Dark Store Distribution

Location: UK-wide

Expertise Area: Distribution

DB3 have worked with a number of retailers on their distribution and logistic projects. with online shopping becoming increasingly popular, we have worked with ASDA and Morrisons on some Dark Store Distribution Centres (DSDC).

DSDCs, are specialised warehouses that have been designed to service online retail orders exclusively. The term “dark store” is used because they differ from standard brick and mortar retail stores in that they do not feature aisles, shelves, or product displays of any kind. Instead, DSDCs are designed with customer fulfillment in mind and contain tightly packed shelves and product racks that store items until they are ready to be picked and packed for shipping.

One advantage of DSDCs is that can be strategically placed closer to customer populations, allowing for shorter delivery times, a critical factor in terms of improving customer satisfaction and loyalty. The highly automated process, with robots and conveyor belts working in unison to pick and pack items, reduces labour costs and increases productivity.

DSDCs have the ability to carry a larger and more diverse inventory than traditional retail stores. Because space is not a concern, they can stock a wide range of items, including bulkier and heavier products that would be difficult to store in a traditional retail location.

INVER HOUSE DISTILLERIES Bonded Warehouse Facility

Location: Scotland

Expertise Area: Warehouse & Distribution

DB3 acted as Architect to support Inver House Distillers (IHD) in building 16 bonded warehouses and supporting infrastructure in phases across the site, to provide disgorging and blending facilities and a bottling plant.

Established in 1964, IHD began in the Lanarkshire town of Airdrie, building the Moffat whisky complex, located on the site of the derelict Moffat Mills paper mill, the complex included a malt whisky distillery called Glen Flagler, and a grain distillery known as Garnheath.

Two years later in 1966, a large bottling plant was opened on the Airdrie site, which also housed Moffat maltings, at one time, the largest maltings in Europe.

Following a number of acquisitions and disposals, and corresponding expansions and reductions of operations, as well as transfers of ownership, Whisky distilling returned to the site in 1989. To avoid confusion with the nearby Knockando distillery, the management team that purchased and expanded the operations, re-branded the whisky anCnoc after the local hill.

The site masterplan sought to continue the development of IHD, building on their history and sustainable business development.

Ancillary activity and structures included a gatehouse, office accommodation, barrel-storage, storage tanks, vehicle parking and staff/visitor parking.

The development comprises of

ƒ 16 bonded warehouses each being 32m in length x 28m in width x 12m in height, designed solely to accommodate the storage of whisky in barrels

ƒ Disgorging plant and associated external tank farm, where the whisky barrels are emptied (disgorged), with the contents being sent to the bottling plant for bottling and despatch, and the empty barrels being refilled and put back into the bonds for maturation

ƒ A bottling / cased goods plant with associated office and staff welfare accommodation

ƒ Staff and visitor car parking that will provide ultimately 92 car spaces

ƒ Internal service, access and fire access roadways with associated drainage infrastructure

ƒ Security gatehouse, security gateway and weighbridge

ƒ Extensive site investigations and ecological surveys to ensure proposals protect and enhance the natural environment.

ƒ Associated landscaping

ƒ Tree Loss Mitigation - In recognition of tree loss within site boundary, Landscape Architects were commissioned to prepare a tree planting strategy on adjacent site owned by IHD

ƒ SuDS (Sustainable Drainage Systems) to facilitate natural drainage, infiltration, attenuation and passive treatment

Walkers

Distribution Centre

Location: Peterlee, County Durham

Expertise: Distribution

High-bay Warehouse at Walkers Snack Foods (Distribution) Ltd. This project allowed the business to optimise its supply chain and increase the local storage capacity within its logistics network. The phased investment proposal was for a new automated storage warehouse built to the rear of the existing distribution centre followed by a new first floor office extension over the existing warehouse offices providing training rooms, meeting rooms and IT rooms.

The building is required to hold an increasing production volume and growing variety of product ranges. This is a highly automated warehouse with a capability to hold a further 9,500 pallets of product ready for sorting, order picking and delivery to our customers.

This initiative reduces inefficient vehicle movements between our existing Distribution Centres and the periodic requirement for off site third party storage and the associated intermediate vehicle movements.

Several options were considered to make this significant investment either at Peterlee, at one of their other sites or even at a new location, but after careful analysis they proposed to expand the Peterlee Regional Distribution Centre site.

Detailed consultation and planning carefully developed our proposal that created a state of the art logistics facility, taking full advantage of modern technology and operating methods to minimise the environmental impact both locally and nationally.