CASE STUDY: Designed Conveyor Systems (DCS) Upgrades Footwear Retailer’s Controls and Deploys DATUM WES in a Live Retrofit

A leading specialty footwear retailer operating a single distribution center faced a critical operational challenge. Its existing controls infrastructure had reached end-of-life and would no longer be supported. It also lacked the visibility needed for modern labor management, prompting the company to seek a retrofit of its warehouse control systems and operational processes. Adding to the project’s complexity was the need to maintain ongoing operations and minimize disruption during peak seasons. The retailer partnered with Designed Conveyor Systems (DCS) to design and execute a phased live retrofit. DCS modernized the facility’s control hardware and deployed its proprietary DATUM warehouse execution system (WES), which introduced enhanced labor visibility and laid the foundation for further efficiency gains.

The Challenge

A specialty footwear retailer — operating more than 800 stores across the U.S., Puerto Rico, and Canada — runs a single distribution center outside of Nashville, Tenn. From there, the company replenishes its stores and fulfills approximately 50% of its e-commerce orders, shipping direct-to-consumer (its stores fill and ship other online orders).

On average, the facility handles 10,000–12,000 stock keeping units (SKUs) daily. Seasonal fluctuations drive inventory turnover 12 times a year, with roughly 40,000 SKUs passing through the operation annually. Staffing includes 200 employees working across two shifts. Inventory is picked from four picking modules equipped with two floor induction points for carts. A packing merge and sortation system incorporates taping diverts to seal cartons, which then move to a shipping sorter outfitted with diverts for trailer loading.

A History of System Updates and Expansions

The facility had undergone several system updates and expansions over the prior two decades, noted the retailer’s Vice President of Distribution. Having worked there for more than 20 years, the VP and his team increasingly found their productivity hamstrung by aging infrastructure and outdated controls.

“Our mechanical functionality hasn’t changed much over time, but the guts of the system — the controls — had become outdated. Troubleshooting required specialized knowledge, and training new staff took longer than necessary,” recalled the VP. “We were running on PC-based control systems, which had become increasingly cumbersome to maintain. Additionally, support from our original systems integrator was ending, and upgrades carried high risk for operational downtime.”

Instead, the retailer wanted to switch over to programmable logic controller (PLC)-based controls. By deploying a standardized control platform, the facility could ensure that technicians and maintenance teams — both internal and external — would have the right skill sets to support the system.

Further, the company wanted to gain real-time insight into labor productivity through better data visibility. Before the retrofit, labor planning relied heavily on warehouse management system (WMS) reporting, which offered snapshots but lacked granularity. Managers needed a system that could integrate control-level data — conveyor cycle times, scans, and carton positions — to provide a new layer of operational intelligence that would enable improved labor planning and standards.

Additionally, the specialty footwear retailer’s leadership team saw the project as an opportunity to lay the foundation for future flexibility. “While we weren’t ready to overhaul our entire system at once, we wanted to stabilize the platform now to enable future improvements like zone balancing, advanced labor management analytics, and potential automation deployments,” said the VP. “Our existing system couldn’t support any of that.”

Top Requirement: Updates Couldn’t Impede Productivity

However, the company had a strict requirement for the retrofit: It had to be performed while the facility remained live and operating. This meant avoiding major disruptions, ensuring safety, and carefully sequencing work to minimize downtime.

In evaluating prospective vendors to undertake the project, the VP emphasized that the decision was not just about technology — it was about trust and culture.

“We’ve worked with a lot of integrators over the years. For me, it’s about finding people who understand our business, are collaborative, and treat us as a partner. That’s what drew me to Designed Conveyor Systems (DCS),” he said, citing DCS’ strong track record of delivering complex retrofits and a reputation for collaboration as deciding factors in the system integrator’s selection.

The Solution

Led by Senior Account Executive Fred Rudolph, DCS proposed a controlled, phased system upgrade that aligned with the retailer’s long-term vision. “They weren’t trying to reinvent the system — they just needed a foundation they could count on,” Rudolph explained. “The goal was modernization without risk.”

Through careful phasing, modern PLC integration, standardized documentation, future-ready design, and the implementation of its proprietary DATUM warehouse execution system (WES), DCS helped the retailer achieve a more reliable, maintainable, and data-rich operation — without sacrificing uptime or flexibility.

Tight Coordination, Planning, and Communication Essential

From the outset, the project was designed as a phased retrofit. This ensured that upgrades could be completed without impacting daily operations.

Wiley Stidham, DCS’ Project Manager, emphasized the multiple steps taken to minimize operational interruptions long before any work began. First, DCS worked with the retailer to jointly map out the project timeline against the company’s volume cycles, code freezes, and operational priorities.

Because the retrofit occurred in a live facility, timing was everything. DCS kicked off the work after the retailer’s 2024 peak season, ensuring the most disruptive activities — like control panel swaps and wiring transitions — happened when order volume was lowest.

A Phased Deployment Approach

Also to reduce the impact on the operation, DCS divided the project into small, contained phases, focusing on one control zone or pick module at a time. Each of the four pick modules had its own dedicated control panels which DCS re-controlled sequentially. Some modules were handed over fully to DCS for several weeks, while others could only be accessed on weekends or off-shifts.

Stidham said DCS used weekly coordination meetings with the facility’s operations and IT teams to confirm exact dates for each pick module, adjusting in real time for unexpected volume surges. When operations projected higher-than-expected throughput, DCS flexed the schedule rather than forcing a conflict.

“We were asking the question, ‘These dates still work, right?’ first,” Stidham said, “instead of waiting for them to come to us. That proactive communication kept surprises off the table.”

The phased turnover ensured the operation could keep shipping product while DCS technicians worked in one area at a time. After each phase, DCS validated functionality, handed the module back to operations, and only then moved to the next one.

Stidham coordinated constantly with both DCS’ controls team and software engineering team, ensuring awareness on both sides when either made an update.

User Acceptance Testing Key to Smooth Transition

During commissioning, the team ran user acceptance testing (UAT) and parallel monitoring — the new DATUM WES communicated with both the legacy and new control panels in test mode before full cutover.

“We went live with the software first,” Stidham noted. “That let us see all the messaging and monitor system behavior before changing any hardware. When we finally swapped panels, we already knew communication worked.”

This strategic sequencing meant that by the time control panels were physically replaced, DCS had already verified data flow and logic integrity — reducing risk and eliminating mid-install surprises.

DATUM Deployed Better Operational Visibility

One of the specialty footwear retailer’s biggest challenges prior to undertaking the retrofit was the lack of real-time visibility across their fulfillment process, noted Brian Curran, Vice President of Software at DCS.

“Their legacy system could move cartons efficiently but offered little insight into where exceptions occurred or how throughput was trending during live operations,” he observed.

By implementing the DATUM WES, DCS gave the retailer a centralized view of the entire material flow, from induction to shipping. The system continuously monitors conveyor activity, order status, and performance metrics in real time — something the old PC-based system couldn’t provide.

“Now they can actually see what’s happening as it happens,” Curran said. “They have visibility into every divert, every scan, every lane. That’s powerful for operations because it lets them make adjustments on the fly.”

DATUM Reprioritizes Order Flows, Picking Waves Dynamically

DATUM’s flexible configuration allows the system to prioritize and reprioritize order flows and picking waves dynamically, based on changing business needs. For example, if e-commerce order volume spikes, DATUM can temporarily allocate more conveyor or sorter capacity to e-commerce lines without manual intervention. Conversely, during a back-to-school retail surge, resources can shift to store replenishment.

Because DATUM was deployed alongside the modernization of the control panels and PLC network, the operation now benefits from a much more stable and maintainable controls environment. Curran noted that the previous PC-based system had limited fault recovery and required manual intervention during unplanned stops.

With DATUM tied into the new PLC-based controls, the system can automatically detect, log, and respond to many issues, improving overall equipment uptime. The WES can requeue cartons, pause sortation zones, and resume automatically after faults, reducing human intervention and keeping material flowing.

“It’s a night-and-day difference in stability,” Curran said. “When something happens, the system knows what to do — it’s not waiting for a person to fix it.”

Control Panel Updates Conducted Methodically

DCS’ Controls Delivery Manager Vince Ashby and his team first audited all of the operation’s existing controls hardware to determine what could and could not be reused.

Across the facility’s 26 control panels, Ashby determined which components required updating while minimizing the risks associated with replacing or rewiring components unnecessarily. Principally, the updates were limited to swapping the outdated PC-based controls with modern PLCs and outdated input/output (I/O) communication cards with new Ethernet/IP based devices, he explained.

DCS’s controls team and electrical subcontractors prepared everything ahead of time — testing existing hardware with new PLCs, wiring diagrams, new PLC programs — so that on-site area recontrols could happen as quickly as possible.

“We built and tested everything off-site and came in ready,” Ashby said. “It was like plug-and-play compared to traditional tear-out work. Once the software team finished their takeover, that’s when the controls upgrade started. By ensuring the software was already validated, we could isolate issues to the control system upgrade if something came up.”

To avoid interfering with operations schedules, DCS often performed panel upgrades and testing on weekends, when the retailer’s production wasn’t running. “Some areas we could work in for three or four weeks straight,” added Ashby. “Others, we only had weekends available to validate the new PLC code. We tailored our approach to each zone’s operational rhythm.”

PLCs Sized to Accommodate Future System Expansions

Additionally, all the PLCs were sized to give the operation the capability to add new technologies or automation in the future without requiring additional controls upgrades, Ashby noted.

“That way, if they put in a new scan tunnel or upgrade a sorter, they won’t need to upgrade the processors or other controls,” he said. “Throughout the whole recontrol process we thought about future expansions and selected technologies that had the capacity to support new systems.”

Every control panel installation ended with a thorough commissioning and hand-back process. DCS verified that conveyors, scanners, and sorters were running under new PLC logic; confirmed system messaging between the panels and the WES; and only then released the zone back to operations.

This ensured no untested code or wiring ever entered the live environment. According to Ashby, this disciplined validation process is part of why the facility experienced minimal downtime and no unplanned outages throughout the retrofit.

The Results

By replacing the specialty footwear retailer’s PC-based controls with modern PLC-based controls, the facility is now aligned with current standards. That makes the systems easier to maintain, said the company’s VP of distribution.

“PLC is an industrial standard. If somebody comes to work on our control panels, it makes it a lot easier because that’s what they’re trained on today. It simplifies troubleshooting,” he observed.

Further Operational Refinements Continuing

Although the hardware updates and DATUM installation are complete, the collaboration between DCS and the retailer continues.

One of the retrofit’s most transformative elements is through DATUM’s ability to track conveyor times, scans, and carton positions in real time. This creates the foundation for advanced labor management and operational planning such as zone balancing — a process that redistributes work more evenly across zones to improve productivity. With DATUM’s visibility, supervisors can identify slow zones, balance workloads between modules, and reduce the need for manual workarounds.

“Right now we plan in WMS and are within about 45 minutes of the plan. By layering in real-time data from the WES, conveyor, and zone systems, we can push that gap even closer,” he noted, explaining the potential impact.

“However, we didn’t want to change too much at once. Our goal was stability first, then to add these refinements to get more efficiency. We’re now working to fine-tune standards in a way that gives us much better precision,” continued the VP.

DATUM’s additional layer of visibility also creates opportunities for real-time labor allocation adjustments, enhanced productivity analysis, and potential artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled optimization to recognize patterns and improve efficiency. It also provides better diagnostic tools, allowing maintenance and IT teams to pinpoint faults quickly and minimize downtime.

DATUM Delivers Future Scalability

Deploying DATUM didn’t just solve the operation’s existing challenges. It prepares the facility to implement automation technologies. The WES provides an open, modular interface layer that can communicate easily with future systems like autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS), or robotic picking. As a brand- and technology-agnostic software solution, DATUM futureproofs the operation for incremental automation.

The retrofit illustrates that trust, communication, and a shared commitment to success are as important as technical capability. DCS brought not only technical expertise but aa collaborative approach that the retailer valued deeply, the VP added.

“Working with DCS is great. They have a heart for their customer. They care about what they do, and they care about solving the things we need to solve,” he said. “I can literally pick up the phone and call Brian at DCS. That’s the kind of relationship I want with my partner. They listen to ideas, support our goals, and are helping us achieve them.”

He concluded by emphasizing the cultural alignment with DCS as a major factor in the project’s success. “DCS treats us like people. It never felt like they’re just chasing the dollar. They wanted to make our lives as easy as possible and take on the burden. That makes all the difference.”

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