Israel’s leading food retail chain Shufersal automates with KNAPP

Shufersal – Israel’s leading supermarket chain – aims to provide its customers with goods of the highest quality and to guarantee the freshness of its food products. To reach this aim, Shufersal decided to invest in its logistics infrastructure for the online store Shufersal Direct and selected KNAPP as partner taking a further towards the future. Two locations in Israel will be equipped with a modern and highly-automated logistic solution by KNAPP and will enable Shufersal to handle customer orders much faster and with the highest quality.

In 1958, Shufersal opened its first store in Tel Aviv, which was the first modern supermarket of its kind in Israel. Now, 60 years later, Shufersal is Israel’s largest retailer with hundreds of stores across Israel. Shufersal’s portfolio includes not only food retail articles, but also various non-food items such as beauty and body care products, housewares, clothing, and much more.

Responding to customer needs, in 2013 Shufersal started its online store Shufersal Direct, which provides customers the possibility to shop 24/7 using the website or the mobile app and have the groceries delivered comfortably at home. Each week, tens of thousands of customers shop online and the online sales are growing significantly year by year – more than 10% of the company’s revenue is earned through their online sales.

Added value for customers thanks to innovative warehousing

After Shufersal decided to invest in its logistics infrastructure, an intense planning phase started with KNAPP and the management consulting company Programa. Drawing on years of experience in warehouse automation for the online food retail sector, KNAPP developed the ideal concept for Shufersal and designed a solution which is tailored to fit Shufersal’s online business processes. In future, online customer orders from the Tel Aviv region will be prepared at the new distribution centers and delivered directly to the customers’ homes.

The innovative logistics solution by KNAPP enables Shufersal to set benchmarks for online operation and consistently increase the online market share. KNAPP’s new shuttle system – the OSR Shuttle Evo – will be the heart of the warehouse. The unique design of the system links the important warehouse processes and guarantees fast and flexible order handling. The OSR Shuttle Evo will be responsible for goods storage, order buffering and supply to both work stations and dispatch areas. The orders will be prepared semi-automatically at the ergonomic Pick-it-Easy work stations. The work stations in the Pick-it-Easy series combine ergonomics, multifunctionality, efficiency, cost effectiveness and design. With the OSR Shuttle Evo, they form a perfect team and every work station has access to every article in the system. The solution provides for error-free order preparation and maintains the quality and freshness of the articles throughout the whole process.

Creating added value for its customers has top priority: the automation of the distribution centers enables the company to increase its article range, shorten its distribution windows and offer same day delivery.

“We wanted to make sure, we’re working with a company that understands the meaning of food automation and is able to carry it out. Without a doubt, KNAPP`s technology is very advanced as well as stable, which is important to us. True, business is done between companies, but ultimately, business is really done between people and with the people from KNAPP it was love at the first sight”, enthuses Zvika Fishaimer, Vice President HR & IT at Shufersal, about the cooperation with KNAPP. With the realization of the automation solutions in Israel, KNAPP and Shufersal are laying the foundation for a long-lasting partnership that is based on trust, competence and commitment.

About KNAPP

KNAPP is one of the leading providers of all-in-one intralogistics solutions, automated warehouse systems and logistics software solutions. Across the globe, countless customers from the worlds of healthcare, retail, food retail and industry place their trust in the experience and innovative power of the KNAPP group. KNAPP specializes in solutions in food and empties logistics, implementing solutions in the highest quality to overcome the challenges particular to food retail. Many customers trust in KNAPP’s tailored system solutions for the fast-growing online food retail segment, such as Lotte Mart, Auchan Direct or Tudesepnsa.com.