"It looks a bit like the scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark when they put the Ark of the Covenant away in that warehouse."  That is the description Pete Utting, CEO of Gardman uses to describe their new 70,000 pallet space warehouse at Daventry which GTN Xtra visited last week to see just how they are getting on with getting back on schedule after the teething problems encountered during January.

"We are now picking at well above our normal peak season rate and that will mean the backlog will have been cleared by the end of February." Pete explained as we took a tour of the facility which is run for Gardman by DHL on the warehousing side and XPO for transport.

In the warehouse it is clear to see that the problem is being solved in the short term by adding more people to the teams to hit the numbers required and garden centre customers can be reassured their orders are being given extra priority in that the sales team are also helping out.

"We've had Scott McCabe and his really dedicated team based at Daventry and often staying until midnight night picking themselves. They've been fully trained to enable anything we have missed to be picked immediately and on the first vehicle out."

"We really have been putting the effort in to try and look after our customers. We are hyper conscious of it."

Paul Barker and Jason Perrins with Pete Utting in the picking area: "We've been picking day and night, its all hands to the pump and we provide extra QC."