- Carton flow retrofit into existing racking
- 20 single bays plus 37 double-wide back-to-back bays
- 5 levels per side, 9 ft. wide bays, back-to-back rows at 99 in. total depth
- Frames approximately 40 ft. tall, legacy cubic profile
- Former Fortune 500 company warehouse warehouse, Brantford, Ontario
- 1,500 new pick faces created
- 96,310 sq. ft.
- April 1 order – July installation
A Legacy Facility with a Peak-Season Deadline
Calendar Club operates an intense five-week selling season, roughly November through mid-December, then goes quiet for the rest of the year. After relocating into a large former warehouse in Brantford, they inherited very tall legacy racking built on an obsolete cubic profile, a style that is no longer manufactured and difficult to source components for. They needed carton flow to move a high volume of uniform calendar cartons quickly during peak, retrofitted into the existing frames rather than starting over. Carton flow is unforgiving in a retrofit: the tracks have to be designed to exact rack measurements, and the cubic frames did not match the standard hardware most carton flow products are built around.
A Hybrid Carton Flow System with an Engineered Fit
3D assessed the facility and presented options rather than a single product. The standout move was sourcing carton flow two ways. One of the carton flow products mounts onto existing beams and is widespread throughout North America. Another product, which is less common, ships with its own integrated frame that bolts directly into the frame line and runs roughly at half the cost.
This second product was not on the customer’s radar; 3D introduced it through their own industry connections. The final layout combined both: a single-bay run of one style where it fit best, and 37 double-wide back-to-back bays of the less expensive carton flow across the main rows, five levels per side. Because the frames were cubic rather than standard, 3D specified custom hardware so the carton flow would seat correctly and designed the system from AutoCAD drawings so the tracks fit the existing rack precisely. An engineer reviewed and certified the completed carton flow installation for load through a PSR document.
Cost Savings and A Better Solution
This is the integrator story in its clearest form. Most suppliers would have quoted carton flow through their normal single channel. Because 3D could draw on deep industry relationships, including firsthand Interroll experience on the team, it surfaced a product the customer did not know existed and combined sources to fit both the budget and the building. The result was a significant cost savings and a better overall outcome.
“Our job wasn’t to sell them a product. It was to get them ready for a five-week season without overspending to do it. We found an option that wasn’t on their radar and built the system around what the space and the budget actually allowed.” said Chase Anderson, Technical Sales Representative, 3D Storage Solutions.
The outcome
Calendar Club now has a precise, engineer-certified carton flow system retrofitted into a legacy facility, built to handle uniform cartons at speed, and delivered at roughly half what a single-source approach would have cost. 3D helped Calendar Club convert an area that had 114 SKUs into an area that offered almost 1,500 SKUs, thereby significantly improving picking efficiency.
