Case Study: Hickory Hardware achieves centralized, high-speed order fulfillment and $5M in distribution savings with Honeywell Intelligrated

Hickory Hardware - Customer Case Study

Hickory Hardware consolidated five legacy hardware brands into a single corporate and distribution center in Nashville and faced the twin challenges of merging manual operations without disrupting service and absorbing steep commodity cost increases. The company needed a centralized, highly efficient DC that maintained fast, accurate order fulfillment and avoided passing major cost increases to customers.

Intelligrated deployed a high-speed automated material handling solution — including IntelliSort sorters, IntelliMerge, and Real Time Solutions pick-to-light and pick-to-voice systems — along with kitting and assembly lines. After addressing initial software integration and employee adoption issues, the DC consistently met service targets (98%+ fill, many orders at 100% fill), processes about 800 orders/3,500 parcels daily (peaks to 1,500/10,000), reduced DC staff from 122 to 74, cut distribution payroll by roughly $2M and overhead by $3M, and improved customer satisfaction.

Hickory Hardware

John Westendorf

Hickory Hardware