Dematic Following up on Previous Success at AS Colour’s New Zealand Headquarters with Automation at its Melbourne Distribution Centre

Dematic has announced that AS Colour, a leading global wholesaler and retailer that designs, manufactures, and distributes premium apparel, will transform its Melbourne distribution centre (DC) with automation featuring a Dematic Multishuttle® goods-to-person (GTP) solution.

Starting out in New Zealand in 2005 as a supplier of quality blank apparel for sportswear, music industry and events merchandise, and company promotional wear, AS Colour now operates from five DCs in Auckland, Melbourne, Los Angeles, North Carolina, and Leighton Buzzard (Bedfordshire, UK), plus 25 retail stores across New Zealand, Australia, and the UK.

“Dematic has been a really strong technology partner, helping us from a global perspective, and we see this as a long-term partnership as we continue to expand as a business in the future,” explains Lawrence Railton, Managing Director, AS Colour. “We’re excited to again partner with Dematic on the Melbourne chapter of our automation.”

As a compact, high-throughput automated storage and picking system, the Dematic solution features high-density tote storage and sequenced order picking for better productivity. The system is capable of processing varied order types, including small e-commerce orders, medium and large B2B orders, as well as retail store fulfilment.

The modular, scalable Dematic Multishuttle at the Melbourne DC will be 18 levels high and four aisles storing over 55,000 totes, with additional capacity built in for projected future growth. Product and order totes will be retrieved and delivered in the required sequence to GTP picking workstations for efficient, ergonomic, and accurate order picking.

The system will be capable of sustainably delivering up to 1,500 product totes per hour across the five GTP picking workstations (an average of 300 product totes per hour to each independent picking workstation). After orders are fulfilled at GTP workstations, order totes will be temporarily buffered within the Dematic Multishuttle before being released and conveyed to the packing sorter in precise order sequence to support efficient packing processes.

Dematic Warehouse Control Software (WCS) will be an optimisation layer between the AS Colour’s Warehouse Management Software (WMS) and the automated equipment that provides the most efficient picking tasks and transportation of goods throughout the system.

The Melbourne GTP system will be roughly 2½ times larger than the GTP system at AS Colour’s Auckland DC. To support future growth after outgrowing its previous warehouse, AS Colour went live with a brand new 7,500 square metre DC in Auckland in 2021.

“Due to our growth over the last 5–10 years, we have outgrown many distribution facilities. Rising demand led us to building a brand-new facility with the focus on automation,” says Railton.

“AS Colour was the first company to choose the Dematic Multishuttle GTP solution in the New Zealand market,” says Seth van Dijk, Business Development Manager, Dematic. “The Auckland system has 18 levels and features two aisles storing just under 20,000 totes with four ergonomic GTP workstations.”

Prior to automation, AS Colour used manual RF processes to pick orders, with operators walking up and down aisles pulling trolleys. Stock was replenished with forklifts and other equipment.

The introduction of automation at its Auckland facility has increased throughput per worker by 344% – from an average of 45 lines per hour to an average of over 200 lines per hour. Other benefits include decreased labour costs and a vast improvement in order accuracy, which reduces the number of unnecessary customer returns and leads to greater customer satisfaction.

“Our customers expect their orders to be accurate and arrive very quickly. ,” says Railton. “With our automated facility, the speed, efficiency, and accuracy with which we’re able to get orders to customers differentiates us. Orders placed online can be picked within 30 minutes of being received, and then packed and out the door within a few hours.”

Railton continues, “The Dematic Multishuttle GTP solution has been a game changer for our business, and we’ve actually seen a big increase in sales in New Zealand – our customers can see how quickly and accurately we get their orders to them.”

The Auckland system stores 8,000 SKUs and the throughput is 5,000 lines per day (6am–5pm) over the six days a week the DC operates, with the capability to process 8,000+ lines per day. The previous DC achieved 2,700 cycle counts. The current DC has dramatically increased to 13,000 cycle counts per month.

“Land has become very expensive in New Zealand, so we had a goal of reducing building size. The Dematic solution helped us achieve a smaller footprint at the Auckland DC and reduced our construction costs by about 30%,” says Railton. “Additionally, we’ve been able to increase our product storage capacity by about 35%, which has brought in more revenue and given us a buffer for supply chain issues.”

Another big goal for AS Colour was to completely remove single-use plastic from its supply chain.

“Traditionally apparel is packaged in plastics or paper, but what’s quite unique to AS Colour is they store the product loose and unpackaged within totes, which is the final package that is shipped to customers. This is a more sustainable approach that the Dematic solution facilitates by keeping products clean and tidy,” adds van Dijk.

To find out more about the automation that is at the heart of AS Colour’s Auckland DC watch the video.