ITALIAN BOOK WHOLESALER TURNS TO AUTOMATION WITH TGW LOGISTICS

TGW Logistics has constructed a highly automated fulfillment center for the Messaggerie Libri book wholesaler in the northern Italian municipality of Stradella. The innovative solution has already celebrated its go-live and is one of the most advanced intralogistics systems for books in Europe. This plant allows Messaggerie Libri not only to speed up its deliveries but also to improve its efficiency in processing orders and in return handling.

Messaggerie Libri is the largest book distributor in Italy. The company was established in 1914 and delivers about 50 million titles to 4000 sales points such as book retailers and stationaries every year. Together with Ceva Logistics, a third-party specialist, Messaggerie Libri has founded the C&M Book Logistics joint venture, which is in charge of the everyday operations of the distribution center in Stradella. As part of a strategic partnership, the two companies will closely collaborate for the next twelve years.

»CITY OF BOOKS« AS A HIGHLY EFFICIENT SHIPPING HUB

Messaggerie Libri has invested a total of more than 40 million euros in this plant, which measures 80,000 m² and is called the »city of books«. A FlashPick®-System with a 14-aisle shuttle warehouse of about 330,000 storage positions is the centerpiece. Thanks to triple-deep storage and the option of stacking containers, the provided surface area can be used optimally.

Orders arrive at 32 ergonomic PickCenter One workstations. The functional areas of the plant are connected by eight kilometers of energy efficient KingDrive® conveyor systems. The TGW Warehouse Software, which is linked to the customer's SAP ERP system, is in charge of the control system.

FLEXIBLE ORDER FULFILLMENT AND RETURN HANDLING

Thanks to the PickCenter One workstations, Messaggerie Libri can switch easily between order processing and return handling – and achieve minimum error rates while maximising commissioning throughput. Fast-moving items are manually picked from pallets. All other items arrive at the PickCenter workstations. Orders are first consolidated in the shuttle buffer before robots automatically group them to pallets.

»Messaggerie Libri can optimize its order processing by means of this highly automated solution and benefits from faster delivery and increased efficiency,« explains Matteo Righini, Managing Director of TGW Italy. »We are highly pleased to have gained the customer's trust and to have won them over in a highly competitive environment.«