Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/466315
COMMERCIAL CARRIER JOURNAL | FEBRUARY 2015 43 INNOVATORS A. DUIE PYLE West Chester, Pa. as the freight moved through the sup- ply chain. A. Duie Pyle realized that even with- in its new Customized Solutions Group that it could do more to drive down costs for itself as well as its customers. "If you are a customer using our entire enterprise, it should add value to you," says Swart, referring to LTL customers that used its warehouses. "And it shouldn't be from the volume of business you do with us – it should be because it takes some cost out for both the carrier and the customer." Looking to solve this problem while adding value and driving more ef- fi ciency into its operations, last year the company developed a single-facility concept that would allow it to bundle these disparate operations under one roof. "We recognized that we service cus- tomers with high-turn products that needed to pull out of inventory and get right into the transportation mode," says Swart. "Having that product in a separate warehouse just added time and costs." A. Duie Pyle set out to purchase land and build its own cross-platform logistics center under the new model, but when Mount Holly, N.J.-based New Century Transportation declared bankruptcy and ceased operations last A s a provider of less-than-truckload, regional and dedicated truckload, warehousing and distribution and brokerage services, A. Duie Pyle means a lot of different things to a lot of different customers. One of the challenges of running such a diversifi ed operation is trying to become a single-source provider. The West Chester, Pa.-based company realized it had been missing an opportunity to brand itself as an all-in-one supply chain solution. "We've had LTL, truckload and warehousing for years, and we always asked, 'We want more of our customers' spend, but how do we do that?,' " asks Randy Swart, chief operating offi cer. "We thought we were an enterprise to them because they used all parts of our business, but we really were no different to them than if they were using an outside company to do one part and then just used us for another." Last year, A. Duie Pyle took the fi rst steps to cement itself as a single-source provider with the creation of its Customized Solutions Group that consolidated its custom dedicated, truckload, brokerage and warehouse and distribution ser- vices into one business unit. The goal, says the company, is to provide enhanced service offerings to its customer base. Gaining supply chain efficiencies A. Duie Pyle's footprint extends from Maine to northern Virginia and west as far as Ohio and includes 24 LTL and truckload service centers and nine warehouse facilities with a combined 2 million square feet of storage space. But these facili- ties remained separate and required multiple movements for its customers' goods The regional LTL and truckload carrier opens a one-of-a-kind warehousing and logistics facility to better meet the changing supply chain needs of its customers. A. Duie Pyle drives new efficiencies, lowers costs for customers with all-in-one logistics center BY JEFF CRISSEY