Medical supply
Same freight, 30% fewer deliveries.
A medical supply company in the South Central U.S. handed us six months of raw sales data: 3,597 shipments and 7,990 pallets. We rebuilt how often each customer gets a truck.
- Who
- Medical supply company
- Data
- 3,597 shipments, six months
- Deliveries
- 29.6% fewer
- Mileage
- 11% less
What was going on
The data arrived as sales records, not shipments. The first job was sorting every delivery by how often the customer received one: truckload, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly or as ordered. Most of the freight sat in the bi-weekly and weekly groups, moving in partial pallets.
What we did
- Grouped out-of-area customers into regional deliveries
- Built pallets closer to their weight limit
- Moved some customers to fewer, fuller deliveries
- Checked that every change kept deliveries consistent, since customers and the dock both count on it
What changed
| Measure | Before | After | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Deliveries | 3,597 | 2,533 | −29.6% |
| Pallets | 7,990 | 7,007 | −12.3% |
| Weight per pallet | 1,651 lb | 1,883 lb | +14.1% |
| Weight per stop | 3,668 lb | 5,208 lb | +42.0% |
| Miles, six months | 225,010 | 200,168 | −11.0% |
Why it worked
The total weight shipped didn’t change: 13.2 million pounds before and after. What changed was how often orders shipped. Fewer, fuller deliveries meant fewer miles, less fuel and fewer trucks for the same freight.
This study is one of the four reflexes in our white paper. Outrun the Bear →