LoadProof Video Testimonial – Luke Gendreau, Kenco

Do you want to give a quick introduction about your manager please?

Uh yes, we’re a third-party logistics firm for a large construction producer. We have products brought in by railway to our location, and we send out to their customers via flatbed trailers. Pretty simple operation; a lot of mostly full units are moved. The customer base is strong, and the business itself is very consistent. You can manage with just a few people and some forklift equipment, and it’s a great place to be.

Great, fantastic! So, what was the problem that you guys were trying to solve? Right, let’s start from the beginning. What were you guys doing before you engaged? Before you started using LoadProof, what was the problem you were trying to solve, and what were your frustrations?

As simple as I made the operation sound, damage to the material has always been an issue, both on the inbound rails and customer complaints after receiving the flatbeds. These are very large units that don’t necessarily have protection around the outside, so it can certainly happen. Before LoadProof, we were at the mercy of conversations with both upstream and downstream leaders, taking their word for best practices used during loading and unloading. We had a little more leverage with our suppliers from the railway regarding things they could do to help protect the product as it was coming from their location.

On the customer side of things, we generally accepted what customers shared with us, and they would typically get refunded for any damage they may have received. Now that we have LoadProof, we can capture photos of both the inbound product as it arrives to share with the producers and give them specific examples of things we’d like to see changed in protection. On the delivery side, we’re capturing each load before it leaves our facility, so when we hear a customer complaint down the road about damage or missing items, we have the photos to prove whether we had an issue on our end.

Got it, so you guys now have a tool to show how it shipped and when it shipped from our facility. You can clearly demonstrate the condition; you’re not blindly taking their word. Claims that chargebacks, whatever it is, right?

Yeah, exactly. There’s another part to that. In the delivery, you have contracted trucking lines making those deliveries. We often feel we’re not doubting that the damage is received on their end, but what happened from the time it left our facility to arriving at theirs? Whether it may have been straps tightened too much, causing issues with the product, or jostling during travel, or even sometimes damage incurred on the customer end during unloading, someone would sometimes claim it was like that when they took it off. With those photos and proof, we can show them that we had no issue on our end.

Okay, all right. Sorry, go ahead.

No, go ahead.

So, how did you think about LoadProof? What picked your cost? LoadProof was actually a corporate initiative with my company. I am a general manager of a Kenco facility, looking at some correspondence for Smart Gladiator, and I see that Trevor Ehrlich had a great statement in appreciation of your company. I’ve worked directly with Trevor since my time here, and the ultimate goal for Kenco is to have LoadProof in all facilities because we’ve seen the benefits, and it’s totally worth it.

Got it. I know it was spearheaded by Christy and Trevor from an innovation perspective. From your personal perspective, what were your challenges running the facility, shipping products, fulfilling orders, and ensuring customer satisfaction? How did you perceive it?

When the idea was first brought to me, I was all for it because I had been involved with similar systems in my past work life. It saves a lot of heartache down the road where you don’t have the answers or proof to show that you did everything correctly. I was probably one of the first to get on board and get the app installed. To be honest, it’s simple to use.

The biggest issue I had was having the team buy in because we changed their process and made them stop to take photos. However, after a while, they saw the advantages of doing so, which protects them from possible disciplinary actions for damages or misses.

It’s an accepted culture; there is no issue whatsoever in having the team use the application. We capture every single load as it leaves the building.

So, how long did it take for the team to buy into the thing? Was it like a week, month? When did they realize, “Oh my God, now I can show this, show that I did my job well”?

Well, as you know, a lot of people are resistant to change. I think that probably drove it more than anything with some senior folks. Honestly, within a couple of weeks, we had it up and running. We had some issues that weren’t related to LoadProof itself; we had connectivity issues. We had to purchase some MiFis and laptops to have out on the floor for protection, so it was a bit of an investment up front, but again, so much worth it.

What results were you able to quantify? Obviously, now you have proof to show. Apart from that, what other areas of the business improved by deploying this LoadProof tool? It helped improve the performance of the workers here. Not only are we using it to show proof down the road, it captures what they did or how they performed as they loaded these trailers. It’s not meant to be used against them, but as a proof tool.

There have been a couple of occasions where customers said they were missing some product. When I refer back to the photos, the customer was right. In the past, the loader could have said, “No, it definitely was on there,” and if everything added up, we’d have no choice but to believe them. But LoadProof holds our people accountable as well and has improved their performance. They realize that this tool is present, and they need to always do the right thing.

It improved internal morale. Now everybody knows it’s all being documented, so they really have to make sure they do their job. We’re not asking them to do anything over the top or beyond their responsibility; it’s just perfecting what they do on a normal daily basis. The customer expects every load in perfect order and exactly as ordered, and it’s helped drive that considerably.

Coming from a 3PL perspective, it’s even more important for you guys. That’s why the big brands outsource to you. We still have some opportunity on the inbound side of things. As much as we are the origin for outside customers, now we need the producers to become the origin so we can feed back to them.

I’ve been looking into that and have certainly shared information about LoadProof with them. Unfortunately, we can’t dictate their actions; it’s up to them whether they want to pursue it. In the meantime, there are still plenty of photos shared of what we see and things we’d like to see done differently. There have been complete Lean Six Sigma Green Belt projects involved with the quality manager of the customer to get that looked at specifically.

I’d say it’s really tough to capture a number for ROI. Reduced labor, quicker turnover, more efficient operations—if I were to guess, it’s got to be in the tens of thousands. For the cost of five dollars a month, we easily get $45 worth of productivity back, if not a thousand times as much.

Monetarily, it’s made a big difference. Even though people submit claims, we have the proof to refute those points. When situations arise, it’s nice to know that LoadProof is there to back us up.