What keeps you up at night? If you're like the rest of us, there are plenty of opportunities these days to have your REM sleep interrupted.

For our cover man, Tim Beauchamp of Corporate Express, one of his concerns not long ago was making best use of a new distribution center. He had his hands full condensing three DCs into one, and wasn't willing to squander any resources, even in the dead of night.

One opportunity was to have a combined receiving/shipping area. "The receiving area would have sat empty during the night," Beauchamp explains, "so we thought, 'How can we best use it."

Unfortunately, receiving is done with lift trucks and shipping with conveyors. The solution is to raise and lower conveyor spurs when needed using hoists. That's just one of the reasons that costs have been reduced, labor saved and throughput increased (See Door to desk delivery ).

Restless sleep has also paid off for our Productivity Award winners. Every Warehouse of the Month and Manufacturing Spotlight story in 2002 was a candidate, so the competition was tough. The winners are: General Motors Lansing Grand River in Manufacturing; Magid Glove & Safety in Warehousing, and; Rite Aid in Distribution . MMH congratulates all three for their outstanding achievements.

At the new Rite Aid DC on the edge of the Mojave Desert, pick-to-light, carousels, conveyors and sorters figure prominently. But as Mark Gullo, project manager, says, "It's not just the materials handling equipment though, it's how you use it. We have gotten about 36% more productivity within the first year by using it better."

Magid Glove, on the other hand, passed on building a new DC, instead, converting its multi-floor manufacturing facility into a multi-floor warehouse. "New buildings might be an easy answer, but they may not be the best. Old buildings can work well too," says Greg Cohen, operations manager.

GM also went new with Cadillac, building its first U.S. facility from the ground up since the late '80s. "We took everything available to GM and ended up with Lansing Grand River," says Patricia Groeneveld, material director.

By the way, winners of these awards are determined by our Editorial Advisory Board. Bruce Wise, one of the original members of the Board, retired at the end of 2002, and is leaving the group. I thank him for his constructive input and guidance over the years. It has been much appreciated.

Meanwhile, the Board has two new members—John Hill, a partner at the consulting firm eSync, and Larry Strecker, senior vice president of international operations and supply chain at Payless ShoeSource. I look forward to their new involvement with MMH.