Aged care provider expands logistics footprint with second warehouse
With margins under sustained pressure in the aged care sector, TLC Healthcare is looking beyond traditional revenue streams with a strategy of ‘concentric diversification’.
The Melbourne-based aged care provider, which also operates healthcare precincts, early learning centres, and training facilities, has acquired a second warehouse in the city’s south and is establishing a new joinery team to complement their existing maintenance group.
TLC Healthcare CEO Lou Pascuzzi said TLC Supplies was founded in 2023 and has experienced “exponential growth”. The operation now manufactures more than 150 products, with significant demand resulting in the group’s acquisition of a second warehouse.
The 2044msq warehouse is located in the high-growth industrial area of Clyde North, 50km southwest of the Melbourne CBD, complementing their original distribution facility in Chelsea Heights, 30km southeast of the city.
Products manufactured by TLC Supplies are used by the TLC group itself, as well as being sold to other aged care providers, medical centres, early learning services, hospitals and institutional customers across the state.
The warehouse occupies a 3159msq site, and will function as a dedicated storage and bulk-breaking facility, feeding inventory into the Chelsea Heights distribution centre. That facility provides high-speed, high-accuracy picking and packing for B2B clients, underpinned by advanced Kardex automation technology.
Decoupling bulk storage from order fulfilment creates a two-node distribution model, which TLC believes will streamline supply chain operations, ensuring faster replenishment and reduced pressure on the existing distribution hub.
The new warehouse is a platform for “sustainable growth” of the TLC Supplies’ business, Lou said.
The model also promotes TLC’s agenda of “concentric service diversification – the main strategy that insulates TLC from the funding pressures currently experienced by other residential aged care providers!”
New home for TLC’s joinery team
In addition to its logistical role, the Clyde North facility will be home to TLC Properties’ new joinery team.
The team is being established as an extension of the existing maintenance division, which is responsible for the upkeep of TLC’s residential aged care homes, medical centres, health clubs, early learning centres, training academy rooms, and cafés, and for small building jobs.
Lou said the investment in the Clyde North warehouse de-risks the group’s supply chain and improves their capacity to meet growing product demand within their own businesses, but also from their clients.
TLC Healthcare owns and operates multi-generational healthcare precincts with co-located residential aged care, community medical centres, health clubs, early learning centres, registered training facilities and commercial cafés, across Melbourne and Geelong.
