Agilon warehouse automation supports Juustoportti’s solid growth

Juustoportti must quickly process milk delivered from dairy farms to prevent spoilage. In this critical environment, machinery operates around the clock, and the team ensures spare parts are always readily available.

The Agilon material handling system consolidated spare parts in one location and digitalised maintenance inventory management.

With critical parts easier to find and inventory balances more reliable, Juustoportti improved production line reliability and reduced stoppages caused by missing spare parts. The automated warehouse management system also allows employees to focus on more productive tasks, creating space for increased production capacity.

Juustoportti Ltd. is a Finnish family-owned company that has grown from a small dairy farm into a thriving business over the past 50+ years. They produce and offer many high-quality products, including dairy, cheese, and gluten-free oat drinks. 

The company has grown rapidly and invested in new production machinery. While the investment rate has been high considering the company's size, maintenance resources have grown more slowly. Maintenance employs about 13 people. Before the automated warehouse Agilon, spare parts for production equipment were in small storerooms here and there around the company. "Some spare parts were catalogued in an Excel file, some in notebooks, and some purely in certain employees' memories."

The operating environment of the dairy is crucial because incoming milk needs to be processed quickly into products. Extended stoppages due to machine failures are unacceptable and place significant pressure on maintenance and repair activities. Now, spare parts are easily accessible anytime, ensuring quick resolution of issues and minimizing downtime.

Before implementing Agilon, managing spare parts was a significant challenge. Spare parts were difficult to keep in one place and find quickly, resulting in weekly shortages for the maintenance team. Too much time was spent searching for parts, contacting suppliers, and arranging urgent deliveries. The process was both frustrating and time-consuming.

Spare parts securely stored in central automated warehouse

The Agilon warehouse automation solution effectively resolved the company's challenges. Juustoportti implemented a 30-metre-long, 6-metre-high Agilon system in its maintenance facilities, enabling centralised inventory management of essential spare parts. The system has since been expanded twice to support increasing production volumes and growing demand.

"Konecranes provided excellent support during the project's specification phase and continues to assist us during operations. All we needed to do was define the available space, the sizes of the boxes, and the volume of the parts we would place in Agilon. Konecranes handled all the dimensioning and capacity calculations. The entire project was incredibly smooth and straightforward. We only required an Internet connection and a standard industrial socket. The system was delivered and installed on schedule, and after a brief training session provided by Konecranes, we could start using it immediately."

Agilon enhanced production line reliability

Agilon has digitalised warehouse management at Juustoportti. Spare parts balances are now monitored automatically, with alerts sent directly to the responsible person’s inbox for spare parts orders. They no longer say, "We don't have it" or "I can't find it," because balances are always accurate.

The Agilon system can be configured to send orders to suppliers automatically and can be integrated with enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems.

Reduced stoppages and optimized spare parts management

Production stoppages caused by missing parts were reduced by over 50%, and production line reliability improved with readily available spare parts. Teams now find spare parts quickly, and inventory balances stay accurate, minimizing the duration of production interruptions. Additionally, Agilon streamlines the process of picking spare parts packages for preventive maintenance, saving time and enhancing productivity in several ways.

Agilon saves significant floor space, boosting production capacity. Agilon also provides visibility into spare parts transactions and usage, with every pick-up, drop-off, and timestamp recorded automatically. On average, Agilon processes 650 transactions each week.
 

The search function stands out. Mechanics add nicknames for spare parts in the additional information fields, making it easier and quicker to find the necessary components. The user interface is straightforward and user-friendly. The system meets current operational needs while still offering additional features that can be explored in the future.

Key benefits of warehouse automation for maintenance operations

• Improve access to spare parts around the clock.
• Increase picking accuracy with automated storage and retrieval.
• Reduce manual inventory work.
• Support faster spare part retrieval and fewer production interruptions.