The implementation of the K.Motion WMS system has created a modern and more efficient warehouse in Dr.Max

Dr.Max pharmacies were established in 2006 and are currently among the market leaders in the Slovak Republic. Customers can find them in more than 320 locations across Slovakia, but also as an online pharmacy.

The Dr.Max Internet dispensary sells over-the-counter medicines, medical supplies and medical devices, dietetic foods, supplementary assortments, veterinary preparations and dermo-cosmetics to customers via an online shop.

Original situation and need for change

The Dr.Max warehouse with an area of 900m2 is divided into two logical units.

Between 35 and 40 warehousemen work in it according to the actual need, divided according to the different operations: receiving, picking and dispatching. Since the beginning of the warehouse's operation, the operators have been using mobile terminals running the ERP system's add-on application for working with barcodes.

The warehouse currently offers over 8,000 types of items and with this quantity, it was time-consuming for the warehouse staff to load the goods one product at a time. They were stacking by scanning the product, position and entering the quantity.

Each position could accept any product, positions were not limited by the quantity of goods and the system had no navigation. Orders were picked in the manner - 1 operator = 1 order, the number of orders picked and the efficiency of work were significantly lower. Work was allocated in a FIFO manner, there was no possibility of prioritising orders.

The system did not provide the possibility to find out the status of the goods, the performance of the operators or who handled them and when.

The e-store must dispense products in accordance with good pharmacy practice and it is not an option to dispense a product that is past its expiration date. Ensuring this requirement has been a lengthy and

difficult process. A staff member had to physically go to the warehouse and check the expiry date of the product.

A modern and more efficient warehouse with a WMS system

With sales volumes growing significantly each year and more complex and complicated processes, Dr. Max had to consider implementing a WMS system that could meet the ever-increasing demands of its customers.

The implementation itself was preceded by a thorough process analysis, which resulted in a warehouse management solution providing the following functionalities:

• division of goods into positions according to individual categories so that there is no mixing of drugstores with medicines, etc,
• the system recommends the position with regard to product turnover so that the most frequently picked products are the best available,
• better tracking of delivered/undelivered goods from individual suppliers, and thus the ability to react more quickly to undelivered goods,
• introduction of mandatory expiry tracking in the system, when goods are picked the system checks the dates and allows to prioritise goods with shorter expiry dates,
• real-time tracking of orders and stock levels, better overview of order management and control, and thus easier traceability of products,
• picking of multiple orders at the same time, overall speeding up of the process, handling more orders per day,
• possibility to prioritize orders, filter them by criteria (delivery method, nature of goods, etc...),
• real-time control of pickers, clearer statistics when picking orders - who, how many, in what time...,
• quick response when resolving complaints, easier tracking of information to resolve them.

"The introduction of the HighJump Warehouse Edge WMS system has significantly increased our work efficiency, our productivity has increased, the work system is simpler, smoother and clearer. We are able to track product expirations and recall them in a timely manner if necessary.

On average, the WMS system processes around 2,000 orders per day. We can say that thanks to the introduction of the system, the warehouse processes have been streamlined, thanks to which the warehouse is able to handle a much larger number of orders without the need to increase the number of staff in the warehouse."

Alena SPIŠIAKOVÁ,
Dr.Max Warehouse Manager