Strengthening your supply chain one link at a time.
Selecting Your New Home (Warehouse)
When searching for an available existing distribution center or warehouse, bigger and taller aren’t always better. Choosing the right facility requires consideration of multiple factors beyond the optimal location. Ideally, this search follows a detailed planning process—defining design criteria, forecasting growth, determining dock door needs, selecting storage and handling equipment, and optimizing the layout. However, in many cases, urgency leads to a rushed decision, with location and size as the main priorities.
To help streamline your selection process, we’ve outlined some key factors to consider when evaluating potential new buildings:
Shape – A well-balanced building aspect ratio (typically 1.5:1 length-to-depth) is important for efficient operations. Unless your operational needs demand an atypical aspect ratio, avoid long, narrow buildings that increase dock travel time or overly deep buildings that require excessive travel distances into storage areas.
Dock Flow – Spec buildings often have docks on both sides (cross-dock), but many operators prefer a U-shaped flow with shipping and receiving on one side. Fortunately, racking can be installed on most of the unused dock, just locating a cross aisle behind the dock levelers.
Clear Height – Storage capacity is impacted by ceiling height and local fire codes, including commodity class of your product and design of the fire protection system. Newer buildings often feature 36-40+ foot clear heights, while most existing buildings are around 32 feet. Older structures may have as little as 28 feet, limiting storage efficiency.
Dock Doors – Spec buildings typically offer abundant dock doors, but they may lack levelers, which are usually added as part of Tenant Improvements (TI). Consider special dock door requirements of your operations, e.g. longer levelers for container unloading, if pit or vertical levelers are appropriate. For older buildings with unique layouts, dock door quantity and placement can be a major deciding factor.
Yard & Site Logistics – Consider yard size, trailer maneuvering, separation of trucks and cars, and traffic flow for both employees and trailers. Main directional approach of truck/trailers to dock doors, to facilitate easier and faster dock access. Adequate trailer maneuverability, employee parking, and safe ingress and egress are critical.
Column Bays – Column spacing varies from 25 to ~50 feet, with deeper dock bays (50-60+ feet). The optimal layout depends on racking configuration (single-deep, narrow aisles, dense storage). Ideally, spacing should allow columns to be buried in flues or within the storage arrangement to avoid columns in the aisles of ambient warehouses; and align with flue spaces in cold storage environments.
Columns – Column size (typically 10-12+ inches) and shape (round, square or wide flange) impact layout efficiency. Larger columns take up more space and may obstruct racking configurations. Some buildings also have large structural lateral bracing between columns that reduces usable warehouse area and may restrict cross aisle placement.
Slab Construction and Quality – While new buildings generally have adequate slab capacity for most rack systems, check and document the slab design, thickness, subsoils, and load-bearing capacity. Tall storage system equipment and high-precision automation may require “flatter” floors than more conventional storage systems. Understand your floor requirements, “Defined” or “Random” traffic patterns and the required floor flatness and levelness ratings using F-numbers (FF and FL) or “F-min” tolerances. These ratings define floor flatness and levelness needed from “Conventional” through “Flat”, “Very Flat up to “Superflat” and “Utraflat”.
Lighting – Warehouse lighting in new buildings is often minimal (spaced every 40+ feet), requiring upgrades in racking and processing zones. Your operation defines the required lighting levels required. Large pallet labels may not require the same lighting levels as small item/label picking or VAS operations that are more tedious. Other light choices may be between conventional high bay lighting and LED lighting. Your choices for the particular type of lighting in your new facility would likely be made as part of your Tenant Improvement (TI) package.
Power Supply – Ensure the available power matches operational needs, typically 1000 amps per tenant space (quarter of a building) in “Big Box” industrial development spaces. Conventional material handling equipment (e.g. conventional battery charging vs opportunity charging), lighting, and climate control systems all contribute to power demands. Large automation systems may require significant power upgrades, which should be planned upfront to avoid costly modifications and schedule impacts later.
Office, Breakroom, & Restrooms – Spec buildings typically have offices at each corner of large facilities, but additional breakrooms and restrooms may be necessary to comply with local building codes. Buildings with existing infrastructure in place may reduce TI costs.
Miscellaneous infrastructure such as dock offices, battery charging locations, employee entrance(s) & amenities locations and layouts all play your operation’s efficiencies.
Keep in mind Information Technology (IT) improvements needed for a server room, remote terminals and printers, RF device storage and charging, and RF communication equipment.
By taking these factors into account, you can make a more informed decision and select the best facility for your operations rather than just the largest or tallest option available.
If you need help, St. Onge Company can support your selection process based on your specific needs.
