One of the biggest challenges facing Unilever HPC, the home and personal care products giant created from the merger of Lever Brothers, Cheesebrough-Ponds, and Helene Curtis, was how to integrate three distinct distribution networks. The solution: a unified network of five super-regional, distribution facilities totaling 4,865,630 square feet.

Forty percent of the initiative, which was announced last summer by Unilever and ProLogis, a provider of distribution facilities and services, is now in place. When completed later this year, it will enable Unilever to ship products to customers throughout North America in one day, a 15 percent improvement in efficiency. Unilever also expects to realize 7 percent savings in transportation, administrative, and facility costs.

Two of the five facilities are already in operation. In Palmetto, Ga., a 600,000 square foot facility distributes products to southeastern retail outlets. The one million square foot facility in Carlisle, Penn. distributes product to retail outlets throughout the mid-Atlantic and Northeast. The remaining facilities in Illinois, Texas and California are scheduled to open later this year.