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Episode 35: Logistics Tour at Party Reflections
131 Plays1 month ago
You're going to want to head over to YouTube for this one! The guys got to see the Party Reflections 'war room' courtesy of Jay Gorman, Director of Operations. Jay answers all of Nate and Kyle's questions about technology implementation, logistics, and employee motivation. Check it out! This episode is brought to you by Anchor Industries. Learn more about Anchor at www.anchorinc.com.
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Under the Vinyl' and guest Jay Gorman
00:00:00
Speaker
This is Under the Vinyl, a rental management media podcast. I'm Nate. And I'm Kyle. And this is what we talk about, tents and everything tent-related. Let's dive in. I'm the one you call when you need a tent up or down.
00:00:14
Speaker
I'm a tent rental man, I'm working on all day. Getting mistakes in the ground no matter what they say. From sunrise to the night, make sure everything's right. Yeah, I'm tent rental man, I'm working on...
00:00:29
Speaker
All right, we're back another week, another TOWYA talk. Today, our focus is logistics, dispatch, fleet tracking, and maybe accuracy reports, Jay. We might look at that if we get over there. Absolutely.
00:00:41
Speaker
Logistics. We don't do logistics in this industry. No. But we're back with Jay Gorman from Party Reflections. And of course, Nate's here again. I'm here. So here we go. Jay, we're in your war room. Yep.
00:00:52
Speaker
So us through this is our logistics office in Charlotte. So we have behind you. You'll see here we have four different TV screens displaying our schedule. so Not small ones either. thirty ninety eight They're 98 inches. If you can't see that, i can measure it for you, but they're 98 inch TVs.
00:01:09
Speaker
um So basically we run a um Six months ago we had whiteboards, there's one still over there you'll see, um that were just basically daily schedules built on the wall for a month out.
00:01:25
Speaker
So we decided to digitize it and we found a program called Connect Team. um And basically it's the similar setup, run for four weeks of the year, but we could also just continue, it basically just keeps rolling all the way through. So you'll see here, this is a Monday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday through the week.
00:01:46
Speaker
So you'll see here we have different all of our different routes. All of these routes relate to, we use point of rental here, so they all relate to our different routes and point of rental on dispatch center.
Logistics and Scheduling Innovations
00:01:57
Speaker
So each one of these, um as we As we go, we can assign the guys, but when we project this out, we basically go through the the weeks and schedule X number of guys per day. um We do this multiple reasons. One of the things is just labor-wise. We all know we're short on labor. right Don't have a whole lot of labor. It's the most valuable resource we have.
00:02:18
Speaker
So this helps us project out. We'll just basically say how many guys we need for each route, and then they'll once we get to a certain day, we know a certain day is max out on labor will basically in POR go ahead and close that day off for the salespeople to add additional stuff to it.
00:02:35
Speaker
So this this format here obviously you guys are with POR but is this Google? ah You're getting this? It's a so this what you see the scheduling software you see here is actually it's called Connect Team is the name it's a brand. Connect Team by itself individual. Are you moving everything from POR to this? Yes there's a guy. So they don't talk to each other No they don't talk to you at this point. it it be nice So anyone could use it. Correct. You could do it if you're alert, whatever you want to do. It's not a point rental-based program. It's completely separate.
00:03:03
Speaker
ah This episode of Under the Vinyl is brought to you by Anchor Industries, a fifth-generation, family-owned company making tents and clear-spanned structures right here in the U.S. of A. Anchor isn't just about selling great products.
00:03:16
Speaker
They bring decades of experience and stand beside you as the business grows. With Anchor's craftsmanship and engineering, you'll have a peace of mind knowing your equipment is built to last season after season. And for the next generation of rental owners and installers, Anchor is more than just your supplier.
00:03:32
Speaker
They're a trusted partner helping guide you to the right products to help grow your business. Give them a call today to connect with your sales rep. 1-800-544-4445 or visit anchorinc.com.
Digitizing Communication and Scheduling
00:03:45
Speaker
This is also how addition to just us seeing where the guys are going, this is how they're scheduled. So this is how the guys know what they're doing on a daily basis. So they can see how far in advance. We try to get, if we have a job going out of town, we'll know them a couple days in advance, a week.
00:04:02
Speaker
But they'll, on a daily basis, by like 3 o'clock, we'll get it figured out, publish a schedule, and they'll know what they're doing for the next And where does that schedule go to be published so that they can see it? All on their phones. It's an app on their phone. They all download them.
00:04:14
Speaker
okay um We get it through all of our guys full time. And then when we have temps come in, that's how we do the same thing. So every individual that is on all these crews, so say you got 10 guys on this crew here, everybody has the app, everybody gets it, not just the lead. Correct. Okay.
00:04:28
Speaker
They all know what they do it. And then also one of the good things we like is we can send messages to the team. So if we have like, you know, someone sends like, Hey, these guys did a great job on this setup. We'll go ahead and send that out and the connect team apps. Everyone sees it Hey, good job to the guys that did that. Or hey, DOT sitting on this road, go the other way. Yeah.
00:04:43
Speaker
Hey, there's this camera, watch out. yeah We follow the rules, Kyle. All right, so we've obviously got multiple TVs in here, so they all have different function? Yeah, ah so these four, the four largest are, so we started, we're in the last week of August right now.
00:04:57
Speaker
ah This first week is September. Then you go on and so on and so forth. And the nice thing is, one of my challenges always is by but dispatch team was, alright guys, we've just finished that week, now we gotta... And we' we'd roll it across, so wasn't that bad, but we'd have to race and start over the next week and write it all down manually and everything.
00:05:16
Speaker
Now I can come in Monday morning, we come in Monday morning, click, click, click, and then the next thing's already up there. Now, the biggest thing in this industry is, well, we've always done it this way.
00:05:27
Speaker
So why what made you switch from the whiteboard theory to this? What made it better and more efficient for you? Two things, we were already on a scheduling app. and it was One of the things is combine the two into one. So we had, we had we were using Homebase for our scheduling app for a while.
00:05:41
Speaker
We had that and we were still doing the manual thing. So one of my guys is like, he likes to look at technology a lot. So he's like, well, I can find if i can find something that'll give us the best of both worlds and not have to, the whiteboard theory go out the window and we can digitize it and it'll be a lot easier.
00:05:56
Speaker
So one person controls all this? Yeah, we have the the my two logistics guys control it, adjust it. And then I have access if I don't go back. Like if I'm, you know, somebody asked a question, what are we doing? And I can look.
00:06:09
Speaker
It should be up to date. They try to keep it up to date. I mean, we're all the way out through October in this stuff and on the back end. What has been the biggest advantage of this?
Maximizing Labor and Fleet Efficiency
00:06:17
Speaker
Knowing what you're doing for, I mean, we've, I was big on planning four weeks out because like I said, labor is our biggest thing. It's huge in our industry. Right. Of knowing, you don't want to tell a guy you can do a 20, you know, 20 meter tent when you've already got, you know, you have that career committed to something else and you don't know. and the sales, this is not a knock on salespeople they hear fucking sales guy. Sorry.
00:06:37
Speaker
but but ah They don't understand that like, okay, yeah, we can book the 20 meter because we have it available. yeah They don't realize you don't have the 10 guys need to go do the job. But what you can remember is I have a logistic background. So if I'm booking it sales wise, I'm booking the labor too. so So that's, I think this is really good for,
00:06:57
Speaker
I mean ideally you work yourself to you said this is relatively new but if you had three weeks out and you already knew the crews who were doing it I think the guys would love that well so that was my next thing is it's an advantage for you to see ahead and you to book and the sales to book but what does that do for the guys I mean how far out are you telling them I mean that's that's fantastic there's i mean we all have guys that do certain things and we've all got those specialized crews so some of these guys they know what they're going to be on or where they're goingnna go and jobs they've done to pass so they kind of can see that coming and look ahead oh what's coming up but can I do that or We're talking about, i mean, we it's a good great segment. We've got um also the sort of two large, two smaller TVs over here. The top one is our dispa is our GPS software. We run Verizon Connect here. You think anyone's speeding? I hope not. Check the V1 real quick. Let's just see what V1's got going. Oh, nice.
00:07:46
Speaker
Six over! Six over, it's not bad. That's not horrible, but we can live with that. Yeah, that's not bad. So this is our, all of the trucks for our Charlotte location, live view.
00:07:57
Speaker
And the nice thing about this map is, It'll actually, when we set it to like zoom out, it'll actually, as in the morning, all the guys, it's real close to Charlotte. And as they if they go some out, it does automatically zoom out and stuff. That's just a feature of the function of the thing.
00:08:12
Speaker
Okay. And we're letting Kyle control this, but he's doing an awful job. That mouse is way too difficult use. So let's run down to this bottom screen. So on the bottom here, we'll look at a fun month. Like who? Is anyone busy in May? No, no one's ever busy in May. Let's see. So what we have here is our issue tracker for... Nobody has any issues. No, no one has any issues. So it here Party Reflections, it's it's actually across all locations.
00:08:39
Speaker
this This actual... not this Well, this document's live. Okay. Each store has their own. Okay. But this is controlled by operations and by sales. Okay. So everyone has access to it.
00:08:51
Speaker
Everyone can comment, put something in here. And it's no matter big or small, like it's just a dish. And you listen, it's not a to get you in trouble. It's more important to see, you know, we use it as a tool like, okay, does this keep happening? There's something here. How do you do better?
00:09:05
Speaker
yeah How do you do better? not's It's not here to get everybody in trouble. correct yeah um we don't try to you know it's not a We don't weaponize it. so it's just in a lily It could be the smallest thing. like You'll see here... ah This is a good one.
00:09:19
Speaker
yeah This is a really efficient thing to do. so We had to send someone all the way to Raleigh because we're missing inventory was wrong. We were missing a flagpole. We didn't have one to... I couldn't make one out of cold cloth, so I sent someone up there to grab one. so Because the client wanted to have a flag on their cellcloth tent. So even those things we do. So just things like that, we just keep track. Like i said, it's not weaponized to the anybody individually. it's all All sales can add to it. I can add to it. My operations guys can add to it.
00:09:45
Speaker
So do you guys have a meeting about it at the end of the month? I have a meeting every Monday. morning with all of my supervisors for both the dispatch and all the warehouse people.
00:09:57
Speaker
We all get together. I kind of give them just anything coming up. Be one on the loop lookout for like the area event we're hosting. yeah um And stuff like that. Just kind of like and see how things were, at any issues this weekend. Do we have anything anything could have done? Have you any issues personnel? Do we have any extra people this week that we can put in another department?
00:10:13
Speaker
that kind of thing. And then also, we on Tuesdays, we have a sales meeting, with of which I attend every week, and we also go it then. So they all know if there's any issues like, hey, this, you know, just so we're clear. Jay's not perfect.
00:10:28
Speaker
Oh, Jay. He was responsible for that. Look, employee, I'm right there. Hey, I love that, though. You're holding yourself accountable well. Exactly. Like I it's not any reason to anything. So is there an incentive program at all to not be on the list? If somebody doesn't miss or doesn't, if does everything right or doesn't get on the list?
00:10:46
Speaker
i I have not gone that far. I do have an abacus in my office for the one we do have the accounting issues. So know if you're familiar with that. so Sometimes departments get the abacus for the week. So, you know.
00:10:56
Speaker
Okay. Oh, that's funny. I do love that. So, yeah. So we've also implemented something like this. We haven't. stayed relevant I felt like with it just because some people felt like it was, well hey you're getting on my butt here. and it It looks at it in a bad way. yeah can't and you can't And that's the biggest thing, you cannot use it as a weapon. well and i feel like as people in management, we are, yeah, we're not using as weapon, but we're looking it as where we can get better because that's what costs us money with all this stuff. Correct. Every little thing there costs us lot. the employee, the guy in the field doesn't understand how that costs the company money.
00:11:31
Speaker
Do you feel like it's helping? I think so. okay I think it it gives us a line of sight to it. you know Right. like And we review every Monday. Like, hey, guys, look, this is what happened. like And you can't, some type of people get, you know, you you get the supervisors get a little upset because their department's on there, but it's like, listen, just understand. No one's perfect. Correct.
00:11:47
Speaker
But I feel like you're not weaponizing it, but as long as they have it in their mind that, hey, now I'm being seen and it is being seen and it's being talked about. It's me and listen, the people above me have access to it. Right. so if they want to go and look and see what's going on, it's not, you know. Right. But I mean, it's now it's in your mind that, hey, now everybody can see this and now we need to do better as a team to figure this out. So I agree. I think that's great.
00:12:08
Speaker
Mm-hmm. um No, this is great. This is, for everybody out there, you're seeing this, this is a dream war room for anybody, no matter what size operation. This is a great functioning state of the art, I'd say, going from the no whiteboards to this is just fantastic. The whiteboards are still over here if you want us to do that. Yeah, we can ship those to Those are exactly what the ones in my office look like. You know, you need to put those up top and keep them for about 20 years now and back. Honestly, you could buy and sell them to another rental company. They're pre-made.
00:12:36
Speaker
Or you can always go back and say this is how far we've come. yeah I mean look at where we've been. How are you scheduling out trucks? So I have a load crew supervisor as well. he So he manages when they come in, he comes in second shift. So 12 to whatever, sometimes eight now, but you know, in the busy season, it could be one or two in the morning.
00:12:54
Speaker
So he handles all of loading of trucks, scheduling of trucks, determines how many trucks he needs for a route and stuff, and then gives that information to them. And actually it's also uploaded them into their, into Connect Team. So the guys know when they get in in the morning, what trucks they need to take with them. So connect teams, does that attach do you attach the contract to that even though it doesn't work together? Do you pull it separately? we got We're trying to get there is another thing that we'd like to get and you know eventually to that point. Are you a paper contract for the guys still? We still are paper contract. So the POR prints your packet and yeah sends it. Okay. I don't trust my guys with an iPad. I've been really thinking about it Well, the only thing I see the advantage to that is they physically have it all the time. Where the paperwork, let's be honest, how many of our guys... Or they don't grab it. yeah They just leave it and they call when they get to the job site. It's like, well, how did you even get to the damn job site?
00:13:42
Speaker
And how do you know what Like having address down. Yeah, how do you know what you're doing? I know you know to get there, but like... My guys take pictures. The first thing they do is take a picture it on their phone because they don't want have to call me later and ask what was on it. And even that, but I think the iPad would be the way to go, especially if you had a software system like this that you can just send it directly to the iPad, ship the ticket directly there and everything. I mean, that's the way of the future. It's great. Well, we're all going to – I mean, DOT is going to get worse and worse. So eventually going to have to be running –
Vehicle Tracking and Maintenance Integration
00:14:07
Speaker
more and more. I know you guys. We do. Our guys all. i can still get with paper logs. Yeah, all of our drivers have iPads for that reason. Yeah.
00:14:14
Speaker
For logging their their drive times. So you guys have Verizon Connect. Do you like it? It's good. I mean, GPS software is good. We also are working on implementing whip around for maintenance, like for inspection of trucks in the morning. Explain that. um So basically, it's a... I know DOT has to do the inspection app, but whip around, it'd be every driver needs to do an inspection on their truck, check certain things. You can customize it to whatever you want to do.
00:14:40
Speaker
um Check the fluids, check the truck. Is the truck dirty? Because, you know, no one leaves anything in the truck after it. Because we slip seats, so there's no... You may drive 20 today and you're driving 24 tomorrow. so And that banana peel definitely wasn't in there last time. Correct. yeah Absolutely.
00:14:55
Speaker
So that's an inspection app where also works. It was worked with Verizon, same thing, and maintenance stuff too. It keeps track of our maintenance as well It's a check system and you do every morning before you leave? They're supposed to do it, yep. And if they don't do an inspection, the driver the dispatchers get alert that, hey, this truck's moving without it. Well, because technically by law, even if it's not CDO, you're supposed to have the inspection report of every truck. Right.
00:15:15
Speaker
So with with the Verizon Connect and and just being able to see everything, you know i know that some people have seen it as... Still speeding. Still speeding. I know that some people have seen it as... five over They feel like you're you're watching them and you're the big brother in them.
00:15:31
Speaker
But what is it that you guys are truly using it for and what is the what is the need for it? A lot, like 90, say 95% of the time. When we're getting calls like a local route.
00:15:43
Speaker
Not even that. Hey, salesperson calls, hey, my client wants an ETA. Alright, well let me see where the truck is in relation to where they're going and see what stop they're at. And you don't have to call and bother them. Correct. And you know where they're going. yeah like there's no Now listen, do we all have the places they go in the morning to stop and get their coffee? Well you know that they don't stop on the way here. They don't stop on the way to work. They get on the clock, stop. Absolutely. so But you know, that's part of it. But you know, but yeah, that's 95% the time we're looking at it going, okay, where are you at?
00:16:10
Speaker
So I can tell this person when you're going to be there. Yeah, this is when we estimate. Do you guys run cameras? We do not. Okay. Do you, Nate? No, we don't. We've talked about it several times. We've been talking about it a lot. struggle with it.
00:16:23
Speaker
Because I don't want one watching me, but right I have to bite the bullet and it's going have to go in my work truck too because if I'm forcing them to get one. Yeah, I mean, I feel like it's a privacy thing. You know, you want to be able to let them have their own privacy and you want to be able to trust that they're doing things. It's not that I my guys. But that's the problem is how do you get that to them? It's how you pass that information down. You're just watching. Correct. And we're not. We're watching so that way if there is an accident and you are not at fault, well if it's commercial versus someone's personal vehicle, you're always at fault no matter what unless you actually have a camera.
00:16:57
Speaker
So on your POR packets, I know when I was doing dispatch stuff, um it lets you route the times and say how long jobs take and things like that. do you guys use utilize that or no? We don't utilize that here as much as should. yeah we do Some of the stores do do that and you can because you can time out routes instantly. So then how do you schedule your guys' routes based on timing and jobs? like if if you're gonna give somebody
Challenges in Job Estimation and Importance of Communication
00:17:21
Speaker
10 jobs a day?
00:17:21
Speaker
they Our dispatcher, like the the he base well the one that is does day the day-to-day stuff is pretty good at going, okay, can get this much, can we add more? Was he in this side of the business before? Okay, so he worked his way up into the dispatch. so He has an idea of the times and what the guys should be doing. It'd be awesome if the industry, it's gonna take a few years to get it done, but came out with like a, okay, this is the average 20 by 20, 20 by 30, this is how long it should take.
00:17:47
Speaker
Well, we talk about that all the time. Yeah, because our local crew versus our national crew and our Nashville crew and how many how long everything takes and it seems like the Nashville or the na sorry local side, nobody can put a true time on it because the people that are running that side haven't gone and put up tents physically.
00:18:05
Speaker
And so where we can kind of guess and estimate a little bit more based on doing it and experience and everything else. So I think it would be great to have an industry standard. The also matters. Yes. yeah Listen, there's crews that we have that can do a 40 by 60 and some can do a 20 by 40. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. I just wondered if there's we can create an industry standard based on pulling the knowledge out of people's heads. Yeah, that's it. And and you all those old guys' heads out there. Yeah. Well, it's even like, ah' it's a lot of us. i mean, you've got to think about a lot of us that are like, oh, this going to take two hours to do this. And they're like, well, how'd you come up with that? And you're like, well I've done it before.
00:18:37
Speaker
yeah Well, can you break it down to me? No, I can't really break it down to you, but I can tell you it's going to take two hours. Exactly. So you can route these guys based on that. But I was just curious. It sounds like everybody's doing it the same way based on experience. Based on experience, yeah. We have those days, know, the specific times all that fun stuff. So that's always fun to work around. Well, I they arrived early for one. Yeah, yeah.
00:18:57
Speaker
So is there any trade secrets that you got that you might have for the the listeners or the viewers on what you think makes your guys' business function logistically the the best it can be?
00:19:08
Speaker
I think communication is biggest thing. Like yeah literally like talk, like that's a huge, like now david and not only between your guys in the field, guys in the field, understand what they're doing on a daily day basis, your operating team and your sales team have to like be on the same page. Well there's always that disconnect. And it's hard, and listen, it's ah it's a hard, believe me. i Sales and operations, yes. It's contentious.
00:19:28
Speaker
it's It unfortunately, but you've got to have that communication. and Thankfully my counterpart in the sales side, we've got a great relationship, and I go to her and be like, you know, I've got this problem. I need your help. I need you to this and this. And she went, okay.
00:19:40
Speaker
And we'll work through it and we'll get through it. And that's the biggest thing is just talking. Don't be afraid to talk. Like, you know, people are afraid anymore in days to pick the phone up. Just send me an email. and now just pick them up and call somebody, you know? Yeah. Although I prefer email just because um like my brain moves a hundred miles a minute sometimes. And I'm like, just shoot me an email. Because if you call me, if you call me, I'm going to forget about it. and if you call me, I'm still going to tell you to email me.
00:20:00
Speaker
So, I agree. The communication, i think the sales and the operations is always going to butt heads. I think you're always going to have that no matter where you go. It's just a matter about how you talk it out. So, if you have a good relationship with your salesperson or your operations person, if you guys can talk it out just to make both parties understand you're good. yeah But, yeah, that's the toughest part of the business, I feel like. You're always going to have.
Episode Conclusion and Guest Appreciation
00:20:21
Speaker
Well, Jay, we've taken enough of your time. so We'll get you out of here. We've got get you a shower. You've got to get ready for this big show. But I appreciate your time today. No problem, guys. Another great tailgate talk with Under the Vinyl.
00:20:32
Speaker
Thank you. Hello.