What does the 'average' warehouse look like? Well, it is just under 240,000 square feet, has about  150 employees, ships more than half a million orders each year and handles more than 50,000 stock keeping units. These statistics come courtesy of a recent benchmarking survey conducted by the Logistics Institute at Georgia Tech and the Warehousing Education and Research Council.

The survey, designed and compiled by Dr. Ed Frazelle of Georgia Tech, includes data from over 120 corporations and 220 warehouse operations. Among the findings, more than 95% of  respondents say they house finished goods in their facilities, while less than 4% hold raw materials and less than 1% store work-in-process.

The average warehouse is also 82% full during normal periods and 96% of the available space is taken during peak inventory times.

Measurements are also important to success within the warehouse. Greater productivity is found in facilities that use more than six metrics to measure tasks such as cases, lines, pallets, pieces or pounds handled per labor hour. Responding facilities also ship on average 100 cases per labor hour.

Keeping workers happy is also important, with the average facility facing an employee turnover rate of 15%. It is no surprise that those facilities that experience low turnover have higher rates of quality processing. Paying workers above average wages also contributes to quality.

That report also profiled the 'perfect warehouse.' As the artwork shows, the profile is more than just warehouse size and activity levels but work force and market accessibility issues too.