DALLAS — City Electric Supply has announced the opening of its sixth fulfillment center in North America, marking a significant milestone as the company's first facility in Canada.
Located in Toronto, the new fulfillment center will play a crucial role in optimizing logistics processes and enhancing the ability to deliver products swiftly and efficiently to branches and customers.
"Toronto was an important addition to the CES network," Director of CES Online North America Rich Antonaros said. "After evaluating factors like branch density and logistics, it became clear that this new center would improve the company's ability to service its northern branches quickly."
The Toronto fulfillment center joins the CES network of strategically placed facilities, including those in Jacksonville, Florida, Charlotte, North Carolina, Fort Worth, Texas, Las Vegas and Indianapolis. These fulfillment centers are essential to ensuring CES can consistently fulfill orders within a single day, reinforcing the company promise that "same day is better than next day."
Spanning 157,000 square feet, the Toronto facility is the largest CES fulfillment center to date. Its size reflects both the growing demand from branches and the commitment of City Electric Supply to continue improvement in supply chain efficiency. Fulfillment centers have proven to be pivotal in the growth of CES, with branches using the first center seeing 47% faster growth within the first year.
The plan is not solely to continue building fulfillment centers across North America, but to also continue innovation with each additional location. The new facility in Toronto is equipped with cutting-edge automation designed to streamline operations, reduce errors, and accelerate order processing.
"These centers are hubs of innovation," Antonaros said, "and we're working on even more enhancements, including an automated wire machine that will be introduced by early 2025. This will significantly increase production capacity and ensure we can maintain our commitment to quick turnaround times."
In addition to automation, CES has consolidated its vendor base for key products, bringing much of the supply chain for items like boxes, covers, and fittings in-house through TAMCO Group — the company that houses the in-house brands of City Electric Supply. This strategic move enables CES to respond more rapidly to the needs of its branches and customers.
"Our goal is to make sure no branch is more than a day away from the product it needs," said Antonaros. "We're working to continuously improve our product and service to the customer. That is something we preach and live by. We're always working to listen and understand how we can take feedback and apply it to identify new value-added services."
The Toronto fulfillment center marks a significant step forward for CES and its dedication to speed, quality, and customer satisfaction. And on that journey, as always, the CES branches are equally important.
"Local branches are the reason we do what we do," said Antonaros. "They're why our business is as successful as it is, and that it continues to grow at the pace it does."
