Faced by the dual challenges of rapid sales growth and continuous addition of new product lines, a leading online retailer of officially licensed college and professional sports merchandise (and a Top 50 Internet Retailer) called Pyramid when it needed to significantly expand and modernize its distribution center (DC).
The catch? The company decided to keep its home-grown warehouse management system (WMS).
The ultimate—and unconventional—solution was to use a common, host-based database management system (DBMS) for information sharing between the legacy WMS and the Pyramid Director Warehouse Execution System (WES). This setup lets Director WES selectively harvest the data it needs to drive fulfillment without requiring custom WMS interfaces.
In turn, Director WES deposits inventory, location and status updates in the DBMS, allowing inventory and customer orders to be managed by the WMS and throughout fulfillment. All inventory receipt, reserve storage and replenishment of the forward pick area is directed by the WMS.
Ultimately Director WES is responsible for the control and management of a variety of material handling equipment and processes in real-time, including:
- Wave optimization and building based on rules and algorithms
- Wave-based picking to totes guided by radio-frequency (RF) terminals
- Routing and execution of all multi- and single-line order waves
- Automatic sortation of picked totes by wave to 60 pack-out pods via pop-up wheel and 90-degree transfer sorters
- Put-to-light sorting and packing
- Automatic sortation of shipping cartons to workstations based on order requirements
- Automatic printing/application of shipping labels
- Slat sortation of ship-ready cartons by carrier/service
Want to learn more? Read the full application brief here.
