State-of-the-art central warehouse for REWE

Hall: 4,
Stand-Nr.: 4D40 

On Friday, June 21, REWE Group celebrated the opening of its new central warehouse for the storage of dry goods in Magdeburg Rothensee together with guests from politics, the neighborhood and partner companies. REWE has invested around 250 million euros in the new 50,000 square meter building. The consulting and planning company io was responsible for the lead consulting of the building and the entire site.

Over the past three years, REWE Group, together with io as lead consultant, has implemented the logistics network with a second central warehouse location in Magdeburg as part of the Benefit25 expansion initiative. The "RE D 39" building was completed in 2023, and the logistics center has been in the ramp-up phase since the beginning of 2024. In the future, the North and East regions will be supplied with around 20,000 items from the dry goods assortment on an area of around 50,000 square meters. Automation will play a key role here – more than 50% of the warehouse processes in retail logistics will be fully automated.

"With this high-tech warehouse in Magdeburg, we are not only securing the supply of goods to our stores in the north and east, we are also entering new dimensions in terms of the level of automation and performance of this second central warehouse. We opened our first partially automated central warehouse in Neu-Isenburg in 2014, followed by the second partially automated warehouse in Henstedt-Ulzburg in 2022. Since then, we have gained a lot of experience in automating warehouse processes. With 50% full automation, the RE D 39 is now the next evolutionary step in central logistics and makes Magdeburg one of the most modern logistics locations – not only for us at REWE Group, but for the whole of Europe," says Peter Maly, who is also responsible for Logistics and Supply Chain Management on the Management Board of REWE Group.

Focus on sustainability

In addition to automation, sustainability is also at the forefront when it comes to implementing retail logistics. The creation of the second location will significantly reduce the number of supply routes in REWE Group’s logistics network.

"Supplying from Magdeburg instead of Neu-Isenburg saves us 4 million kilometers of transportation every year," said Andy Bertmann, Head of Central Logistics Management at REWE Markt GmbH. "The new location thus has a decisive positive impact on the climate targets of REWE Group.

The building itself has been designed with sustainability and energy efficiency in mind from the start of the project through to realization and operation. This includes the use of regional building materials, waste heat recovery, targeted air conditioning, optimized electrical systems, lighting, photovoltaics, green roofs and energy simulation. In addition, the design of the entire site included meaningful ecological mitigation measures for the structural intervention.

The building was awarded DGNB Gold Standard certification.

The building and system technology create a modern and ergonomic working environment for REWE’s 270 employees. Only 50% of the product range – mainly light and small goods – is packed manually. The remaining 50% is picked fully automatically using "Automated Case Picking" to reduce the ergonomic burden on employees. AI-based algorithms are also used in automation and robotics.

"With io’s relevant logistics and industry expertise, the lead consulting // plus planning approach made a valuable contribution to the timely planning and completion of the building," says Florian Heimerl, member of the io management board.

About REWE

With a turnover of 30.6 billion euros (2023), more than 170,000 employees across Germany and 3,800 stores, REWE Markt GmbH is one of the leading companies in German food retailing. The REWE and nahkauf stores are operated as stores or by independent retailers. The cooperative REWE Group is one of the leading trading and travel and tourism companies in Germany and Europe. The company achieved a total external turnover of more than 92 billion euros in the year under review. Founded in 1927, REWE Group has around 390,000 employees and is represented in 21 European countries.