PepsiCo completes £14m distribution centre upgrade

PepsiCo has completed a £14 million upgrade of its Southern Region Distribution Centre (SRDC) based…

PepsiCo has completed a £14 million upgrade of its Southern Region Distribution Centre (SRDC) based in Leicester, making this one of its biggest logistics investments in the UK.

A new building has been established with state-of-the-art equipment and technology that will increase the storage capacity at the site by 29%. This investment will enable PepsiCo to better meet the growing consumer demand for Walkers – which are purchased by 9 in 10 households in the UK – allowing the crisps to be distributed to supermarkets and retail partners more efficiently.

Previously PepsiCo relied on overspill sites that required crisps to be stored and transported to other locations. Now, more crisps can be stored on-site, taking over 600,000km off the road in transportation – the equivalent to travelling around the world 15 times – and annual savings of over 400 metric tonnes of CO2 as a result.

As part of the new building, the latest automated technology has been installed to retrieve and move pallets of stock more efficiently. Previously, a crane would have been used to carry two pallets of product across an aisle. These have been replaced with 18 shuttle cars across 9 levels, which can collect, store and assemble stock, with cars able to operate at the same time to make this process quicker and more efficient.

Andy Smethurst, SRDC site lead, PepsiCo, said: “After two years of planning and execution, our new SRDC building is now open for business, and set to dramatically change our logistics operation. It will create more efficiencies, more capacity, and importantly also take miles off the road so we can reduce our carbon footprint. We’re confident that this will allow us to serve our retail customers with more agility, while also ensuring the future success of our distribution centre.”