Feed My People Warehouse Layout
Introduction
Feed My People Food Bank is a non-profit organization dedicated to preventing hunger. In 2017, the food bank distributed over 7.5 million pounds of food to over 125 hunger-relief agencies. Over 70,000 individuals living in a14 county service area (including 25,000 children) relied on food supplied by Feed My People.
Since 1982 Feed My People Food Bank has been concerned with hunger, rescuing food before it is wasted and distributing it to people who need it most. As a food bank, Feed My People Food Bank is a crucial link between food manufacturers, suppliers, and food assistance programs. The large warehouse, complete with freezer and cooler space, allows storage vast quantities of food for distribution among partners (including Stepping Stones of Dunn County). Feed My People provides hunger-relief programs access to millions of pounds of low-cost foods, helping them efficiently meet the needs of their community.
The Food Rescue Program saves millions of pounds of good, edible food from ending up in landfills each year. Donations of perishable and non-perishable items that have been pulled from the shelves of grocery stores and other retailers are quickly distributed to partner agencies.Donations arrive at random times and in varying quantities, depending on the supply from donor companies. A team of staff members and about 30 volunteers drive over 100,000 miles a year throughout west central Wisconsin delivering food free of a delivery charge. Six refrigerated trucks make it possible to deliver a variety of foods in larger quantities than what would fit in a personal vehicle. Some demand from hunger relief agencies is stable, but Feed My People also tries to deal with varying demands of different products, based on current needs at the local food banks.
To provide these services, Feed My People performs several value-added services to convert donations into useable end product. These operations are performed by teams of volunteers who show up in various numbers and at various times in days, evenings, and weekend shifts. The purpose of this project is to plan and locate these value-added services.
- Bulk staples (generally rice and cereals) are donated or purchased in pallet-sized loads and re-packaged into daily serving size bags, enough to fill the Kid’s Meals and Senior Hunger Program.
- Fresh fruits and vegetables will be re-packaged into boxes for distribution to food pantries. Supply is seasonal and future amounts are unknown, but they will plan forone fruit and one vegetable pallet arriving roughly each week day (20 per month).
- Unlabeled manufacturing overstock cans are labeled, about 4 pallets per month.
- Food drive collections of random items are sorted into boxes by container and food type, for distribution to local food banks. The size and timing of food drives vary, but often create about 800 boxes per drive, with about one drive per month.
- The Weekend Kids’ Meals Program providesweekly bags of food to about 2,100 preschool, elementary, middle, and high school students who may struggle with hunger when school meals are not available.
- The Senior Hunger Program packs and delivers about 200 emergency food boxes each week to many individuals who are homebound. In addition, small pantries have been implemented at numerous area low-income housing developments.
Facility
Feed My People moved into their current 19,000 square foot warehouse in 2008. Despite an improving economy, demand for their food remains steady. Additionally, the food bank is expanding its type of services. Currently the value-added operations are done in open areas between the racks, which block access to the racks and reduce the floor storage spaces. They must be set up and torn down for each work group, adding to the inefficiencies. The food bank also wishes to expand the amounts of fresh fruits and vegetables, and stock hygiene products and other non-food items.
Rough plans have been made to double the size of the building, using available land to the north. The expansion will include additional docks, rack storage, refrigerated storage, and freezer storage. Part of the original warehouse space will be dedicated to the value-added operations. The food bank is also considering adding a kitchen which will allow cooking classes and additional food preparation options. The coolers, freezers, existing dock, and offices will not move, as the cost of renovation is too high. Essentially, the kitchen and value-added operations will be placed in the southeast corner and in the existing bulk storage area. Either bulk storage or overstock will need to move closer to the coolers. A rough layout with key dimensions is shown on the last page.
Dimensions in feet for key equipment in the value-added areas are shown below. The kitchen has been sketched at 48 by 32 feet, but could fit in any 1500 square foot area.
| Machine | Depth | Width | Front | Total Sides | Back | Quantity |
| Clean room | ||||||
| Work tables | 2.5 | 8 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
| Pallets – in/out | 4 | 4 | 6aisle | 0.5 | 7 | |
| Tilt table | 4 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 6 | 1 |
| Hand sink | 2 | 1.5 | 3 | 3 | 1 | |
| Produce sink | 2 | 4.5 | 3 | 3 | 1 | |
| Storage racks | 4 | 9 | 6 aisle | 2 | ||
| Pallet jack storage | 5 | 4 | 6aisle | 0.5 | 1 | |
|
Assembly/sort |
||||||
| Loading boxes | 1 | 1.5 | 0 | 1.5 | 6 | 12 |
| Pallets in/out | 4 | 4 | 6 | 0.5 | 12 | |
| Skate-wheel conveyor | 2 | 20 | 3 | 1 | 2 |
Value added processes
Bulk staple products are processed from pallets into individual serving bags. They will be purchased to meet demand if donations are slow. For example, rice arrives in 1000 to 2000 pound bags and is re-packaged into ½ pound or 1 pound sealable bags. The small bags are used in the Kid’s Meal the program. Assume each bulk pallet holds 2000 bags worth of product, and is converted to pallets holding 30 boxes, each with 50 bags of product. Finished pallets are moved to the overstock area, as they will be used in the Kid’s Meals and Senior Meals. The following process is used for both rice and cereal repacking:
| Cereal/rice repack operation | |||
| Operation | Predecessor | Time – sec | |
| A | Label bag | – | 10 |
| B | Fill/weigh bag | A | 24 |
| C | Seal bag | B | 10 |
| D | Tape bag/box | C | 16 |
| E | New box | – | 120 |
Feed My People is starting to receive pallets of fresh fruits and vegetables. These need to be broken down into boxes of produce. One pallet of bulk produce generally creates a pallet of 30 boxes weighing 20 to 40 pounds each. These items must be stored in coolers both before and after repacking.
Some overstock pallets come as cans of unlabeled produce. If the manufacturer knows in advance that the product will not be sold they will still process the produce but not label it. These cans must be labeled and transferred to boxes. Each bulk pallet holds about 1200 cans which are transferred to 30 boxes, still 1200 cans per pallet. Finished product will be stored in racks in the new addition, awaiting delivery to food banks.
Food drives are sporadic events generally done for our benefit by outside organizations. There is little control over what they collect, when they collect and how much they collect. The largest food drive is the Postal Carriers Stamp Out Hunger Campaign. It generally brings in around 25,000 to 35,000 pounds in one day, on about 40 large pallet-sized boxes (pallet totes). The product is sorted as it arrives into three types of pallet totes. Heavy items are in one tote, lighter products are in another tote, and non-foods are in another tote. A drive can create upwards of 30 to 40 pallet totes of product to be boxed in banana boxes weighting 45 to 50 pounds as an assortment of “Miscellaneous Grocery Items”. Finished product will be stored in racks in the new addition, awaiting delivery to food banks.
Each week during the school year kid’s meal are collated and given to children of Fridays to keep them fed during the weekend. The bill of materials for a sample kid’s meal is as follows:
- 4 cans miscellaneous fruit/vegetables
- 4 bars
- 2 cereal packets (from repack area)
- 1 rice bag (from repack area)
The assembly process is as follows. It takes about 15 minutes to set up the line. Currently assemblers walk the line and fill entire bags, but this is a possible product line process:
| Kid’sMeal pack operation | |||
| Operation | Predecessor | Time – sec | |
| A | Get bag | – | 5 |
| B | Place 4 cans and push bag | A | 12 |
| C | Place 4 bars and push bag | B | 12 |
| D | Place 2 cereal and push bag | B | 7.7 |
| E | Place 1 rice and push bag | B | 7.3 |
| F | Put bag in box | C, D, E | 5 |
Similarly, the Senior Meals have the following sample bill of materials and assembly process. Here, the workers fill a box by pushing the box down the skate-wheel conveyor and filling from boxes that are behind the conveyor.
- 4 cans miscellaneous fruit/vegetables
- 1 can soup
- 1 can tuna
- 1 jar spaghetti sauce
- 3 boxes pasta and meat
- 2 cereal packets (from repack area)
- 1 container Miracle Whip
| Senior meal pack operation | |||
| Operation | Predecessor | Time – sec | |
| A | Get box and walk 2 steps | – | 9.5 |
| B | Place 3 veggie cans and push box | A | 12.4 |
| C | Place soup, fruit cans and push box | A | 8.4 |
| D | Place spag. jar and push box | A | 8.4 |
| E | Place tuna can and push box | A | 8 |
| F | Place 2 pasta boxes and push box | B, C, D, E | 8.4 |
| G | Place meat box and push box | B, C, D, E | 8 |
| H | Place Miracle Whip and push box | B, C, D, E | 8 |
| I | Place 2 cereal bags | F, G, H | 4.4 |
| J | Put box on pallet | I | 9.5 |
Items are brought to the assembly area from the overstock area on pallets. Boxes are moved one at a time from the pallets to the conveyor area, and are replenished as they are emptied. Filled pallets of product are returned to the overstock area, as they are delivered out the front of the building. Pallets arrive and are filled with the following quantities, with 30 boxes/pallet:
- Cans 40/box
- Bars 100/box
- Cereal and rice 50/box
- Spaghetti jars 12/box
- Pasta/meat box 40/box
- Miracle Whip 20/box
- Kid’s Meals 10/box
- Senior Meals 1/box
The value-added processes will either be done in a low-level clean room environment on large stainless steel tables, or on a skate-wheel conveyor assembly process. Possible locations include the current rework/assembly area or the current overstock area. Times and locations for the value-added operations are shown below:
| Product type | Location | Time – minutes |
| Cereal repack | Clean room | 0.4 per bag |
| Rice repack | Clean room | 0.4 per bag |
| Label cans | Clean room | 0.3 per can |
| Kid’s meal pack | Assembly | 0.3 per meal bag |
| Senior meal pack | Assembly | 0.6 per meal box |
| Fruit repack | Clean room | 2.0 per box |
| Vegetable repack | Clean room | 2.0 per box |
| Food drive sort | Assembly | 0.6 per box |
Problem # 1:
Perform line balancing for bulk repack, Kid’s Meal pack and Senior Meal pack. Draw the precedence diagrams first. Rather than meet a given cycle time, balance the tasks trying to minimize the maximum time for a task (which will become the cycle time). Try to balance with 2, 3 and 4 workers for repack and Kid’s Meals, and 3, 4, and 6 workers for Senior Meals. You may duplicate stations (with ½ the task time at each) if necessary to balance the line better. Identify the number of units produced per hour and total idle time for each line. Identify and briefly explain which number(s) of people are better for each process. Use the Line Balance tab on the Excel case template spreadsheet.
Photos
Kid’s Meal bag Meal bags sitting on compressed skate wheel conveyor
Existing assembly area, southeast corner of building
Exiting bulk storage area, facing north. Racks on left could be removed to make room for value-added operations.
Pallet of rice for repack Existing repack area
Repack area – filling and weighing station Repack area – sealing station
Repack area – tape and box station Completed box of repacked cereal
