Coastal Sunbelt Produce is the leading food service distributor of produce and dairy in the Mid-Atlantic. The company serves thousands of customers, including restaurants, hotels, caterers and grocers from its 165,000 sq. ft. facility in Savage, Maryland south of Baltimore. Among the largest in the industry, its fleet of 160 trucks delivers daily from New Jersey to West Virginia.
As of 2004, Coastal Sunbelt was routing to approximately 2,452 customers via 240 routes per week – all using manual processes. While the system was working, it was heavily dependent on the skills and focus of its routers to track every variable and variance for each customer every day. And it was clear that as the company grew, that system would become inefficient - if not impossible.
That’s one reason the company made the decision to automate its routing processes using Roadnet® vehicle routing and scheduling software. With Roadnet tools, Coastal Sunbelt knew it would improve control, efficiency and flexibility in its routing processes – and provide plenty of room for growth.
Found opportunities
“Before using Roadnet, we measured our customer satisfaction based solely on the calls or complaints we received from customers or sales reps,” says Jennifer Caplinger, logistics manager at Coastal Sunbelt. “Once we started using Roadnet products, we quickly realized what opportunities we lost by thinking this way. We have grown about 350% since using the Roadnet product, and I could not imagine leading almost 200 drivers without it!”
Caplinger attributes that growth to the company’s ability to actually measure service to customers using data captured through Roadnet and MobileCast®. For example, the company is now able to accurately quantify its on-time performance. As a result, from 2005 to 2011, it has used Roadnet fleet management software to improve on-time deliveries by 5% despite massive business growth.
“We also made great strides in increasing our truck utilization while still offering customers the deliveries that best suit them,” adds Caplinger. The company was able to improve truck utilization by 13.5% from 2005 to 2011 by analyzing Roadnet data. Concurrently, the company has improved stops per route by an impressive 17% since 2005. “With drivers logging in via MobileCast, we can get more precise service times and therefore route more stops per truck,” says Caplinger. “MobileCast gives us more realistic expectations of how long a driver will take.”
Of course, cost and fuel savings factor into Coastal Sunbelt’s ROI accounting as well. The company has been able to reduce its carbon footprint by backhauling product on its trucks and by partnering with local farms that make a commitment to sustainability. Roadnet helps Coastal Sunbelt to route more efficiently, saving in fuel and resources.
The value of objectivity
Caplinger also values the fact that Roadnet routing and scheduling software provides objective, unbiased information to drive decisions - data that can be shared with her drivers. “It takes the emotion out of the routing process, so drivers can see the reason behind routing decisions – even when they’re not popular,” she says.
“Drivers don’t like it when we kill a route, for example, but with Roadnet, we can sit down, look at the choices and do the mapping alongside the driver. They can see the value of the net miles saved and understand why we’re making the decision.”
As Coastal Sunbelt’s business continues to grow and change, Caplinger’s team hopes to continue to improve metrics like on-time percentage and truck utilization and to reduce off-day deliveries, a sign that customer orders are filled correctly the first time.
“Every routing decision, expansion or customer visit includes reviewing our Roadnet data,” concludes Caplinger. “Roadnet has been a great partner in helping us to use the data collected to best serve our customers.”
