How Thames Logistics doubled throughput with modular racking

From 310 picks / hour to 680 — without a new building

When Thames Logistics came to Kentron in 2024, the team were three weeks from peak and every pallet location was 98% full. The obvious answer — a new building — was 18 months away. The right answer turned out to be a modular redesign of the existing 24,000 m² envelope, phased in over six months with zero production hours lost.

The audit that changed the plan

A half-day SEMA-approved damage inspection identified 240+ red-rated impacts with no remedial plan on file. More importantly, a four-hour time-motion study showed that pickers were walking an average of 11.2 km per shift — because slow-moving SKUs sat in prime picking locations. The throughput ceiling was a slotting problem, not a capacity problem.

Three phases, zero downtime

• Phase 1 — ambient zone. Narrow-aisle reach-truck relocation, damaged frame replacement and slotting to velocity.
• Phase 2 — pick mezzanine. A new two-tier pick module for fast-movers, installed on nights and weekends.
• Phase 3 — VNA high-bay. Replacement of the slowest aisles with a narrow-aisle VNA strategy and MHE swap-out.

The numbers

Throughput more than doubled, picker productivity rose from 310 to 680 picks per hour, and the capex paid back inside 19 months. The DC now runs under an annual SEMA inspection and a priority-spares contract — and Thames have re-signed for a sister site under the same framework.