Samantha Taylor:
Welcome to the Amigo CartCast, the podcast where we roll through the ins and outs of material handling with Amigo carts. I’m your host, Samantha Taylor, here with my co-host Scott Chappell, and we’re on a mission to find a better way for material handling.

Scott Chappell:
Thank you, Samantha. Each episode will explore the innovative features, success stories, and the endless possibilities that Amigo material handling carts bring to the table. Let’s roll into a world of efficiency, innovation, and endless possibilities. This is the Amigo CartCast.

Samantha Taylor:
Welcome to today’s episode. We have Scott in house today. We missed you last episode, Scott, while you were traveling on the road.

Scott Chappell:
That’s so nice. Thank you.

Samantha Taylor:
This is going to be a fun one, because we get to talk about one of my favorite pastime hobbies.

Scott Chappell:
What would that be?

Samantha Taylor:
Shopping.

Scott Chappell:
Imagine that.

Samantha Taylor:
Yes. So, for those who don’t know, just a little history and background for me, my background is actually in fashion marketing and management, which equates very closely to industrial sales of what I’m doing now. Very close. And after I graduated from college, I worked in a retail setting for many, many, many years before I ended up working here at Amigo.

Scott Chappell:
How were the hours?

Samantha Taylor:
Yeah, that’s… it’s tough. It’s a tough world out there. Let me tell you. And the trends that we see in retail are so fascinating to me because, you know, when we were all growing up, people would shop in stores. And now how are they shopping?

Scott Chappell:
There’s a company that starts with an A and ends with an N. I don’t know if people have heard it before, but they’re out there.

Samantha Taylor:
Yeah, with two-day shipping.

Scott Chappell:
Pretty easy.

Samantha Taylor:
Easy peasy. One click. Buy it now. And you have that product. In some cities, same day.

Scott Chappell:
Right? Yes.

Samantha Taylor:
So that’s what I want to talk about today. I want to talk about the trends in e-commerce and buying and how our products fit in.

Scott Chappell:
This is exciting. Have you thought about this, like, all week?

Samantha Taylor:
Yeah. You know what’s crazy though? I remember very early on in my retail career I was interviewing for… it was like an entry-level supervisor position. And, you know, they always ask at the end, you know, what questions do you have for me? This is the interviewee asking me as a young adult. Right. And my mind’s like, I just want to know it all.

And I remember saying, I just truly want to understand the whole process of like, how do they buy the product to then distribute it out to the stores, to then sell it at the stores. So then the end consumer can have exactly what they want. I think that that was a very big picture back there. But fast forward many years now to today.

Samantha Taylor:
I can tell you how they do that.

Scott Chappell:
I would think, just out loud, that there’s a big warehouse somewhere centrally located in the United States where they get that stuff shipped from.

Samantha Taylor:
Well, you would be right.

Scott Chappell:
That’s where we’re going.

Samantha Taylor:
That’s right.

Scott Chappell:
Fantastic! I’m pretty sharp. So, talking about that, Samantha, historically, I think like DCs, fulfillment centers for this retail organization you worked for probably are pretty big in a centralized location, right? That’s how it normally happens. Or that’s how it used to happen.

Samantha Taylor:
Yeah. So I think what traditionally would be is there would be distribution centers. And this is for all retailers. Big warehouse that would probably palletize boxes of inventory to ship out to stores. Now the trends that we’re seeing is with e-commerce and people shopping online, you don’t need big warehouse centers because the orders might be smaller. They’re not necessarily going to stores.

Samantha Taylor:
They’re going direct to consumer.

Scott Chappell:
Good point.

Samantha Taylor:
So with that being said, the trends now are you see more like fulfillment centers or even micro fulfillment centers.

Scott Chappell:
Micro!

Samantha Taylor:
Yeah. What do you think that means?

Scott Chappell:
Well, let me see. I’m going to put it in respect to a microbrewery.

Samantha Taylor:
Oh, I like where we’re going. Shopping. Brewery.

Scott Chappell:
Drinking.

Samantha Taylor:
My kind of vibe. Okay.

Scott Chappell:
So when you say micro, that to me sounds like smaller.

Samantha Taylor:
Exactly.

Scott Chappell:
I am batting a thousand.

Samantha Taylor:
So we’re now seeing a trend in these micro fulfillment centers where a traditional fulfillment center is 300,000 plus square feet. I mean, I know, Scott, you’ve been in facilities. What’s the biggest you’ve been in?

Scott Chappell:
Honestly, I think the largest is like 1.2 million. And that’s a monster.

Samantha Taylor:
You need, like, binoculars to see across the way and wave at your friend. You don’t know who’s doing what.

Scott Chappell:
Exactly. It’s huge, huge.

Samantha Taylor:
So micro fulfillment centers are a much smaller take, just a fraction of the size, probably around 10,000 square feet. And the goal is to be able to have these micro fulfillment centers near city locations and have quick turnaround inventory.

So they might be taking the items from the large fulfillment centers, breaking them down to high need items in these micros to be able to push out to the consumer within 24 to 48 hours.

Scott Chappell:
That makes sense.

Samantha Taylor:
We all want our product and we want it now.

Scott Chappell:
Well, we get used to certain things, right? I mean, we’re not going back to dial-up on the computer, right?

Samantha Taylor:
Could you imagine?

Scott Chappell:
I don’t think anybody can.

Samantha Taylor:
Our children, my children, your children, they do not understand walking uphill both ways.

Scott Chappell:
Yes, I agree.

Samantha Taylor:
So that’s the way of the world—it’s just moving faster and more efficiently. Which then gets me thinking, how can we help with that?

Scott Chappell:
Oh my gosh, you mean the 10,000-square-foot micro fulfillment centers?

Samantha Taylor:
So if we’re looking at efficiency within a warehouse, we’ve talked a lot about different maintenance settings. You’ve talked about janitorial settings. Now let’s talk about order picking and fulfillment settings.

Scott Chappell:
And you know, it’s funny you mention this because I don’t know if people have seen our website. They listen to this podcast. I don’t know how far they’ve dove into our product line, but our products can be used in many different applications. So even if it’s a smaller facility, you know how we always talk about fork trucks and bigger equipment?

Scott Chappell:
I think then our products in that smaller facility can become the bigger product compared to a fork truck, right? Yeah, that’s how that could work.

Samantha Taylor:
I think so too. Yeah. Like, a micro fork truck.

Scott Chappell:
Okay!

Samantha Taylor:
But it’s not quite the same.

Scott Chappell:
We don’t lift anything, but we move stuff, you know, and fork trucks, obviously, they go, racking and shelving, and they’ll go up eight feet, ten feet, 30ft, 50ft, whatever the case is. You know, our products are designed to move things. We don’t lift anything. We can put boxes and products on our products and move them through the warehouse, but we don’t actually lift anything.

So possibly in a micro fulfillment center, like in a standard warehouse, they might have five racks, five high. In micro, it may be—and I don’t know this, so I’m sorry I’m not the expert folks—all you do is have to move it. And that’s exactly what we do.

Samantha Taylor:
Well, I picture, because of the quick turnaround, and of course with my background in retail, they probably bring them in in larger shipments and then have somebody sorting the items. So I can’t imagine that they have high racking systems because it’s that quick turnover, right? They’re bringing it in quickly, sorting it, to then push it out. Right. So that’s where our Amigo product could easily get into smaller, tight areas as well as move product efficiently without having to use those large fork trucks.

And I don’t know either. So if we have anyone who works in a micro fulfillment center and would like to invite us for a tour, we would love to see your facility.

Scott Chappell:
Yeah. So you know, what’s also funny is, this kind of goes in relation to a previous podcast. We talked in the past how here at Amigo we’ve recently expanded. I think we’re like 120,000, 130,000 square feet. Before that, we were smaller and were using our products. Yeah, we make them, but they’re very efficient. We were using our products in 10,000, 15,000, 20,000 square foot facilities because those are the buildings that we had before we had this last big one on.

So I’m just going to tell you, this fits right up our alley because, once again, we build them. But I go out back every day, and I see our people riding them around, and you kind of go, “Is it big enough here?” It doesn’t have to do with the size. It has to do with what you are carrying.

How are you carrying it? And how quickly can you get it to the line?

Samantha Taylor:
So I think it’s very scalable. Yeah, right? I agree. Maybe, like we just mentioned, we haven’t necessarily been in micro fulfillment centers. I think it would be an amazing fit. But we are in large distribution centers and fulfillment centers. And our fulfillment centers that are that one-plus-million square feet typically, I mean, they just have more.

They just have hundreds of Amigos versus maybe just a few. So that’s where our product is very scalable to the size that it’s needed, depending on the size of the building and what they’re using it for.

Scott Chappell:
No, I agree.

Samantha Taylor:
So Scott, since we’re already in these larger fulfillment centers, we’ve seen it. We know it. How would you recommend these micro fulfillment centers? How would we be able to see our products there?

Scott Chappell:
Well, I’m going to tell you, there are probably a couple of different things. When we originally talked about the million-plus, 500,000-plus, what’s funny when you go into those operations is that there’s normally multiple fork trucks rolling around, and they’re back and forth. They’re beeping, there’s safety, and all of that, right? They’ve also got pallet jacks.

They’ve got manual carts. And they also probably have electric pallet jacks that are moving pallets right off these larger, taller racks. So how I see our product working in a micro fulfillment center would be there’s probably one fork truck that is moving around larger items, and then what I would see, because it’s smaller, are manual pallet jacks that people are moving pallet-size orders around.

Where we’re going to fit in is that, let’s say there need to be three boxes in aisle four and six boxes in aisle ten that need to be picked. We’ve got two or three options: a fork truck in a congested area because—yeah, no bueno; a person with a pushcart walking down aisles four, six, and ten picking these boxes up; or possibly an electric pallet jack doing the same thing. That’s where I think our product would shine, whether it’s a towable product with a trailer or our Dex Pro Plus, which is our most popular product with a trailer on the back.

Now, they can pick those 8 or 10 smaller boxes up on our product, zip around the corner, run it down to shipping, come back, and do the next order. So honestly, I don’t think it’s too small of a facility at all because, once again, our products have a small footprint. I mean, it’s less than eight feet long.

It’s less than seven feet long, less than 35 inches wide, and it turns on a dime. I mean, all those things.

Samantha Taylor:
I’m sold! Since you’re on a roll, can you share with everybody how they would be able to see this in their facility? How do they get ahold of you?

Scott Chappell:
How do they get ahold of me? Well, you know, what’s exciting is there’s Scott, but we also have multiple representatives—Amigo factory reps—all throughout the country who work with our local distribution and local dealers.

Samantha Taylor:
Little Scott clones.

Scott Chappell:
I’d like to think so, but that could be scary. If you know me, you know what I’m getting at. But the best way would be to contact us, contact your local dealer, and then we show up with our van, open up the ramp, and just show exactly what they’re able to do. Yeah, could be inside.

Samantha Taylor:
Try it out, load up a hundred packages. And if they want to take it for a day, we can ship them a product for a day or two, a couple of days, to see how much our product could help improve efficiency.

Scott Chappell:
You know, the nice thing about this, Samantha, is we’re not having to twist people’s arms. What we’re doing is saying, “Hey, take a look. Do you want to try it?” Then try it out. And you know what? If it works for you, fantastic, let’s move on. If it doesn’t work, that’s not a big deal.

Samantha Taylor:
So, a lot of great conversation today on e-commerce and trends on how people are shopping. I’m guilty—guilty as one of them—and I think we definitely have a great fit here. This is so exciting. But what I’d love to hear, Scott, before we wrap it up today, is a story. We’ve got to end with a story, Scott.

Scott Chappell:
I like stories.

Samantha Taylor:
An Amigo Road Show story.

Scott Chappell:
Is it because I’m old and been around so long that I have all the stories?

Samantha Taylor:
Like the old wives’ tale—like, sit around the campfire. Okay, everybody, grab your hot cocoa or your bourbon or whatever your drink of choice is and cuddle up to Scott’s story.

Scott Chappell:
Everybody’s waiting. I think everybody’s on the edge of their seat. If you’re driving, just keep driving, keep watching the road. You know, before we get to the story, because I have one, I’m just going to say this, Samantha: even if it’s a smaller footprint, our product works very well. The biggest reason is because it’s a smaller product with very safe speeds around people—4 to 6 miles an hour.

So you’re talking about things that are changing, and I think we can accommodate those changes. Now, as far as the story goes, this is a recent demonstration we did for a company that is large—not a micro. So we’re not there yet, but it’s a large company. And as I was talking to this gentleman about what his needs were, he was like preaching to the choir.

He says, “We have fork trucks moving things around. It’s a fulfillment center as well, so it fits right in. We have smaller loads, like a hot water heater that we need to move, and smaller coupling boxes. The way they do it today is they get a fork truck, put it on a pallet, and their protocol is, if it’s on a pallet, it has to be strapped.”

So they go to all this work to put this 150-pound box—150 pounds, everybody, is not a lot. Okay? Look at your hot water heater at home; it’s not that big. So what they’re very interested in is our product to pick up these smaller orders with our products, where they don’t have to: one, strap down and take all the extra time, and two, take a bigger product potentially in a congested area, which may not be as safe.”

So, this story basically ends with them being very interested in our Dex Pro Plus, which is our most popular 30 by 50. You can put the hot water heater or smaller boxes on it to get things from here to there much quicker. He even told me that this is a test because they may change the whole way they pick things depending on how this goes. Pretty gosh-darn exciting stuff—big company, big area, and they didn’t know about our product until they saw it. Now that they’ve seen it, they’re interested.

Samantha Taylor:
Yeah, but scalability—like, that’s a larger facility, but it could definitely fit any need, no matter the size.

Scott Chappell:
Exactly.

Samantha Taylor:
Fantastic. I love that story! Thank you so much for sharing. I think that wraps up another episode. I don’t want to say that because we say it at the end.

Scott Chappell:
CartCast, it is the end.

Samantha Taylor:
Until next time.

Scott Chappell:
Keep it rolling.

Samantha Taylor:
And that wraps up another episode of the Amigo CartCast. We hope you enjoyed this exploration into finding a better way for material handling with Amigo carts. Be sure to subscribe and go to myamigo.com/podcast to see pictures and videos mentioned in today’s episode.

Scott Chappell:
Thank you for tuning in, and until next time, keep rolling with Amigo.

Samantha Taylor:
Until next time.

Scott Chappell:
Keep it rolling.

Samantha Taylor:
Keep it rolling.