Behind the Scenes: Routing

Let me get back a couple of years… or I guess it’s already a decade ago… 

I started my apprenticeship with a freight forwarding company in Germany for a job title called: Management Assistance. I found it odd to begin with why a freight forwarder would hire a Management Assistance since they’re moving freight, right? After a couple of years with the company and paying attention to not only my job but the ones around me it blew my mind away how many different jobs there were to make this one company run well. Little did I know that this company also had its own IT department. Of course, somebody needs to help out when things go wrong with the system and I’m very glad that the IT found me or I found the IT. 

Most of the time all we see is the execution but not how it came to this execution. How much managing and planning and also manpower has been behind this one execution of the company. 

Let me give you a little understanding about how our company works in regards of our schedule of services. I think it is very helpful for our customers to know when they call us and have a question about a service date. 

We plan our routes ahead of time and make sure that one truck has the least amount of miles to drive from one customer to the next once he is in the targeted area. Once assigned, we route them the quickest way possible and schedule them in our IT system (exactly, we also have an IT system). Once we add the customer and schedule the first application the following applications will be scheduled automatically after generating the new cycle each month. 

When it comes to single applications as well as potential re-sprays it is very helpful to give us a heads up rather than an immediate single application request. Our trucks are on a route in different corners of South East Michigan each day and we try to mix it up very good so we have the flexibility to add a single application anywhere on a short notice. We also have our so called ’emergency truck’ that is available around the clock for short notice requests in case the trucks are everywhere but in the area for an urgent single application request. 

We want to keep our customers happy and satisfied and I hope this was a helpful inside view for you to understand our process of ordering an application and the execution of it.

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