Material handling

What is material handling?

Material handling is the movement of goods and materials inside a facility from one point to another and placing them in the arrangement the next step needs. It covers moving items between a receiving dock, storage racks, production lines, picking stations, and a shipping dock; picking individual items from shelves or bins into an order; loading and unloading trucks or shipping containers; and building or breaking down pallets of boxes, bags, drums, or other units.

A finished job must deliver the load intact and in the right place without damaging the goods or dropping items. It must meet whatever limit the next step sets: a pallet's maximum height and weight, a stack's wrap and pattern, a trailer's loading sequence, or an order's exact item count and destination. Where the facility tracks inventory, the count at the new location must match what left the old one.

Much of this work is still done by people: forklift and pallet jack operators moving loads between docks and storage, workers pushing carts between stations, and manual lines where staff build pallets by hand or sort parcels into bins. Fixed conveyors and automated storage racks handle some of the fixed-route movement, but moving goods to and from flexible locations, loading irregular freight, and building varied pallet patterns still rely heavily on manual labor.

Who relies on material handling?

Warehouse and fulfillment center operators: run distribution centers for retailers, manufacturers, and online sellers. They receive, store, and ship goods, filling orders against delivery deadlines, and need pallets, totes, and parcels moved quickly between receiving, storage, picking, and shipping without damage or loss. Some own the goods passing through; others operate the warehouse under contract for another company's inventory, as third-party logistics providers.

Manufacturers running assembly lines: operate factories, particularly vehicle and heavy-equipment assembly plants, where parts and sub-assemblies must move from receiving or storage to the line and finished units move on to shipping. They own the plant and need a steady, uninterrupted supply of materials so the line does not stop.

Food and beverage producers: run processing and bottling plants where finished cases or bottles must move from the production line onto pallets ready for shipment, often under sanitation rules that call for washable equipment. They own the production facility and need the work done cleanly and at the line's pace.

Parcel and courier operators: run sorting hubs that receive, sort, and ship parcels within tight delivery windows. They own or lease the sorting facility and need completed orders moved from the sorting machines to outbound trucks fast enough to meet delivery promises.

Hospitals: move supplies, meals, linens, and equipment between departments and floors around the clock. They own the facility and need these deliveries made reliably without disrupting patient-care areas.

Construction contractors: build bridges and similar infrastructure and need heavy materials such as rebar bundles carried and positioned precisely at the job site. They perform or commission this work as part of completing the structure.

How robots handle materials

Most material handling robots move on wheels and carry the load themselves. Some ride a flat deck or shelf that a worker loads by hand; others slide a low frame under a cart or pallet and lift it free, or raise forks that lift a pallet the way a forklift does. A few tow a line of carts behind them, and some use wheels that turn in any direction to work in tight aisles. All of them use onboard sensors or cameras to find their own path around people and obstacles between a start point and an end point. A worker usually starts the job by loading the robot, pressing a button, or sending a task through an app, and the robot completes the trip and hand-off on its own.

A second group of robots use an arm. Fitted with a suction cup, gripper fingers, or both, the arm uses a camera to find an item in a bin or on a shelf and places it into a tote or onto a stack on a pallet, following a pattern a person sets up on a screen. Some of these arms stay fixed at one station; others ride a wheeled base so they can reach different spots in a warehouse or factory.

A few robots work inside storage racks themselves, climbing or riding rails to reach stored totes or pallets and bring them to a picking station. Others unload trucks and containers, using a gripper or suction pad to pull boxes out one at a time onto a conveyor, growing faster as they handle more of the same box type. A small number walk on legs rather than wheels, crossing stairs or rough ground while carrying equipment, or use two arms that learn new picking motions by watching a person do the task first.