Andrew Ingredients, a leading ingredients supplier for the bakery and food services sectors, has used vehicle and asset management software Pocket Box Fleet to transform its transport and warehouse operations. Since adopting the software, the company has strengthened safety compliance, reduced maintenance costs by 10 percent, and freed up more than 40 hours of staff time each week.

Andrew Ingredients is headquartered in Lisburn, Northern Ireland, operating a fleet of nine 26-tonne HGVs with tail lifts and ten fork-lift trucks from a 35,000 sq ft warehouse.

The facility stores over 2,000 ambient food products, Andrew Ingredients confirmed, serving customers across the UK and Ireland. Over the past five years, the company has brought order fulfilment for 800 Irish customers in-house, with 96 percent of 1,200 weekly orders now handled by its multi-drop delivery service.

The structural driver is Andrew Ingredients' replacement of a paper-and-spreadsheet-based compliance system with a cloud-based platform, enabling real-time data capture across its transport and warehouse operations as order volumes have grown.

Sammy Adams, operations manager at Andrew Ingredients, said, "Following strong and consistent growth in recent years, I would not be able to coordinate our compliance and maintenance requirements without Pocket Box Fleet. The software has become invaluable, providing the data capture and reporting tools essential for managing our fleet of HGVs and fork-lift trucks, along with other materials handling and warehouse machinery."

QR codes are located on all HGVs, fork-lift trucks, machinery and warehouse locations, allowing drivers and operatives to scan them using a Pocket Box-enabled mobile device to bring up the required check or task, with photo capture and timestamping built into pre-shift walkaround checks.

Adams added, "If something is not completed, it appears on my to-do list to chase up, so nothing can be overlooked. Nothing can be faked, because everything is timestamped and all details are stored digitally in one place. When we have a DVSA or BRCGS audit, everything is available with a click of the mouse, which means there is no risk of misplaced records or compliance gaps."

For the sector, the deployment illustrates how food and ingredients distributors are digitising fleet compliance to meet rising regulatory and audit demands without adding headcount.

Source: HGV Ireland / Pocket Box Fleet / Andrew Ingredients