Speaker: Janalee G., Management Dietitian, Citrus Pear
Tell us about your company and how you planned routes before.
Janalee G.: Hi, my name is Janet Green and I'm a dietitian for a company called Citrus Pear. We are a meal prep company. We deliver freezer meals to our customers to their doorstep.
Janalee G.: The first few deliveries we made, we used a different platform that didn't work out well. The platform with that platform, we had to manually arrange stops and then we also had to contact customers about when their delivery would be and if their meals were there. This added a lot of extra time so we started looking for different companies and different software that we could use that would help us simplify the process and take away a lot of that manual time and effort.
How has OptimoRoute helped your business?
Janalee G.: It's helped our business with time saving and fuel savings. Just mainly by planning out the most efficient route. You can go into the settings as well and decide if you want them to be able to make U turns or things like that. And the software just helps the driver know exactly where they need to go, what stops to make and which really helps with fuel savings and helps with, as far as overall cost of that driver and labor costs, it saves time from having to have someone plan out the route individually and contact customers. The software is really very efficient.
How easy is OptimoRoute to use?
Janalee G.: It's incredibly easy to use. You can upload your addresses either with a CSV file or an Excel file to their software. You can then choose the categories to match their categories so that it's a seamless transition. They know exactly what information you need to deliver those meals or our meals to that customer. You can then set parameters around when to stop or when to start that route breaks and all these are done just by sitting at your computer and can be done within a few minutes.
How important are speed and flexibility for your business?
Janalee G.: Speed and flexibility is incredibly important in our business. We're delivering food to our customers so it is a time sensitive product. Getting it to our customers quickly and efficiently is very important. Not only does the software help us get it to them in the most quick and efficient way, it also helps with being very flexible as well if a customer contacts us and says, Hey, there's been an issue, I need to have my meals at the end of the day versus the beginning of the day. We're able to rearrange that and plan when their stop is without much effort at all. So the software in general is very flexible and easy to use and rearrange stops as needed.
