Averitt Express improves on-time delivery visibility for national retail chain with FourKites real-time tracking

Averitt Express, a leading freight transportation and supply chain provider with international reach across more than 100 countries, operates a dedicated fleet serving a national chain of restaurants and retail stores. Deliveries run from a distribution center near Nashville, Tennessee to over 600 retail locations across 45 states — each store typically receiving multiple shipments per week. Variability in delivery times and routes created a scheduling challenge for store managers, who had to ensure team members were on site to unload trucks when they arrived without leaving underutilized staff waiting around for them. Accurate, predictive visibility into delivery times is therefore critical for store managers, who rely on it to schedule store labor.

FourKites deployed its real-time supply chain visibility platform to bring Averitt's dedicated fleet loads under continuous tracking, using its repeatable integration process and a dedicated onboarding team. The platform applies machine learning and predictive analytics to GPS and carrier data streams, generating up-to-the-minute ETAs that adapt dynamically as conditions change in transit. So that Averitt teams could operate the platform autonomously with minimal need for FourKites assistance, key Averitt personnel were trained as superusers. At the time of the case study, Averitt was rolling out a new notification service that equips its retail customer's store managers with FourKites access via iPads to track shipments from departure to delivery.

The implementation gave both Averitt and its retail customer the ability to calculate very precise ETAs for trucks arriving at retail store locations, based on up-to-the-minute, highly accurate data from the FourKites platform. This visibility has helped Averitt deliver a tech-enabled customer offering that helps its customer optimize its labor costs.

• iPad-based tracking: At the time of the case study, Averitt was rolling out FourKites access via iPads so the customer's store managers can track shipments from departure to delivery
• Nick Fields, Averitt's Director of Analysis and Administration, said FourKites shares Averitt's core value of continuous improvement and has been the right provider to help it enhance its service to one of its longest-standing and most valued customers

• Real-time visibility platforms can create value downstream of the shipper — in this case at the store receiving dock — making them a differentiator for dedicated fleet operators competing on service quality.
• Training internal superusers during onboarding is essential for large, distributed operations; sustained adoption depends on teams being able to self-serve, not on ongoing vendor support.
• Extending platform access to end users (store managers, in this case) puts shipment visibility in the hands of the people who schedule store labor.
• For 3PLs managing dedicated fleets, accurate ETAs can help customers optimize their labor costs.