March 18, 2025 • 30 mins
Warehouse robotics is evolving fast, yet 90% of warehouses still don’t use automation. Why?
Despite the rise of AI, autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), and drone-based inventory tracking, most operations remain stuck in outdated, manual processes. The real challenge isn’t just cost—it’s about knowledge gaps, change management, and finding the right tech fit.
In this episode of Everything is Logistics, host Blythe Brumleve sits down with Kevin Lawton, host of The New Warehouse Podcast, to break down the biggest barriers preventing robotics adoption in warehousing. From entry-level automation solutions to practical strategies for integrating AI-driven robotics, we explore what’s next for warehouses that want to scale.
Key Topics Covered:
- The real reasons why 90% of warehouses haven’t adopted robotics.
- Entry-level automation solutions that are accessible right now.
- How poor warehouse processes can sabotage automation efforts.
- Robots as co-workers: addressing change management challenges.
- Hummingbird Systems’ drone picking technology—is this the future?
"If you automate a bad process, you're just making that bad process happen faster." – Kevin Lawton
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:00):
Blythe, welcome into another episode of
(00:05):
everything is logistics, apodcast for the thinkers and
freight. I'm your host, BlytheMilligan. We are proudly
presented by SPI Logistics, andwe've got another interview for
you from manifest, the futuresupply chain and logistics right
here in Las Vegas. And we've gota fellow podcaster here,
returning guests, third time onthe show.
I think maybe third time youmight be the first three peat
(00:26):
guests.
Blythe Brumleve (00:28):
Okay, I'll take that awesome Kevin Lawton with
the New Warehouse Podcast. He isgracious enough to join us and
tell us about all thingswarehouse robotics, because this
is a topic that is so dauntingto me. I don't know if it's
daunting to you.
Kevin Lawton (00:43):
Yes, it's becoming more and more daunting, because
there's just so many thingsgoing on. So tell us what is
first. Let's give people like,insight into you. Like, how did
you how did you start thepodcast? Like, what got you into
podcasting? Specifically,something, warehousing, yeah,
so, so I started in thewarehouse, started working in
(01:04):
the warehouse, and didn't haveany formal education around
supply chain or warehousing, andI honestly thought in the back
of my head like, Oh, this isn'tlong term, right? This isn't
long term. And now, you know, 13years later, I guess it's long
term, but I wanted to learn moreabout the industry. And at the
time,
Unknown (01:25):
there was just not much that I found, like, very
engaging or interesting.
This was, you know, maybe seven,eight years ago, and, yeah, I
just there was not like, youknow, content creators, like,
like us. And so I had done somesome blogging in the past, in my
past, and it's kind of like,maybe I'll do a blog, but
(01:47):
that was very time consuming, Ithought. And then I came across,
like podcast, the idea ofpodcasting, so I'm like, let me
do a podcast. So it was justkind of for me to learn. And
then I guess it resonated,started to get a little
traction.
And yeah, and now you know,we're recording this year, in
February, March. Our will be sixyears since we released the
(02:10):
first episode. So awesome, yeah.
So now is podcasting your mainfocus? Yeah. So podcasting is
definitely the main focus. Andthen I also teach as an adjunct
professor in in supply chain.
So, funny enough, I didn't get asupply chain education, but now
I'm giving one, and then I dosome consulting, advisory work
(02:31):
too, as well. Yeah, that'sawesome. And so you're here at
manifest, and you have, like,you're one of the few
podcasters, like, with your ownbooth, like we're, we're very
happy manifest, you know, gaveus this booth. But I want to
move up to where you're whatyou're doing, what, and tell us
what you're doing. You have abooth on the trade show floor.
Yeah, we have a booth, Booth1439
(02:51):
and basically we'll be set upthere. I'm
not sure when this is airing,but we're we are doing a live
stream from the booth tomorrowmorning, Tuesday. So we'll be
streaming live to LinkedIn,YouTube, Instagram,
and then we'll be doing someother podcasts at the booth, and
also at other people's booths aswell, so trying to capture some
(03:13):
of those solutions and the demosand things that are going on.
And then I think Wednesdayafternoon, we're going to have
some some fun with some littlesocial media clips, maybe some
trivia, something like that, andgive out some T shirts and then,
and we'll be in here too for alittle bit on Wednesday morning
as well. So, so podcasting don'tstop for you. Yes, yeah, when we
(03:33):
come to the conference tradeshow, it's like back to back to
back. Let's jam as much contentas we can. So we'll do, probably
do about like 20 interviewswhile we're here. Wow, that's
insane. I thought I'm doing sixtoday, and I thought that that
was crazy. Yeah,close to you that the stamina is
nuts. Now for the topic of thisepisode, because with manifest,
(03:54):
they have such a strong focus onrobotics, and this was one of
the first places that I was ableto see that part of the
logistics process under oneroof. But if I remember
correctly, you said in aprevious conversation that we
had is something like 90% ofwarehouses don't have any kind
of robotics. Yeah, yeah. Ithink, I think it's a very
interesting thing, because youcome to trade show conference,
(04:21):
you look online, right? LinkedInfeed, YouTube, like there's all
this video, all thisconversation about robotics and
automation. Butthe reality is that, you know,
there's still in the warehousespace. I mean, the penetration
for actual robotics andautomation is still still fairly
low in in comparison to, like,how many operations there
actually are. So there's still ahuge, huge opportunity in the
(04:44):
market to get into that. ButI think one of the challenges
is, certainly, is like barriersto entry, right? The barriers to
entry are, cost is one for sure,but I think there's also.
Maybe like a little bit of aknowledge gap too, where people
aren't quite certain whether,you know, they're really ready
(05:06):
for robots, and you know, theymay still be, like picking on
paper and things like that. Andyou know, how do I go from, you
know, kind of these oldprocesses systems, into
something that seems superfuturistic, like a robot, right?
So I think there's still a waysto go, but I think that robotics
and automation companies arerecognizing that, and you're
(05:28):
seeing like some solutions nowcome to the market that are
trying to tear down some ofthose barriers, make it a little
more accessible, a little moreapproachable, too, as well. But
yeah, I mean, I guess to answeryour question, yeah, there
definitely is still a big gapwhere
warehouses that have not goneinto automation and robotics at
(05:48):
all. And it's almost shocking, Ithink, with you to your point of
seeing all of these differentcompanies, robotics companies
that have all of these reallycool looking solutions. And if
I'm a warehouse owner like, itmakes me want to go and buy a
warehouse, just so I can usesome of these different robots
for your robot friends. Yeah, itseems like a no brainer, but I
(06:09):
imagine it's very costrestrictive. I imagine that
there's very much, like, whatare some, maybe some of the
other challenges of adoptingrobotics inside of your
warehouse. Is there like, anentry level robot that you can
get, yeah? I mean, I think that,you know, I think one of the
challenges is certainly, likeyou said, there's cost
restrictions for some systems,but because of that, I think
(06:30):
people just see robot andthey're like, oh, expensive,
right? Like they see dollarsigns, basically. But there are
solutions that are not asexpensive, I think, as they are
perceived to be, there'sdifferent pricing models too, as
well, like you can rent themthrough, like a RAS model, which
is robots as a service, right?
(06:51):
So there's options there. But Ithink some of the other
challenges too are that, youknow, a lot of operations are
just, they just haven'toptimized fully, right? And
there's a lot of things to bedone within the operation before
you can say, you know, to get toour next level of efficiency, we
need to bring in robots, right?
So if your processes are notdialed in, solidified,
(07:14):
optimized, when you bring thatrobot in, it's not going to fix
that, right? It's just gonna hada guest on my podcast one time.
It's always stuck in my headfrom a couple years ago, and he
said that if you're automating abad process, like you're just
making that bad process happenfaster, you're not making it
better, right? So when you fullyoptimize, like you've looked at
(07:35):
WMS, for example, you've lookedat, what are you using to pick
how do you make your justprocess flow better? Maybe it's
positioning inventory in acertain way to get more
efficient and be faster. Whenyou feel like you've kind of
exhausted those options, thenit's really makes sense to start
to look at the robotics andautomation and take it to the
(07:56):
next level.
So I think there's that's partof the gap there is that people
have not gone through and donethat work yet to be able to get
to that level. And then whenthey come to get robotics, I
mean, sometimes people will goafter it, and then they're
disappointed in the results, andpart of it is because they
(08:17):
haven't done those steps aheadof time. So there's a lot of
people I know that are focusingon that, from consulting
perspective, servicesperspective, to do that, but I
think that there's a lot ofsteps to take before you can
just buy a robot and just plopit in the warehouse and be like,
okay, to work. We're good. Yeah.
So what are some of so say youhave your processes pretty much
mapped out, and then after youhave those processes mapped out,
(08:41):
what does that next step looklike you? I mean, there's a
labor shortage when it comes towarehouse workers, so there's a
unique set of challenges there.
How do you know what directionto go into next? Yeah, that's, I
think that's one of the otherchallenges, actually, right? Is
that like you walk into a showlike this, or a show like, like
(09:03):
a Promat or a modax, like,everywhere you look, there's
going to be some kind ofrobotics or automation solution,
and it's all around you, right?
And, and if you're not prepared,you haven't done any real
research due diligence, like,you're kind of like, where,
where do I even start? Right? SoI think there's a lot of
education that needs to be donealso in terms of, like
(09:24):
optimizing those processes.
And that education, I think cantake you much further, right?
Because if you look at somethingas simple as, like moving a
pallet, for example, right?
There's tons of solutions thatcan move a pallet, so it's which
is the right one for me, right?
Like, how do I figure this out?
What do I go after? First,you know, it's pretty
(09:47):
interesting. In my career, I hada role and, you know, we had
very little automation. We had alittle bit of conveyor. That was
it. And my boss told me.
We need to automate unloadingcontainers, right? And kind of
like, and as this was maybethree years ago, four years ago,
(10:10):
and the idea of automation andunloading containers like, very
new at that time. And, you know,I tried to explain to him that
we're not there, like, we have alot of other things that we need
to do, or we need to automateother solutions, and the
technology is just not quitethere yet. But I think you know,
and you know to the earlierpoint from, like, a marketing
(10:33):
perspective, right? He He saw avideo of something from from
Boston Dynamics, when they werefirst messing around with that,
and that's when he was like, oh,we need to do this, right? And
I'm kind of like, it's, it's notreally realistic, yeah, it's not
really realistic for us. Like,it's kind of out of reach at
this time.
So I think there is, like, alittle maybe miss misconception
(10:54):
there, and and it is, you know,make your head spin, like, how
many solutions? And when you goand you walk in and you see all
these things moving around,you're like, oh, that could be
great. That could be great.
Wait, what's the differencebetween this one and this one?
And what's the right one for me?
Sothere really needs to be a lot
of like, due diligence, researchon that end to come to the right
decision. What does that looklike?
(11:18):
A lot it looks like listening tothe new warehouse podcast, so it
looks like No but, I mean, youknow, resources like that. I
mean, podcasts are a great wayto learn about some of these
things, looking on YouTube,connecting with people that have
done it before, I think isanother great way to do that. I
mean, like, here, you know, Imanifest if you come in and
(11:41):
you're, you know, maybe a midmarket three PL, try to connect
with somebody from, like, alarger three PL that maybe has
done some of those things thatyou want to do, and learn from
them to find out, like, youknow, how did you go about this?
Like before? And I'm surethey'll tell you, like, you
know, we did this. Don't do thisright? Like, we took the wrong
step here. Like, go about itthis way. And there's a ton of
(12:01):
consultants out there too thatfocus on this,
so working with them is a goodway to go about it. And I see a
lot of people in the industrynow too that have, that have
been on both sides, right? Youhave people that were in the
warehouse were practitioners.
They did implementations ofrobotics or other systems
themselves, and now they go andwork for the end user or
solution provider. So whenyou're engaging with some of
(12:24):
these companies and you'restarting to do some discovery,
I think it's very important tounderstand, are the people
you're interacting with, do theyhave that experience, right?
Like, do they actually feel whatyou've been going through, or
have they gone through that inthe past? Have they really done
a project like this before?
(12:46):
And you know not to say thatpeople that haven't are not
great, but you know that thatknowledge, if you're just
starting from kind of thebeginning, is really needed to
be able to accomplish that.
Yeah, yeah. It sounds like it'sone of those things that it just
can become overwhelming soquickly, and if you don't have
somebody that has been throughthat experience before, or if
you do have somebody that hasbeen through that experience,
(13:07):
and it's an incredibly valuableresource,
so with maybe some of the thingsthat you're going to see this
upcoming week at manifest ormaybe some things that you've
seen you know In the past, whatare maybe some of the most
interesting high level roboticsthat you've seen that are also
practical? Yeah,yeah, that's good question. I
(13:29):
think here just walking throughthe floor this morning and
yesterday morning, a little bit,seeing who's here, there's
actually a couple of differentsolutions that are focused on
inventory management, inventorycontrol from a robotics
perspective, right? So you have,here you have Verity gather, AI
Corvis robotics, doing drones,right? Drone counting Nokia as
(13:54):
well. Here they do drones aswell for inventory counting
Nokia, like the phonemanufacturer, yeah, Nokia
aims, I think they're calling itnow, yeah,
so they have a space here, andthey're using drones for that,
and then dexterity too as well,which has, like, maybe arguably
(14:15):
the tallest robot out There, thebig LEGO model.
Yeah, I love it. All my Legomodels. My son steals them. So I
can't, like, keep them on mybookshelf, but I love them. So,
so that's one I think that issomewhat low hanging fruit in a
(14:36):
sense, because they're justcapturing data, information,
right? So there's not, not ahuge change that needs to happen
there. In some cases, maybe youneed to switch around your
labeling things like that. Andthat's one thing, I think, from
an inventory perspective, thatcan make a huge impact on the
operation overall.
The other one, I think that is,you know, kind of low hanging.
(15:00):
Root, in a sense, is it's justsimply like, is there a movement
that you do every day on aconsistent basis? Right? Do you
pick up pallets in this area andmove them to this area every
single day, right? In a frequentbasis? That's an easy thing
where, oh, this is happening.
It's repeatable, right? We gofrom this location to this
(15:20):
location, so we can automatethat, right? So that
predictability is a good placeto go after that.
But I think additionally,actually a good solution for
that that's here as well, iswith Big Joe. They have an
automated pallet jack.
Used it before. It's really easyto use
(15:42):
and engages ballot. You kind ofteach it where it needs to go,
and then you can reprogram it ifyou need to reprogram it. But
that movement from A to B is aneasy way to start, for sure,
yeah, and that's when it to yourearlier point, when you were
talking about documenting yourprocesses. That would be an
example of, you know, what atypical, you know, worker, a is
doing these things throughoutthe day. Is that a safe
(16:04):
assumption that that's one ofthe processes that you would map
out and then try to figure outhow robotics will fit into that
particular process? Yeah,exactly. So you want to map out
your processes, right? Andunderstand, okay, where do we
have the same thing happeningover and over, right? So, you
know, the pallet movement is anexample, right? Maybe you have,
like, you know, a packing area.
You're loading up pallets withpackages that are going to go
(16:27):
out, and then every day, whenthat pallet is full, that pallet
is going to go to the loadingdock, right? So you can easily,
you know, use an automatedpallet jack or something to come
pick up that pallet when it'sready, take it over to the
loading dock, right? Because ifyou have a human doing that,
right, they're essentially justdoing travel time, right? If you
look at, you know, lean and 5sprinciples like, that's, it's
(16:52):
waste, right? So, so where isthat waste happening from a
human perspective, and then, howdo we address that? How do we
automate? How do we come up withsolutions to do that movement
that's, you know, consistent ona regular basis, if you're doing
something that's like, one offmovements or things like that,
it's going to be really hard tofind the ROI of the system. Last
year, when I was at thisconference, there were these
(17:15):
skates that you put on the bar.
Remember shift robotics, I thinkso. Is that something that is
realistic for a warehouse toimplement? Because it seems like
that would be a really easyentry level, even though I was
not that graceful on them. No,no. I thought maybe like twirls
and stuff, yeah? No, the knees,yeah, I feel you there.
(17:39):
Definitely.
I think that, uh, I haven'theard anything from them lately.
I was wondering if they were alittle bit of a smaller booth.
So I didn't want, I didn't knowif maybe they, you know, yeah, I
think they had an interestingapproach, right? Because
there's, I mean, there's acouple different ways to look at
automation. It's like, how do wedo something that a human
doesn't necessarily want to do,or is just like repetitive
(18:03):
or, how do we use something likethat solution to to make that
human more productive, but alsomore comfortable, right? So, and
I was addressing like, gettingthem to move faster through
through the warehouse, I thinkthat is an interesting concept,
but I do think there was, therewould be a challenge getting
employees like to adapt to themright and use them on a regular
(18:25):
basis. So I think that's, Ithink that's also one of the
points on automation robotics,is that there is a huge, huge
change management aspect, right?
Because there's a, there's a bitof, like, a psychological shift
in the mind, right? I mean, Iremember we were testing in an
operation. I worked there. We webrought in a robot to move these
(18:49):
carts around in ourmanufacturing area, and it was
just, just a test. Didn't reallythink much of it. We brought the
demo unit, and within an hour ofthat demo unit, somebody,
somebody somebody rolled up tome on the forklift, and they're
like, Oh, they're bringing thatin to take our jobs, right? And
I'm like, no, no. Like, we'rejust trying something, you know,
it's not to take jobs like, youknow, we're trying to move
(19:11):
people like, you know, we don'tneed somebody to just push carts
around all day, right? We'retrying to make it easier and,
and that was something like, Iwas like, wow, we should have,
like, talked about this, thatthis is going to be an
operation. It's going to bearound, how do we address this
with the employees? And I thinkthat, you know, you need to be
clear in the the why, right?
(19:31):
Because I think when you startto bring that in the mind, does
go to like, oh, this thing isgoing to take my job, right? But
in reality, in most cases, Ithink, you know, and I've talked
to companies that have broughtrobots in and stuff and and, you
know, they're very proud of thefact that, you know, they they
haven't let anybody go. They'vebeen able to move them into more
(19:53):
meaningful positions, do highervalue type of work saves their
fattoo, yeah, and it makes them.
Comfortable, right? Like a lotof employees, like, when they
start working with them, they'relike, they have great feedback,
because they're like, Oh, I'mnot walking as much, like I'm
not pushing around a heavy cart,like I'm not lifting as much. So
there's a lot of benefits there,but you need to navigate that
(20:14):
very,very like, cautiously, right?
And be, be a little gentle, Iguess, you know, and not just
like, you know, one day, youknow, all these robots are just
showing up, and employees arelike, what's going on? Like, you
know, it's a robot revolution.
They're taking over all thesethings. And, you know, making
sure you have that changemanagement process really
(20:36):
planned out is is so vital tothe success of the solutions as
well. I love that you broughtthat up because I remember
talking with six river systems,and I was on one of their
webinars, and they mentioned howwhenever they onboard a new
customer, they make sure thatthat's part, that that's part of
the process is,I guess addressing the human
psychological component of thisrobot is going to take My job,
(20:59):
and how do I work with it,instead of seeing it as an
adversary? Now I got time foryou know, a couple more
questions here. I do want toknow what is the most incredible
warehouse robotic item thatyou've ever seen, that you're
like, wow, like the Amazons ofthe world or the Walmarts of the
world, that they have that levelof robotics interesting.
(21:24):
So, an operation itself, or likea solution itself. What's the
difference? Well, the operation,you know, being like a warehouse
that has robots in it and stuff,maybe different solutions, or
just a solution that I reallylike in particular, well, it may
be the solution you really like,yeah. So I got a lot of friends.
(21:45):
I don't want to upset anybody myfavorite child,
but I would say lately, one thatreally caught my eye recently
is a company called hummingbirdsystems. So they're utilizing
drones, but what we've seen inthe warehouse is that drones
have been primarily focused on,like, inventory counting, data
(22:05):
collection, right? So usingcomputer vision, they have
cameras on them, right? Yeah,exactly.
But hummingbird systems is usingdrones for picking actually,
really interesting. I think,I think, you know, they have
potential, definitely, veryearly on. I think the market is
like, a little maybe, kind oflike, it's very different, like,
(22:29):
from anything you've seen,right? So, it's a drone. This
drone is tethered so, so there'sa wire, basically, that's going
along the top of the pickingshelves, and it's connected to
the drone, so it's consistentpower, right, which you know,
with some of the autonomousdrones, the battery life doesn't
last that long, so you have toswap batteries, or it has to
(22:50):
land the charge. So this hasconsistent power for picking and
then it has a little arm thatextends out. And when your
products come in, you put, like,a special label on them, and
it's a super strong kind ofmagnet. I forget the scientific
term they use, but and itlatches on and it and it pulls
the arm back, and then eitherdrops it in a box or something
(23:13):
underneath, or there's anotherrobot underneath that will drop
it into which will then take itto the shipping area, wherever
it needs to go.
And I think that that is areally interesting approach. And
I think that, I think thatpeople are gonna be, like,
(23:34):
skeptical about it, right?
Because they seem like maybeit's a little slow, or how is
that really gonna work? Like inscale,
but that is, like, a very uniqueapproach that has caught my
attention, I think.
And I think the founders, theyhave a good track record
history, so they're co foundersof locust robotics and quiet
(23:57):
logistics so, so they kind ofknow what they're doing. Yeah,
right. So that's the otherreason I'm kind of, yeah, that's
not a bad start to go. Not abad, yeah. So, yeah. So that's
one for sure. And then actually,I was gonna answer the question.
I caught my eye up here on theBig Board, robust, AI, I think
is very cool too, which I wouldsay, hummingbird is like,
(24:19):
like, very experimental. I wouldsay, right? Well, robust is
definitely something that'slike, I think, really accessible
for people right now, they havesomething called Carter, which I
think is, so it's a cart, right,which is the perfect name for
cart, right? Carter.
So it is autonomous and alsomanually movable, right? So, so
(24:40):
it is basically on a robot. It'sa pick cart, put items to it, or
take items off of it. You cansend it autonomously to go where
it needs to go, or, very simply,it has a handle, and I haven't
played with it in person yet.
I'm very excited to play with ithere, because I know it's here.
You just.
Engage with the handle, and itautomatically switches to manual
(25:03):
mode, and you just can move itreal quick or move forward,
whatever you want to do. And Ithink that's a real interesting
solution for people that aremaybe just looking to get
started in automation and kindof easy, easy, accessible,
gives them more comfortabilityworking around them. And, you
know, real flexible solution,yeah. Well, that's, I mean, this
(25:23):
is one heck of an episode,because we covered a lot of
ground in a very short amount oftime, but I feel like we
accomplished then you that's whyyou're a podcaster, because you
brought it back to the entrylevel of how someone can get
started, yeah? So we got tocover the whole audience, right?
You have to, you have to go overthe whole ecosystem. So Kevin,
this was fantastic. Where canfolks follow you? If they're not
(25:45):
already following you, youshould be following him. Sure
the show all that good stuff.
Yeah. So new warehouse, we're onany podcast platform where you
find us. We're doing more onYouTube too. So you can follow
us on YouTube as well, or justhead to the new warehouse. New
warehouse.com Here's ourwebsite. Kevin, thank you so
much. Thank you so much. Great.
Pete.
(26:09):
I hope you enjoyed this episodeof everything is logistics, a
podcast for the thinkers infreight, telling the stories
behind how your favorite stuffand people get from point A to
B. Subscribe to the show. Signup for our newsletter and follow
our socials over at everythingis logistics.com and in addition
to the podcast, I also wanted tolet you all know about another
company I operate, and that'sdigital dispatch, where we help
(26:31):
you build a better website. Now,a lot of the times, we hand this
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(27:37):
hope you enjoyed this episode.
I'll see you all real soon andgo jags. You.
Blythe, welcome into another episode of
(00:05):
everything is logistics, apodcast for the thinkers and
freight. I'm your host, BlytheMilligan. We are proudly
presented by SPI Logistics, andwe've got another interview for
you from manifest, the futuresupply chain and logistics right
here in Las Vegas. And we've gota fellow podcaster here,
returning guests, third time onthe show.
I think maybe third time youmight be the first three peat
(00:26):
guests.
Blythe Brumleve (00:28):
Okay, I'll take that awesome Kevin Lawton with
the New Warehouse Podcast. He isgracious enough to join us and
tell us about all thingswarehouse robotics, because this
is a topic that is so dauntingto me. I don't know if it's
daunting to you.
Kevin Lawton (00:43):
Yes, it's becoming more and more daunting, because
there's just so many thingsgoing on. So tell us what is
first. Let's give people like,insight into you. Like, how did
you how did you start thepodcast? Like, what got you into
podcasting? Specifically,something, warehousing, yeah,
so, so I started in thewarehouse, started working in
(01:04):
the warehouse, and didn't haveany formal education around
supply chain or warehousing, andI honestly thought in the back
of my head like, Oh, this isn'tlong term, right? This isn't
long term. And now, you know, 13years later, I guess it's long
term, but I wanted to learn moreabout the industry. And at the
time,
Unknown (01:25):
there was just not much that I found, like, very
engaging or interesting.
This was, you know, maybe seven,eight years ago, and, yeah, I
just there was not like, youknow, content creators, like,
like us. And so I had done somesome blogging in the past, in my
past, and it's kind of like,maybe I'll do a blog, but
(01:47):
that was very time consuming, Ithought. And then I came across,
like podcast, the idea ofpodcasting, so I'm like, let me
do a podcast. So it was justkind of for me to learn. And
then I guess it resonated,started to get a little
traction.
And yeah, and now you know,we're recording this year, in
February, March. Our will be sixyears since we released the
(02:10):
first episode. So awesome, yeah.
So now is podcasting your mainfocus? Yeah. So podcasting is
definitely the main focus. Andthen I also teach as an adjunct
professor in in supply chain.
So, funny enough, I didn't get asupply chain education, but now
I'm giving one, and then I dosome consulting, advisory work
(02:31):
too, as well. Yeah, that'sawesome. And so you're here at
manifest, and you have, like,you're one of the few
podcasters, like, with your ownbooth, like we're, we're very
happy manifest, you know, gaveus this booth. But I want to
move up to where you're whatyou're doing, what, and tell us
what you're doing. You have abooth on the trade show floor.
Yeah, we have a booth, Booth1439
(02:51):
and basically we'll be set upthere. I'm
not sure when this is airing,but we're we are doing a live
stream from the booth tomorrowmorning, Tuesday. So we'll be
streaming live to LinkedIn,YouTube, Instagram,
and then we'll be doing someother podcasts at the booth, and
also at other people's booths aswell, so trying to capture some
(03:13):
of those solutions and the demosand things that are going on.
And then I think Wednesdayafternoon, we're going to have
some some fun with some littlesocial media clips, maybe some
trivia, something like that, andgive out some T shirts and then,
and we'll be in here too for alittle bit on Wednesday morning
as well. So, so podcasting don'tstop for you. Yes, yeah, when we
(03:33):
come to the conference tradeshow, it's like back to back to
back. Let's jam as much contentas we can. So we'll do, probably
do about like 20 interviewswhile we're here. Wow, that's
insane. I thought I'm doing sixtoday, and I thought that that
was crazy. Yeah,close to you that the stamina is
nuts. Now for the topic of thisepisode, because with manifest,
(03:54):
they have such a strong focus onrobotics, and this was one of
the first places that I was ableto see that part of the
logistics process under oneroof. But if I remember
correctly, you said in aprevious conversation that we
had is something like 90% ofwarehouses don't have any kind
of robotics. Yeah, yeah. Ithink, I think it's a very
interesting thing, because youcome to trade show conference,
(04:21):
you look online, right? LinkedInfeed, YouTube, like there's all
this video, all thisconversation about robotics and
automation. Butthe reality is that, you know,
there's still in the warehousespace. I mean, the penetration
for actual robotics andautomation is still still fairly
low in in comparison to, like,how many operations there
actually are. So there's still ahuge, huge opportunity in the
(04:44):
market to get into that. ButI think one of the challenges
is, certainly, is like barriersto entry, right? The barriers to
entry are, cost is one for sure,but I think there's also.
Maybe like a little bit of aknowledge gap too, where people
aren't quite certain whether,you know, they're really ready
(05:06):
for robots, and you know, theymay still be, like picking on
paper and things like that. Andyou know, how do I go from, you
know, kind of these oldprocesses systems, into
something that seems superfuturistic, like a robot, right?
So I think there's still a waysto go, but I think that robotics
and automation companies arerecognizing that, and you're
(05:28):
seeing like some solutions nowcome to the market that are
trying to tear down some ofthose barriers, make it a little
more accessible, a little moreapproachable, too, as well. But
yeah, I mean, I guess to answeryour question, yeah, there
definitely is still a big gapwhere
warehouses that have not goneinto automation and robotics at
(05:48):
all. And it's almost shocking, Ithink, with you to your point of
seeing all of these differentcompanies, robotics companies
that have all of these reallycool looking solutions. And if
I'm a warehouse owner like, itmakes me want to go and buy a
warehouse, just so I can usesome of these different robots
for your robot friends. Yeah, itseems like a no brainer, but I
(06:09):
imagine it's very costrestrictive. I imagine that
there's very much, like, whatare some, maybe some of the
other challenges of adoptingrobotics inside of your
warehouse. Is there like, anentry level robot that you can
get, yeah? I mean, I think that,you know, I think one of the
challenges is certainly, likeyou said, there's cost
restrictions for some systems,but because of that, I think
(06:30):
people just see robot andthey're like, oh, expensive,
right? Like they see dollarsigns, basically. But there are
solutions that are not asexpensive, I think, as they are
perceived to be, there'sdifferent pricing models too, as
well, like you can rent themthrough, like a RAS model, which
is robots as a service, right?
(06:51):
So there's options there. But Ithink some of the other
challenges too are that, youknow, a lot of operations are
just, they just haven'toptimized fully, right? And
there's a lot of things to bedone within the operation before
you can say, you know, to get toour next level of efficiency, we
need to bring in robots, right?
So if your processes are notdialed in, solidified,
(07:14):
optimized, when you bring thatrobot in, it's not going to fix
that, right? It's just gonna hada guest on my podcast one time.
It's always stuck in my headfrom a couple years ago, and he
said that if you're automating abad process, like you're just
making that bad process happenfaster, you're not making it
better, right? So when you fullyoptimize, like you've looked at
(07:35):
WMS, for example, you've lookedat, what are you using to pick
how do you make your justprocess flow better? Maybe it's
positioning inventory in acertain way to get more
efficient and be faster. Whenyou feel like you've kind of
exhausted those options, thenit's really makes sense to start
to look at the robotics andautomation and take it to the
(07:56):
next level.
So I think there's that's partof the gap there is that people
have not gone through and donethat work yet to be able to get
to that level. And then whenthey come to get robotics, I
mean, sometimes people will goafter it, and then they're
disappointed in the results, andpart of it is because they
(08:17):
haven't done those steps aheadof time. So there's a lot of
people I know that are focusingon that, from consulting
perspective, servicesperspective, to do that, but I
think that there's a lot ofsteps to take before you can
just buy a robot and just plopit in the warehouse and be like,
okay, to work. We're good. Yeah.
So what are some of so say youhave your processes pretty much
mapped out, and then after youhave those processes mapped out,
(08:41):
what does that next step looklike you? I mean, there's a
labor shortage when it comes towarehouse workers, so there's a
unique set of challenges there.
How do you know what directionto go into next? Yeah, that's, I
think that's one of the otherchallenges, actually, right? Is
that like you walk into a showlike this, or a show like, like
(09:03):
a Promat or a modax, like,everywhere you look, there's
going to be some kind ofrobotics or automation solution,
and it's all around you, right?
And, and if you're not prepared,you haven't done any real
research due diligence, like,you're kind of like, where,
where do I even start? Right? SoI think there's a lot of
education that needs to be donealso in terms of, like
(09:24):
optimizing those processes.
And that education, I think cantake you much further, right?
Because if you look at somethingas simple as, like moving a
pallet, for example, right?
There's tons of solutions thatcan move a pallet, so it's which
is the right one for me, right?
Like, how do I figure this out?
What do I go after? First,you know, it's pretty
(09:47):
interesting. In my career, I hada role and, you know, we had
very little automation. We had alittle bit of conveyor. That was
it. And my boss told me.
We need to automate unloadingcontainers, right? And kind of
like, and as this was maybethree years ago, four years ago,
(10:10):
and the idea of automation andunloading containers like, very
new at that time. And, you know,I tried to explain to him that
we're not there, like, we have alot of other things that we need
to do, or we need to automateother solutions, and the
technology is just not quitethere yet. But I think you know,
and you know to the earlierpoint from, like, a marketing
(10:33):
perspective, right? He He saw avideo of something from from
Boston Dynamics, when they werefirst messing around with that,
and that's when he was like, oh,we need to do this, right? And
I'm kind of like, it's, it's notreally realistic, yeah, it's not
really realistic for us. Like,it's kind of out of reach at
this time.
So I think there is, like, alittle maybe miss misconception
(10:54):
there, and and it is, you know,make your head spin, like, how
many solutions? And when you goand you walk in and you see all
these things moving around,you're like, oh, that could be
great. That could be great.
Wait, what's the differencebetween this one and this one?
And what's the right one for me?
Sothere really needs to be a lot
of like, due diligence, researchon that end to come to the right
decision. What does that looklike?
(11:18):
A lot it looks like listening tothe new warehouse podcast, so it
looks like No but, I mean, youknow, resources like that. I
mean, podcasts are a great wayto learn about some of these
things, looking on YouTube,connecting with people that have
done it before, I think isanother great way to do that. I
mean, like, here, you know, Imanifest if you come in and
(11:41):
you're, you know, maybe a midmarket three PL, try to connect
with somebody from, like, alarger three PL that maybe has
done some of those things thatyou want to do, and learn from
them to find out, like, youknow, how did you go about this?
Like before? And I'm surethey'll tell you, like, you
know, we did this. Don't do thisright? Like, we took the wrong
step here. Like, go about itthis way. And there's a ton of
(12:01):
consultants out there too thatfocus on this,
so working with them is a goodway to go about it. And I see a
lot of people in the industrynow too that have, that have
been on both sides, right? Youhave people that were in the
warehouse were practitioners.
They did implementations ofrobotics or other systems
themselves, and now they go andwork for the end user or
solution provider. So whenyou're engaging with some of
(12:24):
these companies and you'restarting to do some discovery,
I think it's very important tounderstand, are the people
you're interacting with, do theyhave that experience, right?
Like, do they actually feel whatyou've been going through, or
have they gone through that inthe past? Have they really done
a project like this before?
(12:46):
And you know not to say thatpeople that haven't are not
great, but you know that thatknowledge, if you're just
starting from kind of thebeginning, is really needed to
be able to accomplish that.
Yeah, yeah. It sounds like it'sone of those things that it just
can become overwhelming soquickly, and if you don't have
somebody that has been throughthat experience before, or if
you do have somebody that hasbeen through that experience,
(13:07):
and it's an incredibly valuableresource,
so with maybe some of the thingsthat you're going to see this
upcoming week at manifest ormaybe some things that you've
seen you know In the past, whatare maybe some of the most
interesting high level roboticsthat you've seen that are also
practical? Yeah,yeah, that's good question. I
(13:29):
think here just walking throughthe floor this morning and
yesterday morning, a little bit,seeing who's here, there's
actually a couple of differentsolutions that are focused on
inventory management, inventorycontrol from a robotics
perspective, right? So you have,here you have Verity gather, AI
Corvis robotics, doing drones,right? Drone counting Nokia as
(13:54):
well. Here they do drones aswell for inventory counting
Nokia, like the phonemanufacturer, yeah, Nokia
aims, I think they're calling itnow, yeah,
so they have a space here, andthey're using drones for that,
and then dexterity too as well,which has, like, maybe arguably
(14:15):
the tallest robot out There, thebig LEGO model.
Yeah, I love it. All my Legomodels. My son steals them. So I
can't, like, keep them on mybookshelf, but I love them. So,
so that's one I think that issomewhat low hanging fruit in a
(14:36):
sense, because they're justcapturing data, information,
right? So there's not, not ahuge change that needs to happen
there. In some cases, maybe youneed to switch around your
labeling things like that. Andthat's one thing, I think, from
an inventory perspective, thatcan make a huge impact on the
operation overall.
The other one, I think that is,you know, kind of low hanging.
(15:00):
Root, in a sense, is it's justsimply like, is there a movement
that you do every day on aconsistent basis? Right? Do you
pick up pallets in this area andmove them to this area every
single day, right? In a frequentbasis? That's an easy thing
where, oh, this is happening.
It's repeatable, right? We gofrom this location to this
(15:20):
location, so we can automatethat, right? So that
predictability is a good placeto go after that.
But I think additionally,actually a good solution for
that that's here as well, iswith Big Joe. They have an
automated pallet jack.
Used it before. It's really easyto use
(15:42):
and engages ballot. You kind ofteach it where it needs to go,
and then you can reprogram it ifyou need to reprogram it. But
that movement from A to B is aneasy way to start, for sure,
yeah, and that's when it to yourearlier point, when you were
talking about documenting yourprocesses. That would be an
example of, you know, what atypical, you know, worker, a is
doing these things throughoutthe day. Is that a safe
(16:04):
assumption that that's one ofthe processes that you would map
out and then try to figure outhow robotics will fit into that
particular process? Yeah,exactly. So you want to map out
your processes, right? Andunderstand, okay, where do we
have the same thing happeningover and over, right? So, you
know, the pallet movement is anexample, right? Maybe you have,
like, you know, a packing area.
You're loading up pallets withpackages that are going to go
(16:27):
out, and then every day, whenthat pallet is full, that pallet
is going to go to the loadingdock, right? So you can easily,
you know, use an automatedpallet jack or something to come
pick up that pallet when it'sready, take it over to the
loading dock, right? Because ifyou have a human doing that,
right, they're essentially justdoing travel time, right? If you
look at, you know, lean and 5sprinciples like, that's, it's
(16:52):
waste, right? So, so where isthat waste happening from a
human perspective, and then, howdo we address that? How do we
automate? How do we come up withsolutions to do that movement
that's, you know, consistent ona regular basis, if you're doing
something that's like, one offmovements or things like that,
it's going to be really hard tofind the ROI of the system. Last
year, when I was at thisconference, there were these
(17:15):
skates that you put on the bar.
Remember shift robotics, I thinkso. Is that something that is
realistic for a warehouse toimplement? Because it seems like
that would be a really easyentry level, even though I was
not that graceful on them. No,no. I thought maybe like twirls
and stuff, yeah? No, the knees,yeah, I feel you there.
(17:39):
Definitely.
I think that, uh, I haven'theard anything from them lately.
I was wondering if they were alittle bit of a smaller booth.
So I didn't want, I didn't knowif maybe they, you know, yeah, I
think they had an interestingapproach, right? Because
there's, I mean, there's acouple different ways to look at
automation. It's like, how do wedo something that a human
doesn't necessarily want to do,or is just like repetitive
(18:03):
or, how do we use something likethat solution to to make that
human more productive, but alsomore comfortable, right? So, and
I was addressing like, gettingthem to move faster through
through the warehouse, I thinkthat is an interesting concept,
but I do think there was, therewould be a challenge getting
employees like to adapt to themright and use them on a regular
(18:25):
basis. So I think that's, Ithink that's also one of the
points on automation robotics,is that there is a huge, huge
change management aspect, right?
Because there's a, there's a bitof, like, a psychological shift
in the mind, right? I mean, Iremember we were testing in an
operation. I worked there. We webrought in a robot to move these
(18:49):
carts around in ourmanufacturing area, and it was
just, just a test. Didn't reallythink much of it. We brought the
demo unit, and within an hour ofthat demo unit, somebody,
somebody somebody rolled up tome on the forklift, and they're
like, Oh, they're bringing thatin to take our jobs, right? And
I'm like, no, no. Like, we'rejust trying something, you know,
it's not to take jobs like, youknow, we're trying to move
(19:11):
people like, you know, we don'tneed somebody to just push carts
around all day, right? We'retrying to make it easier and,
and that was something like, Iwas like, wow, we should have,
like, talked about this, thatthis is going to be an
operation. It's going to bearound, how do we address this
with the employees? And I thinkthat, you know, you need to be
clear in the the why, right?
(19:31):
Because I think when you startto bring that in the mind, does
go to like, oh, this thing isgoing to take my job, right? But
in reality, in most cases, Ithink, you know, and I've talked
to companies that have broughtrobots in and stuff and and, you
know, they're very proud of thefact that, you know, they they
haven't let anybody go. They'vebeen able to move them into more
(19:53):
meaningful positions, do highervalue type of work saves their
fattoo, yeah, and it makes them.
Comfortable, right? Like a lotof employees, like, when they
start working with them, they'relike, they have great feedback,
because they're like, Oh, I'mnot walking as much, like I'm
not pushing around a heavy cart,like I'm not lifting as much. So
there's a lot of benefits there,but you need to navigate that
(20:14):
very,very like, cautiously, right?
And be, be a little gentle, Iguess, you know, and not just
like, you know, one day, youknow, all these robots are just
showing up, and employees arelike, what's going on? Like, you
know, it's a robot revolution.
They're taking over all thesethings. And, you know, making
sure you have that changemanagement process really
(20:36):
planned out is is so vital tothe success of the solutions as
well. I love that you broughtthat up because I remember
talking with six river systems,and I was on one of their
webinars, and they mentioned howwhenever they onboard a new
customer, they make sure thatthat's part, that that's part of
the process is,I guess addressing the human
psychological component of thisrobot is going to take My job,
(20:59):
and how do I work with it,instead of seeing it as an
adversary? Now I got time foryou know, a couple more
questions here. I do want toknow what is the most incredible
warehouse robotic item thatyou've ever seen, that you're
like, wow, like the Amazons ofthe world or the Walmarts of the
world, that they have that levelof robotics interesting.
(21:24):
So, an operation itself, or likea solution itself. What's the
difference? Well, the operation,you know, being like a warehouse
that has robots in it and stuff,maybe different solutions, or
just a solution that I reallylike in particular, well, it may
be the solution you really like,yeah. So I got a lot of friends.
(21:45):
I don't want to upset anybody myfavorite child,
but I would say lately, one thatreally caught my eye recently
is a company called hummingbirdsystems. So they're utilizing
drones, but what we've seen inthe warehouse is that drones
have been primarily focused on,like, inventory counting, data
(22:05):
collection, right? So usingcomputer vision, they have
cameras on them, right? Yeah,exactly.
But hummingbird systems is usingdrones for picking actually,
really interesting. I think,I think, you know, they have
potential, definitely, veryearly on. I think the market is
like, a little maybe, kind oflike, it's very different, like,
(22:29):
from anything you've seen,right? So, it's a drone. This
drone is tethered so, so there'sa wire, basically, that's going
along the top of the pickingshelves, and it's connected to
the drone, so it's consistentpower, right, which you know,
with some of the autonomousdrones, the battery life doesn't
last that long, so you have toswap batteries, or it has to
(22:50):
land the charge. So this hasconsistent power for picking and
then it has a little arm thatextends out. And when your
products come in, you put, like,a special label on them, and
it's a super strong kind ofmagnet. I forget the scientific
term they use, but and itlatches on and it and it pulls
the arm back, and then eitherdrops it in a box or something
(23:13):
underneath, or there's anotherrobot underneath that will drop
it into which will then take itto the shipping area, wherever
it needs to go.
And I think that that is areally interesting approach. And
I think that, I think thatpeople are gonna be, like,
(23:34):
skeptical about it, right?
Because they seem like maybeit's a little slow, or how is
that really gonna work? Like inscale,
but that is, like, a very uniqueapproach that has caught my
attention, I think.
And I think the founders, theyhave a good track record
history, so they're co foundersof locust robotics and quiet
(23:57):
logistics so, so they kind ofknow what they're doing. Yeah,
right. So that's the otherreason I'm kind of, yeah, that's
not a bad start to go. Not abad, yeah. So, yeah. So that's
one for sure. And then actually,I was gonna answer the question.
I caught my eye up here on theBig Board, robust, AI, I think
is very cool too, which I wouldsay, hummingbird is like,
(24:19):
like, very experimental. I wouldsay, right? Well, robust is
definitely something that'slike, I think, really accessible
for people right now, they havesomething called Carter, which I
think is, so it's a cart, right,which is the perfect name for
cart, right? Carter.
So it is autonomous and alsomanually movable, right? So, so
(24:40):
it is basically on a robot. It'sa pick cart, put items to it, or
take items off of it. You cansend it autonomously to go where
it needs to go, or, very simply,it has a handle, and I haven't
played with it in person yet.
I'm very excited to play with ithere, because I know it's here.
You just.
Engage with the handle, and itautomatically switches to manual
(25:03):
mode, and you just can move itreal quick or move forward,
whatever you want to do. And Ithink that's a real interesting
solution for people that aremaybe just looking to get
started in automation and kindof easy, easy, accessible,
gives them more comfortabilityworking around them. And, you
know, real flexible solution,yeah. Well, that's, I mean, this
(25:23):
is one heck of an episode,because we covered a lot of
ground in a very short amount oftime, but I feel like we
accomplished then you that's whyyou're a podcaster, because you
brought it back to the entrylevel of how someone can get
started, yeah? So we got tocover the whole audience, right?
You have to, you have to go overthe whole ecosystem. So Kevin,
this was fantastic. Where canfolks follow you? If they're not
(25:45):
already following you, youshould be following him. Sure
the show all that good stuff.
Yeah. So new warehouse, we're onany podcast platform where you
find us. We're doing more onYouTube too. So you can follow
us on YouTube as well, or justhead to the new warehouse. New
warehouse.com Here's ourwebsite. Kevin, thank you so
much. Thank you so much. Great.
Pete.
(26:09):
I hope you enjoyed this episodeof everything is logistics, a
podcast for the thinkers infreight, telling the stories
behind how your favorite stuffand people get from point A to
B. Subscribe to the show. Signup for our newsletter and follow
our socials over at everythingis logistics.com and in addition
to the podcast, I also wanted tolet you all know about another
company I operate, and that'sdigital dispatch, where we help
(26:31):
you build a better website. Now,a lot of the times, we hand this
task of building a new websiteor refreshing a current one off
to a co worker's child, aneighbor down the street or
stranger around the world, whereyou probably spend more time
explaining the freight industrythan it takes to actually build
the dang website. Well, thatdoesn't happen at Digital
(26:51):
dispatch. We've been buildingonline since 2009 but we're also
early adopters of AI automationand other website tactics that
help your company to be acentral place to pull in all of
your social media posts, recruitnew employees and give potential
customers a glimpse into how youoperate your business. Our new
website builds start as low as$1,500 along with ongoing
(27:13):
website management, maintenanceand updates starting at $90 a
month, plus some bonus freightmarketing and sales content
similar to what you hear on thepodcast. You can watch a quick
explainer video over on digitaldispatch.io, just check out the
pricing page once you arrive,and you can see how we can build
your digital ecosystem on astrong foundation. Until then, I
(27:37):
hope you enjoyed this episode.
I'll see you all real soon andgo jags. You.
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