Prime Vision robots help Babydump take first steps in automated order picking
With 134 million babies born globally in 20231 , demand for baby products is high . This birth rate , combined with the rise of e-commerce , has forced suppliers to rapidly expand . To alleviate its growing pains , Babydump , a leading European retailer of baby products , automated its order picking operations at Sint-Oedenrode in the Netherlands to increase throughput and sustainability . For efficiently moving orders through the facility , it relies on 12 autonomous guided robots ( AGRs ) from Prime Vision .
A baby boom for business
Babydump is part of the FTH group and was founded in the 1970s as a retailer of baby products . It ’ s now market leader in its segment with a thriving online operation and 14 stores throughout the Netherlands and Belgium . The business offers baby rooms , prams , car seats , buggies , high chairs , baby clothing and many more baby essentials .
Experiencing rapid growth and looking to meet new environmental legislation , Babydump searched for ways to improve the efficiency and sustainability of its order picking operations . At its site in Sint- Oedenrode , online orders and stock deliveries for its stores were picked manually by employees .
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Optimising picking and packaging
Having reached the limits of this set up , Babydump installed an automatic storage and retrieval system ( ASRS ) from Autostore to streamline the process . The ASRS holds 15,000 crates containing specific items . Instead of employees travelling along the racks , the system delivers the correct items for each order directly to a picking station , allowing workers to easily pack products .
With regards to sustainability , Babydump worked on optimising its packaging . Instead of relying
Babydump , a leading European retailer of baby products , automated its order picking operations at Sint-Oedenrode in the Netherlands to increase throughput and sustainability .
Prime Vision robots have a 35 kg carrying capacity and a 50 x 70cm loading surface , ready to carry a wide variety of boxes .
on standard box sizes that rarely matched the volume of the shipment , the company purchased two box erector machines . These produce two different types of boxes , which once packed by employees at the picking station , are cut to the exact size of the order and fitted with a lid by box closing machines . This minimises wasted space and improves sustainability . The order then travels via chutes to the conveyors , which sort it for dispatch to a particular store , route or delivery service .
Robots connect the dots
However , the success of the system relied on efficiently moving boxes between all the different machines , picking stations , conveyors and chutes . There were other complications too . Beyond the ASRS , prams and other nonmachinable products that can ’ t be handled by automation needed to be accommodated in a different process flow . Furthermore , the facility handles both online and store orders . Supporting 14 physical locations as well as e-commerce customers added more complexity . Clearly , static conveyors would