Picnic has invested 150 million euros in its new, robotized fulfillment center (FCA) in Oberhausen. The powerful e-food warehouse is intended to ensure that the online supermarket can supply more customers, Picnic announced at the opening on June 6. The fully automated facility is expected to enable the company to realize its growth plans and further enhance service quality. The Prime Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, Hendrik Wüst, symbolically opened the FCA by packing the first product for a customer order.
"The state-of-the-art branch enables innovative processes and high efficiency through
the use of modern technologies," Wüst said. "The food processing economy is a pillar of value creation in North Rhine-Westphalia."
To keep it that way, targeted strategies and bold investments on site are needed - for an attractive, competitive, and future-proof development.
1,500 autonomous shuttle robots move through the fulfillment center along 21 kilometers of conveyor technology through three fully automated climate zones ranging from minus 18 degrees Celsius to plus 20 degrees Celsius. The core is a self-developed software platform that coordinates all robot movements in real time -
developed by 100 Picnic engineers over two years. The building was also designed by Picnic itself for full automation.
"Our FCA sets a new global standard," said Frederic Knaudt, co-founder of Picnic Germany. "This will allow us to deliver more families their weekly groceries at the best price, reliably, in the best quality, and sustainably to their homes in the future."
The FCA will supply over 150,000 families in the Ruhr area every week and create up to 1,000 new jobs.
"The new Picnic center not only brings the most
modern technology to Oberhausen but above all, real future prospects for many people - with up to 1,000 new jobs," said the Mayor of the city of Oberhausen, Daniel Schranz.
Here, the economic future grows on Oberhausen's industrial past; it is a well-earned, implemented, and lived structural change.
In addition, Picnic is expanding: the online supermarket recently launched in Bavaria to supply an additional 350,000 households in the greater Nuremberg area. Recently, the online supermarket integrated Thermomix Cookidoo recipes into the Picnic app to simplify shopping and cooking in everyday
