How to Calculate Warehouse Shelving Space

An essential part of operating a warehouse is to know how much space you have available to store goods, without this knowledge, you have a significant problem. Being able to calculate the storage capacity of a warehouse and its shelving systems will allow you to plan budgets and stock in advance, giving you a lean operation that maximises profits.

In this guide, we give you the calculation in order to find out the capacity of your warehouse shelving system, as well as other internal factors to consider.

Total shelving capacity – Calculation

A common pitfall made by warehouse owners and operators is that they simply calculate the size of their shelving system and assume that’s the storage capacity. To find out how much storage space your shelving system has, you need to follow a few steps beforehand.

1. Find the total square footage of your shelving system – this should be labelled on the shelving system or multiply the depth and width.
2. Calculate the amount of space you have for non-storage purposes (beams, pallets etc).
3. Subtract the square footage space used for non-storage purposes from the total square footage space of your shelving to find the usable storage space in cubic feet.
4. Multiply the usable storage space by the shelf’s height to determine the total storage space by cubic feet.

Total storage capacity – Example

For a real-life example to follow when calculating warehouse shelving capacity, see the below points using the steps laid out in the previous paragraph.

1. 30ft²
2. 5ft²
3. 30ft² – 5ft² = 25ft²
4. 25ft² x 20ft = 500 cubic feet of storage available

Even though the 500 cubic feet is the ‘final number’ you need to consider the size and shape of your inventory in order to utilise the maximum amount of space on your warehouse shelving system.

Optimise your warehouse storage system

To find out ways on how you can maximise the efficiency of your warehouse, Oakway Storage has a number of solutions that help business’ like yours. Get in touch with one of our experts to discuss the options on how we can help you, by filling out the form below.