SUCCESS STORY
NORTHSHORE CARE SUPPLY
SUMMARY
Zebra Solutions Support
Move to Automation for
Customer
NorthShore Care Supply
Green Oaks, Illinois
Partner
Numina Group
Industry
Direct Fulfillment
Challenge
Scale operations to support larger order
volumes, new facilities, and streamlined
workflows, while ensuring more accurate
order fulfillment and higher customer
satisfaction.
Solution
• Real-time Distribution System
(RDS) Voice
• Zebra TC52 touch computer
• Zebra WT6000 wearable computer
• Zebra ring scanners
• Zebra headsets
Results
• 4X eff iciencies gained by fulfillment
employees
• Accelerated training and adoption
(minutes/hours vs. days of training)
• Improved customer experience due to
faster/more accurate deliveries
• Improved deployment speeds and
scalability
• Achieved cost efficiencies from
targeted technology deployments and
lower FTE headcount
Fast-Growing NorthShore
Care Supply
Medical Supply Company Leverages Zebra
Computing Solutions to Improve Scalability and
Customer Satisfaction
When providing specialty medical products direct to customers, there’s
no room for mistakes. If the wrong product is shipped or if an order
misses a carrier shipping window, it can cost customers their comfort
and dignity. For NorthShore Care Supply, it’s essential to leverage
technology solutions to help reduce human errors, ensure fast delivery,
and support scalability.
Adam Greenberg, President and Founder at NorthShore Care Supply,
founded the company nearly 20 years ago to restore dignity to its
customers by providing adult incontinence supplies online. Based
on what he’d seen among his own family members, Greenberg knew
customers needed reliable, high-quality products.
NorthShore has always been committed to doing its own fulfillment,
even as order volumes continue to grow beyond 1,500 daily.
With incontinence products—especially unique items, sizes, and
absorbencies customers can’t find in retail stores—NorthShore
has higher standards for fulfillment, providing tracking numbers
immediately, controlling shipping cutoffs, overseeing product
packaging, and adding sample and upsell items.
When the company began to outgrow its warehouse and started
construction on a larger one, its highly manual, paper-based picking
and packing processes were no longer scalable. Products of similar
size and weight were too often being mis-picked and getting past the
scales. Long-term warehouse staff who were experts on the products
were moving up in the company, and newer employees weren’t as
familiar with the inventory. At the same time, orders were increasing.
SUCCESS STORY
NORTHSHORE CARE SUPPLY
“A lot of our products look similar.
It’s easy to get products mixed up
unless you start using barcoding. It’s
upsetting to the customer if they don’t
get exactly the right size or style of
product that they were looking for.”
“A lot of our products look similar,” Greenberg says. “It’s easy to get
products mixed up unless you start using barcoding. It’s upsetting to the
customer if they don’t get exactly the right size or style of product that
they were looking for.”
To tackle these challenges, Northshore invested in a high-performance
automated pick, pack and ship order fulfillment solution to increase
productivity, order accuracy, and throughput. Northshore’s decision
to expand and enhance its operations came just in time—COVID-19
hit while its reduced staff was focused on the move to a larger facility,
and lockdown triggered a boom in sales that demanded operations be
ramped up immediately. The company turned to its long-time partners,
Zebra Technologies and Numina Group, to help improve picking
productivity, eliminate errors, and scale the new distribution center’s
throughput for business success.
Adam Greenberg, President and
Founder at NorthShore Care Supply
Scaling Up While Doubling Down on Automation
To meet the challenges of scaling to its new facility and growing
customer base, NorthShore worked with Zebra Solution Partner,
Numina Group to deploy its Real-time Distribution Software (RDS)
Voice Suite, a pick by voice and warehouse automation software
platform. Warehouse staff are directed through Zebra TC52 touch
computers, Zebra WT6000 wearable computers, and Zebra ring
scanners and headsets. The rugged arm-mounted computers keep
operators working hands-free and are designed for enterprise-class
durability, which increases uptime and productivity.
“We had to do more with technology to meet the demands of our
customers and our own high standards,” says Greenberg. “The Zebrabased solution Numina Group helped us formulate aligned with all of
our criteria for expanding, scaling, and modernizing our business.”
In earlier years, NorthShore’s only automation were kiosks on the
conveyor and the print-and-apply labeler. At its new distribution center,
the company is fully embracing automation. NorthShore implemented
a fleet of autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) that transport batch
order picking carts and voice-directs the pickers using headsets and
scanners to ensure operators spend their time picking instead of
pushing heavy carts around the warehouse and wasting time.
2
Batch order release is also automated. North Shore’s warehouse
management system sends the order data to RDS which determines
the most efficient group of orders for picking. RDS selects and assigns
a group of orders and a robot to a cart, and the robot then picks-up
and transports the cart to the first pick zone. Simultaneously RDS
directs the picker’s work task using the Zebra wearable computers to
synchronize people and robots in the picking process.
SUCCESS STORY
NORTHSHORE CARE SUPPLY
Numina Group has continued to optimize NorthShore’s RDS
application software, by adjusting the algorithms to increase the
operation’s efficiency. A small change in the batch order release
algorithm can make a large difference in driving picking efficiency and
AMR utilization. Numina Group’s ability to remotely support further
system optimization is appreciated by NorthShore.
“Numina Group has a deep understanding of warehouse processes
and its software ties together all of our processes throughout the
fulfillment operation, as well as our order management ERP software,”
Greenberg says. “Numina Group has tailored the middleware to
our needs, becoming the brains behind the operation and directing
everything.”
The Search for Solutions
When NorthShore began testing automation, its goals included
streamlining operations, implementing paperless processes, and
delivering high-quality items quickly and efficiently. The mix of
technologies it deployed helped ensure the company achieved
its goals.
Kiosks at packing stations were an excellent first step, but the
company and its partner saw many more opportunities to enhance
processes. Adding Zebra TC8000 touch computers enabled
NorthShore to build lists of items electronically that forklift operators
can scan and move for inventory, track and replenish.
NorthShore also completed an engineering study with Numina Group
to determine the wearable touch computers most suitable for the
company’s needs. The company required the solution to scale to
handle the next five-year growth, supporting double to triple the day
one order volume. Additionally, NorthShore wanted flexibility with its
voice-direction software to provide pickers with more capabilities to
increase efficiencies, improve fulfillment accuracy, and scale.
“We didn’t want to settle on the old-style devices that were heavy and
had small screens with limited functionality,” Greenberg says.
After testing a variety of barcode scanners for comfort and
functionality, NorthShore decided the TC52 and Zebra’s wireless ring
scanner was the best solution for its applications. Greenberg says the
pickers like the accuracy of the TC52 because it doesn’t accidentally
scan barcodes on the cart or bins so the pickers are getting the right
scan the first time.
3
SUCCESS STORY
NORTHSHORE CARE SUPPLY
Ready for Future Applications
Rather than having to triple check orders, pickers can now move
forward to the next item or order because they quickly hear and see
their work task instructions. The new process saves times and reduces
errors. Overall, NorthShore has seen up to a 4X boost in efficiency
across its fulfillment team as a result.
At the same time, new employees can be trained on the new platform
faster, adding to operational scalability. “The Android-based interface
and familiar form factor provides new employees lots of confidence,”
says Greenberg. “They can get up to speed in minutes or hours
instead of days or weeks.”
As NorthShore continues to scale and focus more on its own product
line, continuous improvements are planned to create efficiencies and
further streamline processes for continued operation success. Zebra
solutions will be central to fulfilling orders to NorthShore’s tens of
thousands of customers and supporting their applications, especially
as the company offers more products across new channels.
“At the same time, new employees
can be trained on the new platform
faster, adding to operational
scalability. The Android-based
interface and familiar form factor
provides new employees lots of
confidence. They can get up to
speed in minutes or hours instead
of days or weeks.”
Adam Greenberg, President and
Founder at NorthShore Care Supply
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