and place them into the correct destination chute for onward despatch to customers.

To give the operatives safe access to the central section of the system, two steel bridging step units have been positioned at each end of the carousel conveyor.

Now that we are using the new system we have a much better facility to handle and sort our finished parcels in a safe, accurate and efficient way.”

David Moores, Head of Operations – Logistics, boohoo.com

Reliable 24/7 operation

“It’s proved to be a very reliable solution,” concludes Moores, “once it’s set up it can run 24/7 without any
problems. Naturally with any new equipment there’s always a bedding-in period when a few tweaks are required, but the team at BS Handling Systems are very responsive to any calls for action, sorting out any issues on the same day.

“Now that we are using the new system we have a much better facility to handle and sort our finished parcels in a safe, accurate and efficient way.”