Brown Shoe Opens DC in California

Brown Shoe Company on Thursday opened a 350,000 square foot Famous Footwear Distribution Center, which will be able to accommodate 32 million pairs of shoes a year.

The new Tejon Ranch, Calif., center will "add time savings and cost efficiencies to the process of shipping footwear to the chain’s stores," the company said in a statement.

Supply chain strategy, design and implementation firm Fortna partnered with Brown Shoe to integrate equipment and system technologies to support growth capacity, space utilization, handling cost and service performance.

"We are proud that Brown Shoe recognizes the value of the Fortna model and are confident that their business goals of cost efficiency and optimized customer service will be met in this new distribution center," said John White, executive vice president-Fortna.

"The new Famous Footwear DC has an annual capacity of 32 million pairs of shoes and expected inventory turns 17-22 times per year, which means our stores and Web sites will offer shoppers important seasonal footwear trends earlier in the season and freshen assortments more frequently," said Brown Shoe Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Ron Fromm.

The Famous Footwear Distribution Center is in the 1,450-acre business park Tejon Industrial Complex at the junction of Interstate 5 and Highway 99 in central California, approximately 90 minutes north of the Los Angeles ports and four hours south of Oakland.

The center employs about 75 people, and is expected to add 40 additional jobs in the coming months. Its initial shipping area includes all Famous Footwear stores west of the Rocky Mountains -- approximately one-third of the 1,100-store chain's locations -- and will expand later this month to include direct shipping to West Coast customers who place orders on FamousFootwear.com.

Contact Marcy Behrmann Frank at mfrank@joc.com.