Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/599511
58 COMMERCIAL CARRIER JOURNAL | NOVEMBER 2015 features to match orders with capacity – but only if that information already had been entered. As the company grew, the need for advanced planning capabilities became greater. This year, Saddle Creek created an interactive planning dashboard tool with a built-in predictive model that determines when orders and capacity will become available by day of week and time of day. DelBovo describes the tool as an "elec- tronic playbook" for the customer service team. The dashboard pulls information from the company's recently developed data warehouse. The predictive model uses historical data on shipping patterns and customer lane commitments to plot days and times that new orders are expected. It also predicts the length of haul. "This tool enables operations to see freight many days in advance in terms of expected versus planned loads in order to maximize utilization," says Kristen Lowers, director of transportation systems. Besides giving advance visibility for shipments, the tool ranks each load by im- portance based on the lane commitments Saddle Creek has with customers. The tool also uses predictive modeling to determine where and when capacity will be available, including how many available hours each driver will have. Business intelligence Saddle Creek also designed a separate business intelligence dashboard that pulls information from the same data ware- house. The dashboard has been custom- ized to make everyone in operations as effi cient as possible, Lowers says. Driver managers and other operations personnel use dual monitors. One screen has the dashboard running at all times to give them instant access to service performance, equipment utilization, fuel effi ciency, driver pay, safety, maintenance and more. The dashboards eliminate at least 30 minutes of time each day that people used to spend running reports and getting information from different sources, Low- ers says. The dashboard also is accessible on any device. The user interface presents a wheel of icons that represent different steps specifi c personnel need to complete during the workday. Each icon has various reports, information and tasks associated with that area. Driver managers and other operations personnel are accountable for reporting to their leaders on what they are doing each day and week to improve the action items on their dashboards. "There are no rogue processes," Lowers says. "Everything is unifi ed at the corpo- rate level. Everyone is looking at the same thing." Zone fueling Saddle Creek operates a fl eet of com- pressed natural gas tractors from its terminal locations in Lakeland, Atlanta and Ft. Worth, Texas. To reduce the weight and cost of its trucks, the company chose a smaller tank system. "It's all about weight," DelBovo says. "You've got to get the maximum payload in there." To extend the range of the trucks to 800 miles, their tanks have to be slow-fi lled, allowed to rest for about an hour and then topped off. This three-stage process deliv- ers a 10 percent greater range by achieving a greater fi ll percentage. With limited space in its fueling sta- tions, Saddle Creek needed an effi cient way to coordinate the fi ll process. The company organized its fueling area into 10 zones and, through testing, determined up to 10 trucks could be fi lled simultaneously in each zone to maximize effi ciency. The next question was how to create an operational procedure so that fueling did not cause unnecessary delays. Saddle Creek worked with its fuel partner to rede- sign its CNG fueling stations as a series of zones in which groups of tractors are fi lled on a rotating basis in one-hour periods. A green-yellow-red light system indi- cates the status of each zone – full, ready to fuel, in process. Drivers use a mobile form to specify the zone where they dropped off their tractor. "We've used our reporting capa- bilities to engineer a fuel station tractor map," Lowers says. "This map provides a real-time way to track where tractors are parked within the fueling zones, which tractors are fully fueled and ready for dispatch, and helps direct drivers where to pick up the tractor for their next trip." These tractor maps are displayed on large TV screens in the dispatch offi ces. The fueling system is coordinated by the company's operations planning sys- tem. The programming for the zone fi lls is based on order volume and demand. The program can change by day and hour. "Overall, the new innovations have increased operating performance and improved our ability to deliver on our promises to our drivers and to our cus- tomers," Lowers says. CC J I N N O VATO R S pro les carriers and eets that have found innovative ways to overcome trucking's challenges. If you know a carrier that has displayed innovation, contact Je Crissey at jcrissey@ccjmagazine.com or 800-633-5953. Saddle Creek designed a business intel- ligence dashboard that pulls information from a data warehouse. The dashboard has been customized for everyone in operations to maximize e ciency. Michael DelBovo, president of Saddle Creek Transportation, believes the sky is the limit for driver earnings through the company's focus on fleet ef ciency.