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By Counterman
Scheduling of delivery drivers can be one of the more difficult personnel-related tasks for any manager. Often at the lower end of your pay scale and frequently staffed by part-time employees, these positions can be difficult to screen, fill and maintain. They are a critical link to commercial success, yet their value is easily overlooked when weekly schedules are created.
In many retail environments, analysis of prior hour-by-hour sales figures often shapes the forecast for staffing future shifts. Adequate staffing at the front counter is critical to assisting customers and moving merchandise efficiently, but in order to accurately forecast demand for delivery drivers, we must ignore the majority of retail sales, which occur in-store or, increasingly, as online purchases. Unless your business model includes “home delivery” to retail customers, staffing your delivery needs will revolve exclusively around your commercial accounts.
Having adequate delivery capability to maintain (or strengthen) your commercial relationships can look different for each location. Vehicle and personnel numbers will vary based primarily on that individual store’s customer mix and the type of market served. Wholesale jobbers generally serve a broader geographic area than retailers, due in part to their smaller store network. A chain retailer is more likely to have a greater concentration of individual stores per square mile, each serving a smaller area, while the jobber maintains a larger commercial customer base spread across a larger geographic area.
As a result, jobbers tend to make better use of scheduled route delivery, in contrast to focusing on frequent short “on-demand” deliveries in the immediate area. These schedules are much easier to forecast, as they are somewhat consistent throughout the business day. When scheduling for the “hot-shot” portion of your delivery needs, however, the natural ebb and flow of your store’s daily routine become an important factor. There are key points throughout each day that require additional delivery staffing.
Many stores enjoy some form of overnight warehouse delivery, and those daily orders will be expected at shops across your territory as soon as possible the following morning. Between those “first thing in the morning” deliveries and the daily ritual of vehicle pre-checks, the first hour of the workday can be a beehive of activity for your delivery staff. By the time your trucks are returning from their early rounds, orders generated from those 8 a.m. diagnostic appointments at shops across your market have begun to filter in, resulting in another rush. Customer calls ramp up again before and during the traditional lunch hour, as shops try to arrange deliveries to arrive before technicians return from their breaks. Another flurry of dispatches will be in response to the afternoon’s diagnostics, with shops hoping to wrap up repairs before end of day, and to beat the overnight order deadlines for the next day’s business.
In addition to customer-driven rushes, we may also see a spike in driver demand centered around our own incoming deliveries. Stores with midday warehouse deliveries will see a surge in demand around these times, as well as those created by UPS or FedEx drop-offs. Most of our best customers already know what time to expect such special orders, and the volume of “where’s my stuff?” calls will add to the sense of immediacy felt by everyone on staff!
Delivery scheduling can also be adversely affected by seasonality and holidays. Freezing or snowy weather not only creates delays in parts deliveries from the warehouse and at store levels, but it can also limit an individual driver’s ability to report for duty as scheduled, creating a gap in coverage. Coupled with the longer delivery times required for the remaining staff to complete routes safely, it can create temporary bottlenecks. Holidays also create personnel issues, as we attempt to find coverage for those days that everyone wants to spend with family and friends. Travel-intensive holidays like Memorial Day, Independence Day and Labor Day also create an increased demand from shops prepping vehicles for extended trips, with added pressure for everyone to complete repairs, often at the last minute.
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By Counterman
Thirty years ago, I was full of questions. As a rookie counterman, I was also pretty short on answers. I hadn’t “been there, done that” and I didn’t even know about the T-shirt. I was strictly an order-taker, fumbling my way through a catalog of unfamiliar parts and asking a lot of questions. I asked coworkers what parts were called, I asked customers whatever the computer prompted me to, and I even asked myself (several times) if this was the right job for me. Turns out it was, and I just needed to learn to ask the right questions.
Customers come to us every day for answers, but the search often requires us to ask the right questions before we arrive at the answer to theirs. One of the most difficult types of questions from both sides of the counter involves diagnostics. Ideally, when a customer presents their request, their diagnosis is already complete and accurate. More often, we are also asked to interpret a symptom, translate a printout from a code reader, or offer a solution to a problem we haven’t experienced alongside the customer.
Professional technicians have a distinct advantage over parts specialists in the sense that they get to “experience” a repair from beginning to end, rather than being brought in midway through the process. From taking a test drive to performing pinpoint electrical testing or disassembling a component or assembly, technicians are literally “hands-on” throughout the repair process. On the other hand, we are frequently asked to give assistance without seeing, hearing or touching the vehicle in question.
In Australia and Asia, our job title is often advertised as “parts interpreter,” which is a pretty accurate description of what we do daily. We translate a foreign language for people who might not otherwise understand the information in front of their eyes. In order to perform our function as interpreters, we must be able to mentally perform a “virtual repair,” confirming that the correct diagnostic procedures have been carried out, that we are providing all of the necessary components and supplies to repair the vehicle, and then analyze the results to determine if our interpretation has been successful.
More than just cataloging and identifying parts or selecting boxes from a shelf, the best parts specialists have the knowledge of how these parts coexist within the systems that they are a part of. An understanding of the methods used to test and troubleshoot components is critical when determining what your customer has done (or not done) to arrive at their “diagnosis,” and to help guide them through the appropriate steps to correct any further issues they may have. In those cases when we do have the luxury of seeing the problem firsthand, using visual and audio clues along with our own knowledge of how the affected parts tend to fail gives us yet another opportunity to recommend the most appropriate solution for our customer. On those occasions when the diagnosis doesn’t match the parts request, this approach also helps us to prevent comebacks and “alleged defective” returns.
It’s often said that “there’s no such thing as a stupid question.” Looking back on my career behind the counter, I’m still not entirely convinced that’s true, but now I know that some questions are more important than others. Here’s hoping it doesn’t take you 30 years to figure out which ones those are, and that you aren’t afraid to keep asking until you do!
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By Counterman
You can get pretty much anything delivered if you want it badly enough. In the parts business, we’ve been doing it for decades, but delivery on demand has crept its way back into grocery and prepared foods, hardware, and many other industries. It’s not a new concept, only more efficient and widespread than it was at the turn of the 20th century, and even the 21st!
Instacart and other grocery services may seem like a modern marvel, but most grocery stores during the first half of the 20th century offered delivery, as did the local pharmacy, dairy, and a host of other businesses. The rise of suburbia (and the supermarket) after WWII threw a curveball into that business model as people became more mobile and spread out from urban centers.
Pizza delivery, especially the Domino’s “30 minutes or less” guarantee, has had a drastic effect on our own delivery operations. For traffic safety reasons, Domino’s no longer guarantees half-hour delivery, but the effectiveness of their advertising campaign still resonates with the public some 30 years later. At the parts counter, as well as with food delivery services like Doordash and GrubHub, there’s still an unspoken expectation that our items will be arriving at fixed intervals after the order is placed.
Fortunately, we don’t deal in perishable merchandise, so a delayed delivery doesn’t ruin the product. That doesn’t stop the phone from ringing off the hook with the dreaded “where’s my stuff?” calls, so we still need to keep up our pace to serve our commercial clientele. As soon as the call ends, or the online order is sent, we are “on the clock,” even if it is only the customer’s internal clock.
Auto parts deliveries generally fall into two categories; “hot shot” and “routed.” Dispatching these orders and staffing a delivery team depends greatly on your market, geography, and each customer’s expectations. If you recall the fable of the tortoise and the hare, the moral of the story was that “slow and steady wins the race.” Routed deliveries are the tortoise, quietly making steady progress in a direct path that ultimately got him to the finish line. The post office, UPS and Amazon all successfully make use of delivery routes. You can generally count on regular deliveries from each of these providers within a specific daily window, and most recipients are content to schedule work around these time slots. Stock orders, parts ordered in advance of a scheduled appointment, and customers at the edge of our service areas are prime candidates for route delivery. For emergency orders, vehicles tying up a lift, and those instances where we have to correct previous cataloguing, picking or delivery mistakes, we must rely on the hot shot delivery.
The hare in our fable is a “hot shot” in many ways, sprinting here and there at a frenetic pace, expending considerable energy and even showing off a little for the crowd. Hot shot deliveries showcase our store’s commitment to serving our customer’s needs, but it can be physically, emotionally and financially draining. No wonder the hare decided to catch a quick nap! It’s easy to get caught up in the moment when it comes to hot shot delivery. If a “top 20” customer asks (or demands) us to drop everything and run, the first instinct for many is to dispatch the part with the first available delivery driver. This can quickly spiral into a shortage of available drivers (or even counter staff) as they scatter to the four winds, each with a single item or order. The problem is only compounded when multiple drivers are dispatched to the same general area, or, in some cases, the same customer! We need to coordinate the chaos to give our customers the best service possible.
For those stores with a dedicated outside salesperson, their daily or weekly sales routes are an established roadmap that can be used as a template for routed delivery. While a salesperson might spend all day maintaining relationships and making sales along a particular route, delivery personnel need only a fraction of that time to cover the same mileage and drop off the requested parts and supplies. Scheduled delivery twice or even three times a day is a real possibility in many markets, with a minimum of vehicles and drivers on the road at any given time. We can also maximize the profitability of route delivery by calling customers along the intended route ahead of time to identify any “last minute” needs before the driver even starts their engine.
Driver scheduling and dispatch requires a balance of “speedy” and “steady” to coordinate the chaos inherent in a successful store operation. Everyone admires the speed and agility of the running rabbit, but sometimes we also need a herd of turtles to get the job done. Knowing how to use both types of delivery effectively maximizes productivity and profits!
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By NAPA
A resilient effort by Christian Eckes and the
link hidden, please login to view team salvaged a top-10 finish in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series (NCTS) opener at Daytona International Speedway on Friday night. The driver of the No. 19 NAPA Auto Care Chevrolet Silverado RST finished 10th despite being involved in three multi-truck accidents in the second half of the event. His 10th-place result earned him 39 points and places him third in the NCTS championship standings.
Eckes was buried deep in the field after qualifying 25th, but he instantly darted toward the front once the green flag flew. Eckes’ aggression was immediately evident as he made three-wide moves on the opening lap. He narrowly avoided a multi-truck accident on lap six and joined the top-10 on lap 13. A one-lap dash to close Stage 1 saw Eckes grab three points in eighth position on lap 20.
Crew chief Charles Denike kept Eckes on track during the caution to inherit track position and found themselves in the mix for the race lead when Stage 2 went green at lap 27. Eckes was in the thick of the battle for the race lead and pushed his new MHR teammate Tyler Ankrum to the Stage 2 win. Eckes pocketed another nine points by running second at the end of the segment on lap 40.
Under the second-stage caution, Eckes pitted for four tires and fuel and restarted 12th on lap 45. A caution on lap 57 allowed him, and several other competitors, to make their final stop for fuel. Eckes restarted 16th on lap 62 and rocketed to the front with some aggressive drafting. He briefly took the lead on lap 72 but was involved in an accident on lap 79 while running second. Despite losing a lap, the NAPA Auto Care team made ample repairs and allowed Eckes to regain his lap on lap 86. With five laps to go, he suffered minor damage in an incident which set up an overtime restart. After restarting 24th with two laps remaining, Eckes drove halfway back through the field but was swept into a track-blocking accident on the final lap and suffered significant damage.
Eckes was able to refire his Chevrolet Silverado RST and drove back around to the checkered flag to finish 10th and start the season just four points out of the championship lead.
“Tonight was a wild night, for sure,” Eckes said. “We were able to drive our NAPA Auto Care Chevrolet up to the front a couple times and were going to be one of the trucks to beat. I was able to work well with our teammates for a while tonight until we got turned off Turn 4 there with 20-to-go or so. I’m proud of the guys on our NAPA team to get it fixed and got our lap back. We never gave up tonight and we saved a ton of points because of it.”
Start / Finish: 25 / 10
Points Standing / Total: 3rd / 39 pts. (-4)
Next Race: Saturday, Feb. 24, Atlanta Motor Speedway
How to Watch or Listen: 2:00 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN or SiriusXM
NAPA:
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By RockAuto
Get a 5% instant manufacturer rebate with purchase of select Walker Products parts.View on RockAuto.com
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