Why You Should Be Using Automated Kitting

Automated kitting is an excellent way to improve your efficiency and speed up the fulfillment of certain types of orders. It maximizes the work of your skilled and highly paid workers by moving the more tedious tasks to automated storage and retrieval systems (AR/RS). Automated kitting can speed up processing common purchases or improve the response to special promotions to ensure efficiency and customer satisfaction in your supply chain.

What Is Kitting?

Kitting, which is also called product bundling, is the process of bundling multiple items together into one product listing. They come as a single unit at one price, often as part of promotions or discounts.

Some situations that are good for kitting include:

• Promotions: If you offer promotions like “Buy this, get that” or “Save 20% when you buy together,” kitting can help you consolidate those items into one product. It saves time on picking and processing since you only need to scan and keep track of one SKU item.
• Common purchases: If you sell items that are commonly sold together, it might make more sense to bundle them, making it easier for workers to grab picks and quicker for customers to receive. 
• Increasing sales opportunities: A less-popular item can bundle with a bestseller to increase the chances of moving inventory of the one that’s less desired or hasn’t been as heavily marketed.

The Benefits of Using Automated Kitting

Manual kitting is a great way to utilize entry-level labor to sort and preassemble components, keeping skilled workers focused on the manufacturing line. Kitting can improve productivity and make your employees’ labor more valuable to you, but it can take up space and time when done manually. It’s a process that usually involves lots of movement to different storage locations.

AR/RS systems and automated kitting can save time. Instead of having employees do the work, an AR/RS system can pick the individual components of a kit and batch the kit components into totes. The operator then assembles the kits and stores them in either the same storage device or elsewhere. The AR/RS systems are high-density, so they take up less space than the manual alternative, allowing you to make a more efficient warehouse layout and minimize travel time.

Another benefit of AR/RS solutions is that they can reduce mistakes. Human error is tough to avoid, but robotic systems are much more accurate. They can help move the product faster and ensure delivery of the correct item every time. These systems free up employees to do other jobs that speed up the entire picking process, and it involves less effort when they do need to operate the system.

Finally, automated kitting systems can deliver products to assembly for just-in-time manufacturing practices, helping you meet goals for lean production.

Finale Inventory and Automated Kitting

As the goals of the warehouse industry evolve to meet higher efficiency demands, you need software that grows with them. Whether you choose to sell your bundles as one “item” or pull from individual product counts, Finale Inventory can help you craft these kits. It can integrate with ordering systems and e-commerce platforms and allow you to make full use of your AR/RS for an automated kitting system that significantly boosts supply chain efficiency.

Sign up for a free trial today or schedule a demo with one of our knowledgeable representatives.