Barilla America, Inc., the U.S. based division of The Barilla Group, Italy's largest food producer, was launched in 1996. Just three years later, Barilla became the number one brand of pasta in the United States (and today produces the fastest-growing pasta and sauce brands in their categories). To achieve this milestone in such a short time is a testament to Barilla's history of 130 years of excellence in food production, brand building, product quality, and global consistency.

Barilla wanted a logistics partner when they set up their first North American manufacturing plant in Ames, Iowa. The single operation would serve as the Midwest Distribution Center and act as the national replenishment center for Barilla. That partner would be involved in the warehouse design and layout of a single 180,000 square foot warehouse attached to the production plant. With this start-up, their partner would need to provide the systems and personnel, assist in obtaining equipment and setting up the warehouse, and offer initial load consolidation and freight management until Barilla's own systems were firmly established in North America. In addition, Barilla required ongoing packaging services.

When Jacobson Companies moved into the new Barilla warehouse in Ames, Iowa, construction was still being completed. The racking was not yet in and the Jacobson team worked within the Barilla production plant moving product directly from packaging onto the warehouse floor. Once the 24,000-racked positions became available, the process continued directly from packaging to racking. Early warehousing was completed with best practices using a paper tracking system. Operations migrated seamlessly to an RF device tracking system shortly after operations began.

Jacobson provided the transportation management support initially required for Barilla to begin North America operations, and continued to support that effort until Barilla transportation was stable in North America.

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