Greenfield Warehouse for Processing Fashion (Returns)

Logistics Planning

Capacity expansion of the logistics network through implementation of a greenfield logistics center

In our customer's project, the logistics of the company-wide B/C and D returns goods as well as the second-hand business were completely reorganized. For this purpose, goods from the returns centers are reassembled into sales units and sent to the company's own outlet stores or to third-party recyclers. Due to the strong growth, the customer decided to adapt the logistics processing to the new and growing requirements and planned the construction of a new logistics location in eastern Germany for this purpose. Metroplan supported the customer in all phases of the project, from the concept planning of the intralogistics to the tendering and awarding of contracts and the acceptance of the finished facility, including a new warehouse management system.

In the conception phase, various material flow concepts were developed on the basis of a data analysis. These were evaluated in terms of investment requirements and operating costs and a preferred concept was defined together with the customer.

In a subsequent tendering phase using the Metroplan Guided Engineering process, the suppliers were involved in the tendering process at an early stage. This early involvement ensures a high degree of maturity in the suppliers' detailed solutions on which the tender is based and a high level of transparency between customer and supplier. 

The guided engineering process significantly shortened the implementation planning phase.

In the subsequent implementation support, the execution planning, the specification phase and the implementation of the scope of delivery and services were accompanied and checked with regard to the specified acceptance criteria. The test procedure developed and continuously improved by Metroplan was used as the cornerstone for an efficient and transparent method for all parties. This ensured a high level of basic stability from the very first second of using the new system.

During the ramp-up phase itself, any anomalies that arose were resolved in close cooperation with the customer and the supplier, so that our customer was able to hand over a fully functional system at the end.

Despite the special challenges posed by COVID-19 during commissioning, the implementation phase was completed on time and in line with the tight schedule.