Success Story Powered by New York MEP Regional Center Center for Economic Growth
Based in East Greenbush, NY, Gettysburg Flag Works has been in business since 1993. The company was started by US Army Veteran, Mike Cronin, and has been operating in their 6,000 sq. ft. building in East Greenbush since 2006 and currently has 20 team members.  They regularly keep about 250,000 units in inventory covering flags, banners, flagpoles and accessories. When COVID-19 hit, they experienced an increased demand for their products and found they had issues managing their warehouse space (2,000 sq. ft) with this demand. By 2021 they were considering expanding their facility.
Gettysburg Flag Works turned to the Capital District Regional MEP Center, Center for Economic Growth’s Business Growth Solutions organization for help. Following meetings where CEG gained an understanding of their situation and needs, they partnered with Relay Integrated Logistics & Solutions’ Larry Treen and started a project to figure out how to optimize use of the existing 6,000 sq. ft of space without expanding. They were able to do so by improving the picking and packing area and vendor drop-ship techniques. The also addressed optimizing cash flow and turnover of inventory.
We had thought about optimizing the building rather than expanding, but we weren’t sure we could get it to where we needed it. The Center for Economic Growth’s Business Growth Solutions and Relay Integrated Logistics & Solutions gave us an outside perspective that proved we can. Now we can accommodate more staff, more inventory and we should be able to continue operating out of our building for an additional three to five years.
- Eliminated the need to spend on facility expansion
- Recovered 850 sq. ft. of space by optimizing storage in 3 dimensions
Read the full story on the NIST website here.
