SSI Unmatched Partnerships

With over 40 years as a distributor of new and used warehouse equipment, we have worked with an untold number of manufacturing partnerships. Our integrated service and supply approach allows us to work with businesses at all supply chain stages. Many of these partners have been around for a long time, working with us on hundreds of projects worldwide. Together, we have built a relationship based on trust, loyalty, and mutual success.

The result of that trust and loyalty gives us one of our signature “difference makers”: A dedicated production capacity program. There will usually be hurdles to overcome in any project, but this program is designed to help our clients hedge against fluctuating lead times when an order is needed ASAP.

About Dedicated Production Capacity Partnerships

Because we are the largest purchaser of pallet racking for resale in North America, we have established foundational relationships with various manufacturers for all types of warehouse equipment. Essentially, we have partners in which manufacturers guarantee us a certain percentage of their monthly production capacity to help fulfill the volume of orders we place with them.

With the dedicated production capacity from our manufacturer partners, we can take advantage of better-than-market lead times. Our project managers are often in contact with these manufacturers and can get a good sense of their timelines quickly.

For example, when some manufacturers are working on a timeline that may be 8-to-10 weeks out, we can often leverage our orders to fit a 5-to-6-week schedule using our dedicated production capacity. That difference cuts your wait time almost in half, helping keep your project on track or getting it started sooner. For us, it is all about finding ways to maintain command and control over your project timeline, even as unforeseen variables appear.

We can also use these expedited timelines to balance multiple manufacturing partners to help us strategically source material closer to your job site, reducing freight costs and overall project costs.

This “difference maker” is an example of how we see ourselves as a trusted partner for you from start to finish of your project.

Simple. Smart Strategic.

If your team has an upcoming distribution facility to design, relocate, or reconfigure, give us a call. Our experts have years of experience in these build-outs and have the expertise to navigate the ups and downs of major construction projects. If things go awry during the process, we have partnerships at the ready to assist in keeping your project on time and budget.

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On-Demand Automation Intro Blog

On-Demand Automation may be a foreign term to warehouse managers who look at the prospect of introducing automation as an insurmountable hurdle in their warehouse operations. Those decision-makers are hesitant to learn about implementation because they see the idea as too costly, too distracting, and too steep of a learning curve.

“It will take too many resources. I will never get a return on my investment. I’ll have to reconfigure my entire operation.”

These are all misconceptions, especially by introducing on-demand automation.

In short, on-demand automation allows warehouses to introduce technology into any facility, as is, at any scale, without installing IT systems, and with the flexibility to change at any time. Fetch Robotics, a pioneer of on-demand automation offers software that works with a line of autonomous mobile robots that increases productivity with a return on investment in under two years for most applications.

On-demand automation is the perfect way to introduce automation into your operation, earning ROI while providing evidence for buy-in from stakeholders for further investment into automation.

Why Introduce On-Demand Automation?

  • Deploy AMRs in hours: In the past, automation brought long lead times, engineering, and installation requirements. With on-demand automation, we can create virtual conveyors or transport maps in just hours using cloud-based software.
  • No facility reconfiguration: Most automation solutions require changes to your facility, including floor space, layout, and storage mediums, to work with the system. However, on-demand automation solutions work with your existing floorplan and can independently navigate without modifying anything.
  • No additional IT systems: Because on-demand solutions use cloud-based software like FetchCore, they can work with or without Warehouse Management systems. That flexibility means AMRs are ready to go no matter your operating system.
  • Scalability: Once you go with on-demand automation, you can add to your robot fleet without adding infrastructure. So, you can continue to easily add AMRs as needed without investing in costly automation systems.
  • Flexibility: Consumer demand is changing rapidly, so warehouse managers need to be adaptable. On-demand solutions are not limited to a single-function workflow. Modifications can be made on the cloud-based platform and pushed to the robot in just a few clicks.
  • Data, data, data: On-demand automation software collects data from robots, equipment, systems, and devices across all facility operations, giving you actionable insights into how your warehouse operates.

If you are interested in automation but just not sure how to get started, we will help. Our Solutions Development team is prepared to answer any questions or misconceptions you may have about introducing automation into your operations. It may not be as difficult or costly as you think, with a return on investment quicker than you may realize.