That’s what consultant Jim Apple of the Progress Group asked at the recent Marc Systems users’ group meeting. To begin, profile historical demand patterns in the warehouse. "Now comes the hard part – predicting the future. Unfortunately, there’s too much discontinuity to simply extrapolate from the past," says Apple.

When selecting creative handling alternatives, think units not orders. "If you do that then you can treat each unit as if it is an order for maximum flexibility," adds Apple. Then it’s time to decide what the peak capacity should be for primary materials handling processes or if there is a need for temporary supplemental processes too.

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