Walk a cutting-edge factory floor and you'll find them—shiny robots picking items with mechanical precision or moving pallets with choreographed efficiency.  

It's impressive. It can also be a little intimidating. 

"In many cases, people actually come to us a little confused and overwhelmed about robotics," says Fabian Audisio, TRG's VP of Sales for LATAM and longtime robotics expert.  

The confusion isn't about whether robots are cool—we can all agree they are.  

It’s about where to start. 

What's less confusing are the problems driving customers to robotics in the first place. Labor markets are tight and getting tighter. Seasonal volume spikes keep getting more extreme. Order accuracy expectations keep rising while margins keep shrinking. And the physical demands of warehouse work will take a toll on any team. 

Three Use Cases That Matter

Let’s forget about brands, models and specifications for a moment. At TRG, we think robotics conversations work best when we focus on what the robots actually do—and what pain points those actions solve: 

Picking – This is the most complex entry point, but also the most common. Picking robots assist workers by optimizing how items initially get collected from the various shelves, racks and bins where they are stored. 

• The Pain Point: Manual picking is physically demanding work in a tight labor market. The job requires speed and precision simultaneously. That combination is hard to maintain over a long shift. Training new team members also takes time you don't have during peak season. And when volume doubles for the holidays, finding enough qualified humans to maintain your service levels can feel nearly impossible. 

Moving – Robots are great at handling point-to-point transport of pallets, cartons or totes across facilities. According to Audisio, this can be a great place to start since a small implementation may only involve a single robot moving a pallet from point A to B all day long. 

• ​The Pain Point: Moving material is important, but it’s also repetitive work that pulls skilled workers away from higher-value tasks. The physical nature of the work also carries inherent safety risks no matter how well you train. And when you're already short-staffed, which is most of the time these days, every pallet waiting to be moved represents throughput you're losing. 

Sorting – Sorting robots can replace rigid old-school conveyor systems with a more efficient workflow. When properly planned, robotic sorting systems are highly scalable and can easily flex up or down depending on current demand. 

• The Pain Point: Fixed conveyor systems lock you into configurations that made sense when you installed them but may not match today's reality. Adding and removing fixed shipping lanes often requires major capital investment and installation downtime.  

Safety First 

According to Audisio, safety often tops the list of concerns for those who do not have significant experience with robotics. This makes sense.  

Introducing robots into your environment for the first time naturally raises new questions about how they’ll navigate around your team. 

Other frequent concerns include: 

• Navigation methods and how robots know where they're going  

• Integration with existing systems like Oracle or SAP  

• Battery life and charging logistics  

• How robots get assigned and controlled  

These aren't theoretical concerns. They're based on real implementation challenges customers have experienced.  

The good news? They're all solvable with the right partner. 

How TRG Helps 

Robotics doesn't exist in isolation; it’s one piece of a larger operational puzzle. 

The best way to understand how robotics might help solve your puzzle isn't through spec sheets or feature comparisons; it's by talking to experts like Audisio who understand how robots fit into actual workflows under real conditions. 

That’s why TRG's sample distribution system at MODEX 2026 is a great way to contextualize how robots can fit into a larger workflow—moving inventory through receiving, identification, sorting and shipping stages. 

Ready to see robotics solutions that actually solve your supply chain problems?  

Visit TRG at MODEX 2026.