Last night we went out for dinner with an old army buddy who is up from the Natal Midlands on business this week. He is a shareholder in an online service provider company that has seen large growth over the last 5 years.
We meet up a few times a year, but stay in contact over the phone and we bounce ideas of each other. If one of us has a problem we will discuss the problem and find a solution and we know each others business inside out. Over the last 12 months they have added some large clients to their business and have out grown their current warehouse facilities.
What he asked me last night I was not expecting as he has asked me to help over see their move to another warehouse that has inside services that will save him having to invest in trucking, forklifts and whatever else is required. This will allow them to expand knowing they have back up within their new facility.
He knows my history having moved 3 warehouses before and why he has asked me to oversee this. Down time is the big problem and why it has to be done over a weekend so you are up and running ready for business for the Monday morning. I refused payment for my time and he said he will pay me what he thinks is fair as it is an entire weekend I am giving up. I guess that is right even though i could never ask him for payment as this is what we do for each other.
I will be visiting their warehouse either tomorrow or next week depending on my schedules as each day is different from the next and this will take a bit of time to plan. This is a big job and is not like moving house as this is on a much larger scale. All the information I have currently is they have 42 racks which is a number of truck trips just required for this and this to dismantle and reassemble would be a good 6 -8 hours work depending if they are the very tall ones which I have to presume they are.
Roughly 15 years ago I moved stock from one warehouse to another and even though we started at 6pm on Friday evening we were still working at 10pm Sunday night. That was a good lesson as I was one truck too short which cost me around 8 hours of lost time.
This move will be done in the first or second weekend in September so there is time to get prepared. The timing will also start at 6pm on Friday night and this time will try and be completed by Saturday night not leaving anything to chance as who knows what can go wrong. I day saved will be savings in the pocket as we do not want to keep staff working for 48 hours as this is tough going and tests your metal.
I need to count the number of pallets calculating time and distances between the old and new facility which will let me know the transportation required. A team is required to disassemble and assemble the racking on the new site before the palleted stock can move. I will use my guys for this as we have done this before and know what we need to do. This will be organised chaos for the first 12 hours and only then will it look more organised and will become easier the following day.