2023-05-10 13:41:54
E-commerce giant Amazon has started shipping orders again logistics center of El Far d’Empordà. The first trucks, precisely, started leaving yesterday. The new center already has 900 workers and the goal is that in three years there will be 1,500. Most of the employees are from the area, although there are also 47 who have arrived from other centers (seven of which, from Martorelles). The new center, which has involved an investment of 200 million euros, is fully robotic and moves huge numbers. It has more than 3,000 robots, 23 kilometers of tapes and can ship up to more than 600,000 orders in a single daywhich will be distributed both in their area of influence and throughout Europe.
Amazon’s new logistics center at the Logis Empordà shopping center began operations on April 17. Since then, the work has focused on the entire product input and distribution side. Yesterday, however, the cycle was completed. Because the first trucks with orders have already left the facilities. Above all, the destination of the products will be the area of influence – the north of Catalonia, Northern Catalonia and the south of France – but there will also be some that will be sent all over Europe (because they will be part of the inventory of this center, and they will not be in other nearby ones).
The e-commerce giant’s plant in Alt Empordà already has 900 employees. They are mainly from the area – up to 95% – although there are also 47 who have arrived from other Amazon centers. Among these, those from Murcia, Seville or Barcelona; but there are also seven of those affected by the closure of Martorelles (Vallès Oriental).
The logistics center is, in fact, like a small city. In fact, it already exceeds the population of El Far d’Empordà, the municipality that hosts it (which has half a thousand inhabitants). According to its director, Jordi Bellana, the plant is home to workers “of 39 different nationalities”, with an average age of 33. Between 35 and 40% are women (which exceeds the sector average by more than ten points).
Within the Amazon plant, there are up to 60 different professional profiles. The most numerous, that of warehouse workers. Eric Sibecas, from Llançà (Alt Empordà), is one of them. Works in the order preparation area. He’s been starting his own company for a couple of months now, and going to work at Amazon allows him to “have a fixed portion to cover expenses” while he sets up his own. “Since there are rotating shifts, this gives me freedom,” he emphasizes.
Robots and artificial intelligence
The new logistics center in l’Empordà, which Amazon has named BCN4, is the first robotic first mile that the multinational has inaugurated in Europe this 2023. Just to get an idea, inside the facilities locations there are up to 23 kilometers of conveyor belt and 3,000 robots that move the 20,000 shelves where the products are stored. More than 50% of the inventory comes from small and medium-sized companies (across Spain, there are up to 13,000 that supply Amazon).
Bellana emphasizes that robotization is one of the mainstays of the logistics center. There are, for example, in the goods receiving area, in the palletizing area or in the entire part where orders are prepared. Moreover, this is also combined with artificial intelligence. This is the case, for example, of the devices worn by employees who have to enter the area where the mobile shelves are (if there is a product that has fallen to the floor or there is a breakdown).
Using these devices, it is 100% guaranteed that there are no accidents with any of the robots or mobile shelves, which can weigh up to a ton. Among the Amazon workers who have been assigned this role, here at Far d’Empordà, is Christian Cayoja.
“When one of the robots fails, and we have to enter the area, we mark the path we will follow and in this way we avoid accidents”, he explains. Cayoja has been working for the multinational for three years. First in Toledo and, now a few days ago, at the Far d’Empordà. “I wanted to have the experience of seeing a center start from scratch; I live in a rented house in Figueres with my sister,” he specifies.
66 football fields
Amazon’s new logistics center in Far d’Empordà is spread over three floors. Each one occupies about 50,000 square meters. To give you an idea, each floor is equivalent to the surface area of 22 football fields. The two upper floors are where the units are stored; and the lower one, where the products are received and the orders have just been prepared. To ensure confidentiality, everything is barcoded; the label with the customers’ name and address is not put on until the end, through a machine that uses a laser to identify them.
Since the facilities opened, its director explains that little by little they have been filled with product. “There are weeks when we have processed more than a million and now we have 5; once we have all the shelves full, this logistics center will have up to 25 million products on its shelves,” explains Bellana.
The director specifies that the facilities have the capacity to process up to more than 600,000 orders (units) in a single day. Specifically, a maximum of 605,000. “Shipments will be made all over Europe, because not all centers have the same inventory; it may be that we have unique units, and that a customer in Munich requests them,” he underlines.
Jordi Bellana explains that the moments when the center will reach its maximum dispatch capacity will be, precisely, those of “maximum demand”. He mentions, above all, Black Friday and the Christmas campaign. “Apart from that, however, we also have ‘prime’ campaigns, for example in July, or others in which orders for certain products specifically increase, such as books for Sant Jordi or at the beginning of the school year”, explains the director.
Up to 1,500 workers
The new robot center that Amazon has in Far d’Empordà will be adding workers in the coming months. The goal, Bellana specifies, is to reach 1,500 in three years. At the outset, the salary they will receive will be more than 1,380 euros per month. Across Catalonia, the American e-commerce giant currently employs more than 7,300 people.
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