Location Aware Picking uses your warehouse's physical layout to group orders into optimized batches and guide pickers along the most efficient path to every item. Instead of following a fixed pick list, pickers follow a route built specifically for your warehouse map, cutting down on walking time and increasing the number of units picked per trip.
Location Aware Picking is an add-on feature enabled through your Customer Success Manager (CSM) and ShipHero's implementation team. Contact your CSM to check whether Location Aware Picking is a good fit for your warehouse and to get pricing.
Location Aware Picking Key Features
| Feature | What It Does |
|---|---|
| Smart Batching | Groups your open orders into batches based on your warehouse's actual layout and order mix, increasing the number of units picked per trip. |
| Smart Routing | Calculates the most efficient pick route to every location in a batch and displays it on the picker's mobile device. |
| Live Pickers Dashboard | Shows floor managers a real-time map of picker positions and status across the warehouse. |
| Picker Performance Dashboard | Scores each picker's performance against an expected time calculated from your warehouse map. |
| Guided Putaway | Suggests optimal storage slots for incoming inventory once your warehouse is mapped. |
Location Aware Picking Benefits
Warehouses that adopt Location Aware Picking typically see these results:
- Reduced walking distance: an average reduction of 20-30%, with some warehouses seeing up to 33% savings in travel time
- Lower labor cost per order: fulfill more orders with the same or fewer pickers
- Objective picker accountability: performance scores give managers a data-based way to coach pickers
- A complete floor picture: combine picking and packing analytics in Workforce Hero for full visibility into warehouse performance
Is Location Aware Picking Right for Your Warehouse
Location Aware Picking works best in warehouses where picker walking time is a meaningful cost. Check yourself against the table below: the more boxes you check on the left, the stronger the fit.
| Signal | Strong Fit | Weak Fit |
|---|---|---|
| Order volume | High enough that walking time adds up across a shift | Very low, so setup effort outweighs the time savings |
| Warehouse size | Large enough that inefficient pick paths are measurable | Small enough that walking distance is trivial |
| Picking method | Primarily multi-item batch (MIB), where one picker fulfills several orders in a single pick run | Mostly single-item batch (SiB), case-picking, or full-case wholesale |
| Location setup | Consistent, well-organized pickable locations with naming that follows a logical path | Frequent temporary bins, ad-hoc moves, or naming you're not able to restructure |
| Picker workflow | Pickers keep their cart with them for the entire pick run | Pickers don't keep their cart with them, common in some zone-pick setups |
| Warehouse mapping | Has, or can provide, a CAD file or detailed floor plan | No floor plan, blueprint, or CAD file available in any form |
Location Aware Picking is available to 3PLs and brand-operated warehouses on ShipHero's WMS. It tends to deliver the strongest results for high-SKU, high-volume direct-to-consumer fulfillment, including fashion and apparel, beauty, supplements, tech accessories, pet, and sports and fitness brands.
Get Started with Location Aware Picking
Location Aware Picking is an add-on to your ShipHero WMS subscription. Pricing is set per warehouse based on your configuration, and adding it also unlocks Wave Picking, and future releases in that product family, at a lower price than if you added them separately later. Contact your CSM for a quote for your account.
Pricing Requirement
Your account must be on, or willing to move to, ShipHero's usage-based pricing model to add Location Aware Picking.
Once you've confirmed fit and pricing with your CSM, these articles walk through the rest:
- How to Get Started with Location Aware Picking: prerequisites, the setup process, and CAD file tips
- How to Configure Location Aware Picking Settings and Related Features: what you'll see and configure once it's active, including known limitations and common questions