My home is my Egger and my warehouse is my castle

True to the motto “My home is my Egger and my warehouse is my castle” the METALAG WMS is now also in use at the new automated high rise racking store for private brewery Egger and Radlberger-Getränke!
 

Egger and Radlberger warehouse in Unterradlberg

At the end of March 2012 the newly constructed high rise racking store of the private brewery Egger and beverage specialists Radlberger went into operation in Unterradlberg near St. Pölten (A). The warehouse extension was a necessity due to both beverage companies’ extremely successful development. For this, METASYST Informatik provided their well established warehouse management software METALAG. “This project allows us to double our warehouse capacity, which means we are optimally equipped for even more growth in the future”, states Manfred Speiser, general manager for engineering, purchasing and logistics at Radlberger, “In cooperation with the brewery Egger we could draw on synergies and developed an efficient warehouse solution, opening up new potential for both companies.
 
Egger and Radlberger: Austrian companies with a long tradition
As part of the Egger consortium, which also comprises Radlberger and Egger Bier, the roots of Egger Bier reach back into the 17th century. In 1978 the private brewery Egger was newly constructed in Unterradlberg, in 1988 Radlberger was founded. Radlberger specialised itself on developing and producing soft drinks in PET-bottles. In addition to the brand Radlberger a host of other drinks are also produced in Unterradlberg. Overall about 200 million bottles in the sizes 0,33l, 0,5l, 1l, 1,5l and 2l are dispatched from the warehouse each year.
 
Logistical challenge: variety, quantity and inventory turnover rate
Per year Radlberger bottles around 250 different products in around 200 million bottles. “Variety, quantity and the continual turning of our warehouse demand a huge logistic performance” – this is how Manfred Speiser explains the complex requirements to warehousing. Over an area of 3.500 sqm and with a volume of 100.000 m³, the new high rise racking store offers space for 20.000 pallets. About 350 pallets per hour can be moved by altogether six racking cranes, 250 m worth of modern conveyor technology control the inner workings of the high rise racking store and makes for a quick handling of deliveries and dispatches. In the interests of securing quality, the IT system ensures that the products are fully tracked, starting with the raw material right up to the finished bottles.
 
METALAG WMS modernises the model company
The new automated high rise racking store is equipped with 6 aisles with double depth pallet storage. The warehouse management system METALAG manages around 19.000 pallet places on 13 levels. Several automated guided vehicle systems take over the pallets from the bottling lines of both companies and transport these onto the conveyor system for storage in the high rise racking store. 12 dispatch lines that automatically identify the codes on the dispatch pallets are on hand for delivering the products. Delivery pallets can be obtained from the manually managed warehouses, as well as from the automated high rise racking store. In order to control the warehouse management processes, the METALAG WMS was linked to the Radlberger ERP system and the viastore material flow calculator. In doing so, the METALAG stacker control and stacker commissioning system for Radlberger-Getränke and Egger-Bier, first introduced in March 2009, was augmented in March 2012 by functionality of management for automated trades. Thus the new warehouse management system completes the modernisation of this Lower Austrian model company.
 
METASYST Informatik GmbH
With many years of experience and over 200 successfully realised projects to look back on, METASYST is a reliable partner where effective logistics solutions are concerned. METALAG is a well engineered warehouse management, control and truck guidance system that caters to all needs in effective standard processes in warehouse logistics, as well as offering dynamic commissioning control. Manually organised warehouses are supported via mobile terminal applications (barcode, RFID, voice control), as well as warehouses with semi or fully automated warehouse management systems.