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Today’s warehouses use more space and deal with more diverse products and product lines than ever before. Getty Images532775917 In 2018, commercial real-estate firm CBRE reported that for every $1 billion increase in e-commerce sales, an estimated 1.25 million square feet of warehouse space was needed to keep pace with demand. CBRE predicted that e-commerce-generated warehouse demand could grow by an additional 191.2 million square feet from 2018 to 2020. However, it is not e-commerce alone that is generating increases in warehouse space and operations. So, too, are increases in product diversity and SKUs that warehouses must track. These SKU numbers are unique to each store, or customer, of the warehouse—and they are exponentially multiplying as new product lines and product variations come online to satisfy the demands of a market where customers want more product differentiation and variety. In this highly dynamic environment, warehouse systems and managers must be able to track inventory from time of arrival to time of disbursement. This includes every move of inventory that occurs on the warehouse floor—and can extend to track and trace visibility of merchandise that is being transported from the warehouse to final destinations. To monitor these variegated product and warehouse demands, new developments in barcoding, packaging and tracking have gained traction in 2019 and will be critical to the success of warehouses as we head into 2020. Here are the key technology innovations that have occurred in barcoding, packaging and transportation, and that have the ability to take warehouse efficiency and performance to new levels. Barcoding and Scanning There is a plethora of barcoding, QR (quick response) coding and RFID (radio frequency identification) solutions available today that can be adopted in warehouses, depending on the types of food and beverage goods a warehouse stores and processes. A single barcode […]