7 Best Practices to Improve Warehouse Forklift Operations and Lift Truck Fleet Efficiency

Are you looking for ways to streamline your warehouse forklift operations or optimize your lift truck fleet management? Improving efficiency in material handling can reduce costs, boost productivity, and enhance safety. Based on insights from our customers, here are seven proven best practices to help you achieve these goals.

1. Assign Experienced Pros to Put-Away

• Use skilled employees for receiving and put-away tasks. They know your products and understand how to stock bins and shelves efficiently.
• Start new employees with order picking. This helps them learn products, customers, and your inventory system. Plus, their work is easy to check during packing.

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2. Schedule Truck Arrivals

• Avoid excessive waiting time in the yard and reduce pressure on receivers and shippers.
• A well-planned truck arrival schedule means fewer dock doors are needed—saving money on utilities and improving workflow.

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3. Separate Shipping and Receiving Shifts

• Schedule receiving during one shift and shipping during another.
• This reduces staging area requirements by up to 50%, freeing up valuable warehouse space.

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4. Speed Up Unloading

• Trucks sitting idle cause yard congestion and delays.
• Studies show 60% of mass merchants unload trucks in under one hour, compared to only 20–30% in the grocery industry. How does your facility compare?

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5. Maintain Warehouse Floors

• Damaged floors slow forklift operators and increase safety risks.
• Potholes and uneven surfaces can cause wheel wear, lift truck damage, and even product loss.
• Regular floor maintenance keeps operations smooth and safe.

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6. Improve Packing Operations

• Ensure packers receive complete orders to avoid delays.
• Provide enough space for safe, efficient packing.
• Maintain a consistent workflow to prevent bottlenecks. If you notice fluctuations, review your order picking process for improvements.

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7. Seek Forklift Operator Input

• Involve your lift truck operators in process improvements—they often have great ideas.
• Ask them to detail tasks and suggest ways to save time or effort.
• Observe top performers and share their best practices across the team. You might even discover a future leader!