Next Day Delivery on Standard Products Now Assured
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It has long been a genuine boast of ours that standard connectors would be in the hands of the customer within 24 hours. Indeed, for years, the company’s slogan was “Our stock today, yours tomorrow. Today, it’s “We Connect Technology”, but the delivery promise remains.
Guaranteeing Next Day Delivery
Rapid delivery has always been achievable for us thanks to a massive stockholding of connector products held at the company’s UK Headquarters – a massive and imposing country estate which includes a large Victorian mansion as well as modern manufacturing and assembly facilities.
However, sustained growth and the successful launch of a division dedicated to the fast-moving motorsport sector came together to put pressure on the side of Lane’s business dedicated to getting the product out of the door and shipped to the customer.
The situation was not helped, either, by the fact that we, including our sister Lodge Group company Weald Electronics, also build to order and ship customer specific connectors within days and not the weeks often taken by other connector suppliers. Significantly, these can include specials built from our multi-million pound inventory of connector piece parts as well as high performance circular connectors designed and manufactured by Weald Electronics to meet the requirements of demanding standards including MIL-DTL-26482 and MIL-DTL-38999.
A country house as an HQ is fine but….
Improving Our Facilities
According to Managing Director Simon Hammerton, being based in a fine Victorian mansion works well for management, sales and marketing offices but can pose enormous issues when it comes to space-hungry departments like product stores and dispatch.
“Over the years we have gradually filled every ground floor and basement space with finished connectors and connector piece parts ready for the adjacent packaging and dispatch areas”, says our Managing Director Simon Hammerton.
“With more than 30,000 items shipped each week and bearing in mind our commitment to the fastest possible delivery times, it became quite clear that a major rethink in the way we move products from our mansion-based warehouse to the courier’s truck was important if we were to continue to meet our customers’ delivery expectations,” he adds.
With that in mind, we have now opened a new efficient picking, packaging and dispatch facility next to product warehousing. The new facility is designed to make use of the latest product movement systems as well as environmentally responsible packaging materials – recyclable cartons and less waste for example.
While it still needs the human touch, much of the new product packaging and dispatch facility uses technology to speed the process and eliminate the potential of human error.
Lane’s Managing Director, Simon Hammerton is reluctant to put a figure on the cost of the new facility claiming instead that the significant investment will ensure that we can continue to meet our commitment to getting connectors to the customer which is very much in line with industry expectations.
Take a peek at our new facility below:
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You can find our full range of electronic connectors, including connectors by the industry’s leading manufacturers, at the FC Lane Online Shop.