Reliable wireless network furnishes productivity

Founded in 1970, Mealey’s Furniture distributes living room, dining room and bedroom furniture to Eastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey. The company’s warehouse operations depend on a wireless network that is a critical part of the order fulfillment process, as the company incorporates RFID tracking. When leadership recognized the wireless network dropped connectivity on a regular basis, it installed a wireless kinetic mesh network that provides optimal connectivity across its fixed and mobile assets.

The warehouse’s order fulfillment system includes seven orderpicker lift trucks equipped with computers that communicate with access points. Much of the equipment operates on a radio frequency, and every time the equipment goes down—sometimes for three to five days at a time—it causes business interruptions and affects productivity.

Stephen Sredinski, IT director at Mealey’s Furniture, came to the company in late 2014 and immediately noticed chronic connectivity issues. “One day everything worked, the next day the Wi-Fi was totally out and lift truck scanners couldn’t connect,” he says. “It was averaging a couple days of functionality followed by a day of downtime.”

Ed Darcy, president at Mealey’s, said the entire operation then reverted to manual pick tickets that made it much more time-consuming to pick and put away merchandise. Productivity fell by as much as 50% during these times, and operators were compelled to work overtime to recover.

Sredinski noticed an odd pattern of failure that led him to the IT director at a warehouse across the street. The neighbor’s wireless network was so powerful that it interrupted the Mealey’s network. In a bizarre twist of fate, the neighbor’s solution provider now powers an equally robust network for both warehouses.

The new network (Rajant Corp., rajant.com) employs nodes to reliably direct data on the best available traffic path and frequency to deliver critical information in real time. Nodes can act independently and with full routing capabilities, creating a true peer-to-peer, mobile-enabled network. With no single point of failure, the technology guards against interruptions that cause costly downtime.

“It was clearly a morale issue, and now that it’s fixed it makes a world of difference for operators,” Darcy says. “There are a lot of happy people now.”

Just two months into having a stable wireless network, productivity has increased 10% to 15% over previous highs. The inventory team has also boosted efficiency by scanning merchandise without interruptions, allowing them to maintain appropriate inventory cycles and correct human errors through the technology.