The intralogistics group Mecalux has installed PepsiCo’s first automated warehouse in Poland. The leading global food and beverage company has operated along the Vistula River since the 1970s, opening its first factory in Michrów in 1991. With 9,000 locations for finished goods, this space is part of the Środa Śląska factory. The plant — the multinational’s most sustainable in Europe — is responsible for distributing thousands of pallets of potatoes daily.
Credit: MECALUX, S.A.
The facilities, which cover an area the size of seven football pitches, “produce bags of potato crisps and other snacks for the European market, primarily Germany,” says PepsiCo. Every year, Środa Śląska receives 60,000 tonnes of potatoes to manufacture Lay’s and 15,000 tonnes of corn to make Doritos crisps.
PepsiCo meets its high production levels with Mecalux’s automated warehouse. The facility receives goods through new electric monorail and conveyor systems for pallets, executing thousands of movements continuously every day. These solutions are helping to optimise PepsiCo’s supply chain overall; the multinational also recently relied on Mecalux to equip its plant in Veurne (Belgium), one of the largest in Europe.
Additionally, PepsiCo will implement Mecalux’s Easy WMS warehouse management system to control inventory status in real time. This software will be integrated with PepsiCo’s ERP system to ensure that operations run smoothly, coordinating flows of goods from production until they are prepared for distribution to clients. “The production process is fully integrated with the automated warehouse. This means each bag of potato crisps is automatically transferred from production to picking, palletising and loading onto the lorry,” says Maciej Pietrusa, Warehouse Manager for PepsiCo Poland in Środa Śląska.