How to Find the Best Warehouse Staffing Agency Near You

Warehouse staffing agencies can help you find general laborers for your warehouse operations. They can be a good source when you need to hire fast, find temporary or seasonal workers, or need permanent hires.

However, warehouse staffing agencies are not the place to go when it comes to finding experienced professionals for your installation and integration of material handling equipment. This requires specialized expertise to ensure safety and compliance with regulations.

In this guide, we will explain how to find local warehouse staffing, how you find a warehouse staffing agency near you, and when you need to find experts for your warehouse equipment needs.

What’s an Easy Way to Hire Good Warehouse Labor?

One of the easiest ways to hire warehouse workers is by partnering with a staffing agency that specializes in warehouse and logistics staffing.

These agencies maintain a pool of pre-screened, experienced candidates ready to be placed in open warehouse positions. Using a warehouse staffing firm saves your company significant time and effort compared to recruiting, interviewing, and hiring workers directly.

You can outsource the entire hiring process from posting job ads to screening resumes, conducting interviews, background checks, skills testing, and more.

When you need to quickly ramp up staffing for a busy season, open a new warehouse, or fill vacancies, a call to your staffing agency partner can provide access to its pipeline of candidates.

Why Should I Hire a Specialized Warehouse Staffing Agency?

While general staffing agencies can provide warehouse workers, agencies that specialize in warehouse and logistics staffing offer several key advantages:

• Deep candidate pool: Specialized agencies focus solely on recruiting and placing warehouse associates. This allows them to build a large database of candidates with direct warehouse experience.
• Niche expertise: Warehouse staffing firms intimately understand the skills, physical demands, and experience required for different warehouse roles. This allows them to better evaluate and match candidates.
• Compliance knowledge: These agencies stay up-to-date on labor laws, safety regulations, and compliance requirements specific to the warehouse industry.
• Temporary-to-hire model: Many offer a temp-to-hire model where you can evaluate workers before permanently hiring them, reducing turnover risks.
• Value-added services: Some provide extra services like handling worker’s compensation claims, payroll processing, or safety training.

What Are Warehouse Workers Called?

Warehouse staffing agencies can provide candidates for numerous warehouse roles, including:

• Warehouse Associates
• Order Pickers/Selectors
• Shipping & Receiving Clerks
• Material Handlers
• Forklift Operators
• Inventory Control Specialists
• Warehouse Supervisors/Managers

The job titles and responsibilities can vary, but these roles all involve the core tasks of receiving, storing, order picking, packing, shipping, inventory management, and general warehouse operations.

Best Practices for Choosing a Warehouse Staffing Agency

When you are looking for a staffing agency to fill warehouse operations roles, here are a few tips to ensure a good fit.

Before you make contact, you should first determine the number of workers needed, job roles to be filled, and anticipated workload. The more detail you can provide about your needs, the more easily you can evaluate whether a particular agency can meet those needs.

You should look for:

• Proven industry expertise: Partner with an agency that specializes in warehouse and logistics staffing. Their deep understanding of the sector enables them to recruit suitable candidates adeptly.
• Rigorous candidate vetting: Inquire about the screening protocols, such as background checks and drug testing, to ensure qualified and dependable personnel.
• Employee retention track record: High turnover disrupts operations. Evaluate typical retention rates to gauge the agency’s ability to provide a stable workforce.
• Staffing flexibility: Verify the agency’s capacity to scale staffing up or down promptly to accommodate fluctuating demands, including seasonal peaks.

You also must have a clear understanding of the fee structure upfront. Staffing agencies commonly charge a percentage of the placed workers’ wages. They should be transparent about what they charge, and it should be straightforward. Avoid agencies that use complicated formulas or make it difficult to understand exactly what you will be charged.

It is a good idea to compare rates across multiple providers for a fair deal.

Many agencies also offer a replacement guarantee, providing a no-cost swap if an employee leaves within a specified timeframe.

Can Warehouse Staffing Agencies Provide Experienced Installers and Integrators?

While warehouse staffing agencies can generally find operations personnel, they typically cannot supply experienced professionals for the design, installation, integration, and implementation of materials handling equipment and warehouse systems.

Staffing agencies supply general labor at various skill levels for basic warehouse functions. However, installing complex warehouse technology like conveyor systems, automated storage and retrieval systems (AS/RS), pick modules, sortation systems, and more requires specialized expertise. These advanced materials handling solutions need to be precisely designed for the application, with components engineered and integrated to work together seamlessly.

Inexperienced installers who do not fully understand the equipment can make costly errors during implementation, leading to poor performance and significant safety concerns.

The Importance of Experienced Professionals in Warehouse Design and Installation

For a warehouse to operate efficiently and safely, the warehouse design and materials handling equipment installation need to be meticulously planned and executed by professionals with years of experience in warehouse design and integration.

You cannot underestimate the importance of experienced professionals when it comes to warehouse design, engineering, and installation. Here are just a few of the reasons why this matters.

Safety

Warehouses need to prioritize safety. In the most recent report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), warehouse operations were among the top 10 most dangerous workplaces. Nearly three out of every 100 warehouse workers suffer accidents that require medical attention each year.

Improperly installed warehouse equipment can pose serious safety risks to workers and lead to injuries or accidents. Experienced professionals follow strict safety protocols and manufacturer guidelines.

If you decide to use your in-house team or hire day laborers to put together your pallet racking or material handling equipment, you are taking a big risk. If an accident occurs, your liability could be much higher if you do not use professional installers.

Regulations & Compliance

There are codes, standards, and regulations regarding warehouse equipment installation, which experienced professionals follow to ensure compliance.

Before you install warehouse equipment, you need to obtain permits. If you have gone through this process before, you know it can be complex and take time. You will need structural drawings, certified and stamped by a professional engineer (PE), verifying you meet all standards and guidelines, such as:

• Building codes: Local and state building codes mandate minimum standards for materials, structural integrity, design elements, and safety measures.
• Zoning laws: Depending on size, purpose, and geographic location, warehouses may be subject to specific zoning ordinances.
• Fire safety: Fire codes outline requirements for fire safety, protection, and suppression in warehouses.
• Accessibility: You may need to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) for new construction or alterations.

Working with professionals can streamline the permitting, providing the design and engineering expertise to produce the stamped engineering documents you need to simplify the process. A structural engineer can do the calculations to ensure that your plan and equipment abide by standards for:

• Structural support and weight loads for the intended use
• Seismic zones
• Foundation and anchoring
• Maximum pallet load heights
• Travel aisles
• Vertical clearances

Depending on your location and use case, there may be many more calculations that need to be made and approved for a safe installation.

Efficiency and Quality Assurance

Small errors in installation can create bottlenecks, inefficient processes, and excess travel, which undermine the entire system’s throughput and productivity. Professional warehouse design and installation optimize your workflow to create a more efficient workplace. This improves productivity and safety.

Experienced installers can assemble and test your equipment more efficiently as well, letting you get back to work sooner. They will have significant experience with the type of material handling equipment you are implementing, so they know what it takes to do the job right. This reduces your downtime or ramp-up time dramatically, compared to using temporary labor or reassigning your in-house team, taking them away from their core duties.

Besides following strict guidelines and quality control protocols, experienced installers and integrators will double-check installation for structural integrity at each stage to ensure your equipment meets the highest standards. When a job is completed, you can be confident it meets manufacturer specifications for safe operations and will pass inspections.

System Integration and Customization

Different pieces of equipment need to work seamlessly together to provide an efficient workflow. Experienced installers ensure components work together as an optimized system. This is especially important if you are installing multiple pallet rack systems and automation.

Most installations require some level of customization and adjustments. Experienced teams can adapt designs and modify equipment as needed to fit your needs.

Long-Term Cost Savings

The upfront investment in experienced installation prevents costly downtime, repairs, replacements, and safety issues down the road. Using inexperienced or unqualified labor for complex warehouse installations is extremely risky and can lead to expensive rework, delays, inefficiencies, and potential hazards that negate any perceived cost savings.

Conesco Storage Systems Provides Professional Warehouse Installation and Integration Services

Conesco Storage Systems is not a warehouse staffing agency. We do not provide temporary or seasonal help for warehouse operations or place full-time workers in your warehouse. What we do is provide professional design and labor for installation, integrations, expansions, relocations, and liquidations for materials handling equipment.

Our team of experienced project managers, design engineers, and installation crews have decades of combined expertise implementing advanced warehouse technologies including:

• Pallet Rack Systems
• Conveyor and Sortation Systems
• Mezzanines and Vertical Storage
• Automated Storage and Retrieval Systems (AS/RS)
• Pick Modules
• Lifts and Machines
• Wire Decking

We take a comprehensive approach, from initial design and planning through final implementation, testing, and employee training. Our experience across hundreds of warehouse integration projects allows us to foresee and prevent potential issues before they occur.

Conesco Storage Systems has more than 400 combined years of warehouse industry experience and provides services for top warehouse operators across the country, including:

• New and Used Material Handling Equipment Sales
• Warehouse Liquidations
• Facility Decommissions, Transitions, and Moves
• Logistics (Freight + Coordination)
• Experienced Labor for Integrations and Installations
• Warehouse Plans and Strategy
• Engineering and Permitting
• Material Handling Consulting

If you need entry-level workers or general operations workers, a warehouse staffing agency can help you fill your open spots. If you need professional design, installation, integration, or other warehouse services, Conesco has the expertise to ensure your project is completed safely, efficiently, and to the highest standards of quality.

You can request a free consultation with our team. We will walk you through the process, discuss your needs in detail, and create a customized proposal based on your requirements, timelines, and priorities. We can handle your entire warehouse equipment planning, designing, and building process and provide the skilled labor you need. We are not a staffing agency, but we have a team of experienced professionals for installation and integration.

Frequently Asked Questions — FAQs

Is it a good idea to use a warehouse staffing agency?

Yes, using a reputable warehouse staffing agency is generally a good idea for quickly accessing a pool of qualified warehouse labor, whether you need temporary workers or to permanently hire associates. Warehouse staffing agencies can save time and costs compared to directly recruiting and hiring for general labor.

Why do staffing agencies have a bad reputation?

Some staffing agencies have gained a negative reputation due to unethical practices like misleading job descriptions, taking excessive fees from workers’ wages, or failing to verify employee qualifications. However, many reputable agencies prioritize transparency and only work with trusted clients who treat employees fairly.

What are the benefits of warehouse labor management?

Effective warehouse labor management can provide significant benefits like increased productivity, lower costs, improved safety, better quality control, and the ability to scale staffing up or down as needed. Technologies like warehouse management systems (WMS) help with optimizing workers’ output.

Where can I find experienced professionals for warehouse installs and integrations?

For complex warehouse installations, integrations, and implementations of materials handling equipment and technologies, it’s best to work directly with experienced providers like systems integrators and specialized contractors. Companies like Conesco Storage Systems have teams of seasoned professionals dedicated to these types of projects.

Call Conesco Storage Systems at (303) 690-9591 to discuss your warehouse design project, or request a consultation.