News

Campus warehouse and delivery services consolidated
By Carol C. Bradley

A re-organization of the University’s warehouse and distribution services—and a new 15,000-square-foot addition to the Mason Services Center Building—will result in coordinated and considerably more efficient delivery services across campus, says Daniel E. Skendzel, director of administrative services.

In an administrative restructuring last year, the Warehouse and Delivery Group was created by combining General Services, the Building Services warehouse, Central Receiving (including recycling), Mail Distribution and ND Surplus under associate director Frank Parker.

Individual departments shouldn’t notice much change, Skendzel says. “They will still get the products they’ve ordered. But it will greatly improve the efficiency of delivery.”

Previously, three different departments managed three different warehouses on campus, with four different departments handling deliveries.

The result was that one truck might be delivering boxes of office supplies to a building, at the same time another was delivering custodial supplies.

With the new system, all deliveries other than mail will arrive on one truck. For the time being, mail will continue to be delivered by staffers on golf carts, but the department is looking at ways to integrate mail services with other deliveries.

“The efficiencies will be huge,” says Frank Parker says. “We’re really going to save on the number of vehicles going to buildings.”

The 15,000-square-foot warehouse addition to the Mason Services Center, scheduled to be completed in June, will allow all outside warehouse space to be moved onto campus. Previously, the University had rented storage space on Grape Road.

When changes are complete, the current warehouse facility in the Maintenance Building on Douglas Road will be known as Central Receiving South. That facility will handle both receipt and delivery of large freight, as well as storage of departmental supplies—animal bedding for the Freimann Life Science Center, for example—tables and chairs for campus events, and “attic storage,” the University’s stock of ceiling tiles, floor tile, carpeting and the like.

Upon completion, the Mason Services warehouse addition, which will be known as Central Receiving North, will receive and deliver small parcels, and store and deliver all custodial supplies.

Having all warehouse storage on campus “is going to be great,” says David L. Czajkowski, manager of General Services. With items such as tables and chairs for events stored off campus, driving and loading a truck could easily take 45 minutes to an hour or more, at each end of the trip. Now, Czajkowski says, “The items will be right here. It will greatly improve our turnaround time on deliveries.”

More efficient delivery systems will save on fuel, adds Skendzel, but the real impact will be in increased productivity. “We’ll be able to do more with less effort.”

Contact General Services at 631-8327 or visit bizops.nd.edu for more information and contact numbers for various departments. General Services work orders should still be submitted with a facilities requisition, which can be found on inside.nd.edu under the “administrative tools” tab.