Customers
"Kiva provides
world-class eCommerce fulfillment operations right out of the box,"
said John James, CEO and co-founder of Acumen Brands. "The Kiva
warehouse automation solution is the only way we found that would
enable us to build our company quickly, yet preserve the
flexibility we need for an unpredictable future. It speeds our
transformation from an emerging player into a leading internet
retailer."
Boston Scientific Corporation chose Kiva to automate
two key distribution centers in the United States and Europe. The
medical device manufacturer was seeking a
warehouse automation solution that would help ensure maximum
reliability while maintaining rigorous product and inventory
control.
"Other material handling approaches would have required us to
integrate different technologies to handle units, cases and
pallets, as well as a wide range of product sizes," said Ken Pucel,
Executive Vice President, Operations at Boston Scientific. "Kiva is
able to provide us a proven solution with the flexibility and
ease-of-use of a single technology for our needs."
Crate
and Barrel purchased a Kiva system for its Tracy, Calif.
Distribution Complex (DC). The Tracy DC fulfills direct-to-consumer
orders and improves service levels in thirteen western states. This
Crate and Barrel DC is the largest industrial facility in the
country to achieve Gold designation from the U.S. Green Building
Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®)
certification program.
"Our customers expect to get great value and service from Crate
and Barrel, but they also care about our carbon footprint. This
played a role in our selection of Kiva Systems," said John Ling,
Vice President of Supply Chain Management and Logistics at Crate
and Barrel. "Kiva's mobile robotic approach is not only the most
cost-effective way to automate pick, pack and ship operations, but
also the greenest. The robots themselves are energy efficient, plus
the entire robot zone can be operated with almost no lighting."
Established in 1990,
Dansko has been a leader in providing all day comfort footwear,
socks and healthcare apparel while standing at the forefront of
ethical business practices. The new Dansko DC will use Kiva's
innovative mobile-robotic solution to fill orders including shoes,
boots, sandals, socks and healthcare apparel for shipment to more
than 2,500 premium U.S. and international retail locations.
"At Dansko, the relationships we have with our retail partners are
an essential element of our success, so Kiva's exceptional order
accuracy was an important factor in our decision, said Peter
Kjellerup, co-founder of Dansko. "We were equally impressed
with how flexible Kiva is which means that as our company continues
to grow, our automation can easily expand with us - without having
to worry about overhauling the system in five or 10 years. We're
excited to break new ground not only with our new DC but also with
our new mobile-robotic fulfillment solution from Kiva."
"The Kiva solution offers compelling advantages for our operations
and our customers," said Scott Hilton, Executive Vice President of
Operations, Diapers.com. "Our adoption of Kiva throughout our
distribution network reflects our confidence that it will
substantially increase employee productivity while providing the
flexibility to efficiently support our extremely rapid growth. Our
Kiva-based fulfillment platform will be the foundation for
continued expansion in both order volume and SKU count over the
coming years while maintaining our fast, free shipping for our
customers."
Dillard's,
Inc. ranks among the nation's largest fashion apparel, cosmetics
and home furnishings retailers with annual revenues exceeding $6.2
Billion. "The enhancement of the online shopping experience at
dillards.com was a major focus of our efforts in 2011. We developed
a fulfillment center that can expand with increased sales and
support the wide variety of merchandise we offer online," said
Dillard's President Alex Dillard. "We chose Kiva because we want
our customers to have the same gratifying experience with our
online store as they do when making an in-store purchase. Kiva is
ideal for us because it can easily expand and adapt to changing
merchandise as we introduce new products to our online store."
DJO, a global provider of
medical devices that provide solutions for musculoskeletal health,
vascular health, and pain management, deployed Kiva's Mobile
Fulfillment System for split-case picking and order assembly of
large and small items. Kiva offers a DC automation solution that
enables DJO to nearly double the capacity of its current
facility.
"We require our investments in automation to quickly generate
returns for the company and we are particularly pleased with the
strategic flexibility of the Kiva solution," said Luke Faulstick,
DJO's Executive Vice President and COO. "With our rate of growth,
Kiva's scalability allows us to purchase what we need today and
easily expand the system later."
"The Kiva automation solution will enable us to handle a wide
variety of products in a very efficient manner. This highly
accurate, one step order fulfillment process easily integrates with
our existing technology," said Jon Axelsson, vice president of
supply chain, drugstore.com. "We considered more traditional
material handling options, but we were impressed by this system's
unique abilities. As we continue to expand operations, these units
can scale to accommodate growth and also easily relocate to support
the needs of the supply chain. When you compare Kiva's rapid order
processing and ability to handle diverse merchandise to other
alternatives, Kiva is the clear choice for our business."
Follett Higher
Education Group (FHEG) implemented a Kiva system to meet the
challenges of a rapidly changing textbook market and to accelerate
its eCommerce growth. The company uses Kiva to store
and process orders for the largest pre-owned textbook
inventory in the USA. Follett consolidated both its
wholesale used book and direct-to-consumer warehouses in a single
Kiva-enabled distribution and fulfillment center, to better serve
customers and meet the demands of continued growth.
Being in the academic market, we have two significant seasonal
peaks each year," said Fred Weber, senior vice president of
distribution and wholesale services, FHEG. "In the past, we haven't
been able to turn around the books we buy in December fast enough
to meet January's demand. Kiva increases our efficiency and
productivity to reduce our backlog by 200 percent. This, combined
with the flexibility to increase capacity as our business grows,
made Kiva the clear and best choice for our business."
Gap Inc. Direct installed
the Kiva
Mobile Fulfillment System to support its growing e-commerce
business. Gap Inc. Direct, a division of Gap Inc., sells clothing,
shoes, handbags and accessories from Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic
and Piperlime.
"We are constantly looking for ways to improve the quality and
efficiency of our fulfillment processes," said Toby Lenk, President
of Gap Inc. Direct. "Implementing this new technology offers
important benefits as we scale our business for growth. It allows
us to expand capacity in line with demand, reduce costs, and frees
our distribution staff to focus on accuracy and productivity."
Gilt Groupe
provides instant insider access to today's top designer labels, at
up to 60% off retail. All sales take place only on
www.gilt.com and the full collection of merchandise is always
available at the start of the sale.
"Kiva allows us to handle a broad spectrum of constantly
changing merchandise and process orders in as little as 15 minutes
from the time a customer completes their online experience," said
Christopher Halkyard, Vice President of Operations, Gilt Groupe.
"Kiva offers Gilt a flexible and productive solution so we are able
to expand as needed."
The new
facility represents a complete integration of Office Depot's supply
chain - allowing the Company to service both its North American
Retail stores and Business Solutions Division customers from one
building. The combination facility features one of the largest
implementations of the state-of-the-art mobile robotic picking and
sorting solution from Kiva Systems. This new combination approach
will allow Office Depot to support its growing business, optimize
total supply chain expenses and utilize inventory more efficiently,
while maintaining service levels and next-day delivery.
Quiet
Logistics, an innovative third party logistics (3PL) provider, uses
the Kiva solution to deliver order fulfillment, returns processing
and value-added services for a wide spectrum of customers.
"We have been implementing warehousing technology for over
twenty years, and Kiva has the only practical automated solution
that supports the diversity of pick-pack-ship operations we run,"
said Bruce Welty, Founder and CEO of Quiet Logistics. "Kiva is the
first automation approach we'd be willing to bet our business on.
Kiva's innovation immediately cuts hard costs, increases throughput
and improves service levels to give us, and more importantly, our
customers a tremendous competitive advantage."
Saks Incorporated
purchased a Kiva system for its Aberdeen, Maryland distribution
center. This kicks-off a Saks initiative to convert its fulfillment
center for online and store replenishment orders from manual to
automated operations, based on the Kiva Mobile-robotic Fulfillment
System.
"Given the growth of our Saks Direct business, and our need to
support critical store initiatives, this the right time for us to
invest in automation," said Michael Rodgers, Executive Vice
President of Service Operations and CIO at Saks Incorporated. "The
Kiva solution is a terrific option that can more than double
productivity of our operations while also offering the flexibility
we need to support our multichannel, multibrand fulfillment
strategy well into the future."
"Kiva's solution solves many
fulfillment center design challenges simultaneously, said Larry
Plourde, Director of Fulfillment Center Operations and Logistic
Systems at Staples. Using one simple system, they've achieved
infinite pick-face density with zero walking, concurrent picking
and replenishment, pick-to-light across all product velocities, for
real-time order processing with cycle time in minutes, and zero
location profiling or re-slotting."
"The Kiva system we've deployed in Chambersburg has impressed us
with both its speed and flexibility, but above all, it's the most
cost effective solution we have found when it comes to split-case
order fulfillment," said Don Ralph, Senior Vice President of
Logistics Operations for Staples North American Delivery, Staples,
Inc.
"This building has the best quality metric of all the buildings
across the network …We did an annual inventory and from a
substantial amount of sales - we had less than a $250 variance for
the year, " said Dave Carr, Fulfillment Center Manager, Staples,
Inc. "The selection of the (Kiva) technology was for various
reasons one is customer satisfaction - delivering the perfect order
correct, complete, on-time. Second is flexibility - the ability to
add on to the system at any given time... Kiva can grow as our
business grows."
"Our previous warehouse was built around a cross-belt
sorter, but increased flexibility was required to manage multiple
workflows efficiently," said David Rupert, Senior Manager of
Engineering at Timberland. "On any given day, we have vast order
combinations of footwear, apparel and accessories headed out the
door to wholesalers, retailers or directly to the consumer. With
Kiva, customer specific packing requirements can move quickly and
easily through a single system with greater inventory control and
productivity reporting."
"At Timberland we treat each order, whether it is pallets of cargo
pants or a single pair of our classic boat shoes, as if it's going
directly into our customer's hands," said Mark van Onna, Director
of European Distribution Center at Timberland. "Kiva's unparalleled
order-accuracy means that every order filled meets our highest
standard."
"As more consumers enjoy the simplicity and ease of
online shopping, Toys 'R' Us continues to invest in e-commerce
enhancements to advance customer service and satisfaction across
all shopping channels," says CEO Jerry Storch. "We believe the
facility will play an important role in further accelerating our
company's online business growth and order fulfillment." With the
Kiva solution for pick, pack and ship, Toys 'R' Us will be able to
process and ship most e-commerce orders in the western U.S. in
about two business days, the retailer says. (Source:
InternetRetailer.com, April 20, 2011)
Von Maur Incorporated
purchased a Kiva Mobile-robotic Fulfillment System for its
Davenport, Iowa distribution center to extend its legendary upscale
customer experience to its fast-growing online store. The Kiva
System is used to fulfill orders for its entire Internet retail
operation.
"With Kiva Systems, Von Maur takes the truly unique customer
experience that our customers have grown to appreciate in our
stores and extends it to our online business," said Melody
Westendorf, chief operating officer. "We considered manual
processes and conveyor automation, but only a Kiva system delivers
the ultra-fast cycle time that our customers want and the accuracy
that they expect, along with a process that ensures that they are
never disappointed by stock-outs. And only Kiva offers the
flexibility we need to adapt to fast changes in our
marketplace."
Kiva
exceeded pick rate, quality, cycle time, tote utilization,
installation, training and operating expectations while deploying a
major material handling system within four months of contract
execution. Walgreens initially chose the Kiva Mobile Fulfillment
System for its speed, accuracy and flexibility, all of which are
critical to the company's expansion. Productivity metrics from the
initial Kiva deployment far exceeded project specifications, with
output per worker increasing to almost three times previous levels.
More extraordinary is the fact that these numbers are being hit at
full throughput so soon after system go-live.
"We moved forward with the installation of this system because
we were interested in meeting needs from our continued store growth
and the need to continue expanding our distribution capacity to
support this growth. We ...handle more merchandise with the same
amount of staff as a result of the improved efficiency levels. We
see a flexibility and scalability…that makes the system easy to
expand if business conditions demand more capacity." Michael
Polzin, Walgreens.