“Great Product, Excellent Service”

IT Manager

Metrow Fooods Ltd

Metrow Foods Ltd are a food and drinks supplier to the restaurant and catering industry. The company deliver their products to over 2000 sites nationwide using a fleet of vehicles made up of cars, vans and Lorries.

Metrow Foods initially required tracking to be installed into their sales fleet. It was important to Metrow that their mobile sales team were meeting customer contact targets as well as maximising their productivity and managing their days effectively.

The tracking system was setup with the addresses of Metrow’s customers added as POIs (Points of Interest). A POI brings a name/reference to an address/location of importance to a company. When a vehicle enters or exits a predetermined area of a map the user will be provided with the POI name, for example, Head Office. This feature allows tracking users to quickly identify if a vehicle is at a location of significance to the company. The satellite overlay featured within the application allows the user to further identify the area where the vehicle is currently situated. The system uses satellite images and provides an overhead view of the area and clearly shows the environment the vehicle is in such as: residential, industrial park, retail park or in rural areas.

POI names are also featured in the Daily Activity & Visit reports generated by the tracking system; these reports allow the sales manager to easily ensure that contact targets are being met.
Like many companies Metrow was keen to ensure that their mobile sales team were starting and finishing their days at reasonable times to ensure good daily planning and productivity. The tracking system has been setup so that if a member of the mobile workforce starts their day either to late or finishes to early the sales manager will be notified by the tracking system. These notifications have saved the sales manager time as it has reduced the requirement to check the tracking system and contact the sales team whilst ensuring good productivity.

Due to the benefits now being achieved by the sales fleet Metrow Foods has expanded the tracking system into their delivery vehicles. These installations were completed outside of operating hours so that the vehicle schedules were not interrupted in any way.

The reports now generated by the tracking system have allowed Metrow Foods to manage their drivers and vehicles with much greater insight. These reports provide accurate information, within selected date ranges, relating to the distance covered by each vehicle, journey time, number of journeys and start and finish times. This information helps to ensure that the work load is evenly spread and that their drivers perform in accordance with health and safety/duty of care legislation. In addition this data helps Metrow keep fuel and operational costs to a minimum by reducing vehicle idling and ensuring efficient route optimisation.

All of the tracking benefits mentioned help Metrow to maintain their high standards of customer service. Metrow are able to ensure that deliveries are being made on time and that contact targets are being met whilst at the same time recognising hardworking and responsible drivers within the fleet.