Beyond the Bean - Warehouse Capacity and Productivity Case Study
Company and Project Background
Beyond the Bean is an independent business located in Bristol, specialised in manufacturing and supplying products to the café bar and food service industries. They offer a wide range of products, including smoothies, syrups, cookies, toppings, hot chocolate and equipment.
As the company continued to develop new products, the need for an efficient warehouse operation became crucial to receive, store, pick and despatch these goods. Beyond the Bean manufactures its syrup range in an adjacent facility, which has resulted in increased stock levels to accommodate economically sensible batch sizes.
Objectives of the Project
Due to business growth and range expansion, the warehouse operation at Beyond the Bean was under pressure. The company sought external support from The Supply Chain Consulting Group (SCCG) to conduct a comprehensive warehouse review. The objectives of the project were to analyse the product range, recommend appropriate storage media and layout options, maximise space utilisation and determine storage and throughput capacities.
Initial Situation and Challenges
The existing warehouse layout used wide-aisle pallet racking with a large area of clear floor space for marshalling. However, this setup was no longer optimised to accommodate Beyond the Bean’s growing business needs and expanding product range. Additionally, the existing system required gap analysis to identify areas that needed reconfiguration or improvement to align with best-practice processes.
Solutions
SCCG addressed the challenges and achieved the project objectives through a strategic and design phase, followed by an implementation phase. The consultants then conducted an operational and capacity review, analysing current activity data and applying growth projections. Various design options for the Distribution Centre were developed and modelled, including equipment, layout considerations and process enhancements.
A collaborative design workshop resulted in finalised CAD layouts, accompanied by a comprehensive report explaining recommendations. Material flow analysis was conducted to optimise space utilisation and gaps in the existing system capabilities were identified.
Conclusions
The project delivered significant improvements to Beyond the Bean’s warehouse capacity, productivity and efficiency. By optimising storage and picking efficiency, the redesigned operation effectively accommodated the company’s current and projected growth. The recommendations, including layout changes, process improvements and system enhancements, provided a roadmap for the company’s expansion plans.
