The more product you can legally and efficiently load on your trucks, the greater your profit.

Pallet and trailer cube optimization

AutoVLB (Automatic Vehicle Load Builder also known as Super Truck) minimizes supply chain transportation costs by maximizing the loads on all trucks in a way that cannot be achieved manually, with TMS (Transportation Management Systems)  or with non-optimizing systems. AutoVLB works to optimize the creation of an order so that it fills up the truck while meeting both service and inventory constraints.  With AutoVLB you can probably save between 4 and 8 percent on shipping costs. Most companies think their loads are full or that their TMS is fixing orders that don't quite fill a truck…but time after time, AutoVLB has been able to make better orders that generate bigger shipments. We invite you to put AutoVLB to the test!

How does AutoVLB work?

AutoVLB takes requirements, for example what is shipping from a plant to a warehouse, and automatically turns this demand into efficient, low-cost truckloads that use almost every last pound or cube of capacity. Loads organized by AutoVLB are legal, damage free and maxed out.

To maximize truckloads, AutoVLB uses real-world constraints:

• equipment size (for example 96 inch interior width does not allow turning pallets)
  
• special state restrictions such as California’s kingpin rule (Bridge Formula)
• axle weight limits
  
• the physical size and configuration of each product -- for example is an item stackable - on itself, on other items.  You can't put the bricks on the eggs (unless you want an omelet)
  
• what is needed today, tomorrow and into the future

Contrast this to manual methods that use simple rules of thumb such as “A truckload is 42,000 pounds” or “A full load is 21 pallets.” AutoVLB optimizes against the real constraints.

Keeping axle weights legal - now that is a real constraint

The bottom line is savings – both money and the environment
AutoVLB has been proven by industry leaders to save money.  P & G has announced that AutoVLB saves them 7%.  This is 7% fewer trucks, 7% fewer carbon emissions, 7% fewer freight bills...and a lot more on the bottom line.   Kraft calls AutoVLB "Super Truck."  While we can't tell you how much they have saved, we do know they are a very good reference.

Getting more on a truck
We often hear “we always ship full loads.”  The reality is most company’s loads are far from full and simply looking at the data can validate this.  Most shipments have a healthy gap between the planning limit and the actual shipment weight.  Here is an example of why planners and non-optimizing-load builders have problems filling up loads:

While the following adjustment may seem simple, most (99.9%) of companies computer systems don’t have the intelligence to do this – and it gets harder with more complex loads.  Additionally, without systems support, planners have difficulty making decisions that generate this kind of change.

Also, without optimization systems to help the loaders on the dock, load planners have to allow big margins of safety so the loaders can avoid any over-weight trucks or leaving product on the dock.  In a recent study of more than 600 overweight shipments, 94% were caused by loader error.  If you think it is easy, try the educational – but entertaining game  http://www.transportationoptimization.com/vlbgame.asp

“The operation was a success, but the patient died.”
An optimized load is useless if the forklift driver has difficulty getting the load balanced and legal. To make sure loads are not held up at the scales and arrive damage-free, AutoVLB creates a loading diagram and a case pick sequence for every shipment.  It can do that because it incorporates both AutoPalletP3 and AutoLoaderT3 – software that has proven itself in some of the biggest and best-run shipping operations in the world

Good pallets support the building of good trucks.  While the following diagram is an exaggeration, it is indicative.

AutoVLB works in many places in the operation to cut freight costs:
AutoVLB provides support:

• In the creation of VMI, replenishment and purchase orders.  For example, replacing non-optimizing load builders.  The effectiveness of the load is determined when the order is made--and well before the TMS gets a chance to even look at it
  
• Checking and fixing orders as they are received
  
• Updating shipments as new information comes to hand. For example, a 48 ft trailer is dispatched to pick up the load rather than a 53 footer

This is depicted in the following diagram – “Before” is the traditional approach to load building using a non-optimizing or manual process.

And the outputs vary based on when and how AutoVLB is used.  In a planning mode, AutoVLB creates optimized orders for vendor managed inventory and stock transfers.  When customer orders are received, AutoVLB can check them.  Are they full truckloads?  Are they more than a full load and do they need to be split?  For example, some drug chains send in orders for more than 10 trucks and expect the supplier to create loads.  The savings are large when AutoVLB can create 9 loads instead of 10.

In the same light many small orders that will be fulfilled from the same site to the same destination may be “optimally” consolidated into a truckload.  Wal*Mart is well known for having many buyers place orders against a supplier and have that supplier select the right orders and put them together to minimize transportation costs.

In the world of operations, where the rubber meets the road, AutoVLB creates the best pick path and the optimal loading sequence to guide the warehouse workers to make a damage-free load–on-time--every time.

AutoVLB also provides the opportunity to re-optimize shipments that, for example, have been cut because the production line did not run or, alternately, a super-light weight tractor trailer has been assigned and the maximum load weight can now be an additional 4,000 pounds.  In these circumstances the loads can be filled out to eliminate waste (And save dollars)

Software alone is NOT enough
Software needs to be a solid part of a holistic approach to freight optimization.  The following diagram depicts a proven, successful, three-phased approach that generates hard savings but also introduces new concepts and real changes in thinking which speeds acceptance.  Here is an example:  To prove savings, we often weigh trucks as they arrive empty and again later when they leave the yard full.  This process makes it possible to see how accurate the item-master weights are, and how much money is being left on the table.  It is also an excellent way of overcoming ”tribal knowledge and superstition.”  For example, proving there is a huge margin of safety built into planning weight limits.  This is borne out in a large truck population (over 860,000 trucks weighed in 16 locations in the US):  96% of 5 axle tractor-trailers are more than 5% under-loaded. 

What happens where we have to ship direct from the production line to the truck?

In situations where there is limited dock space and the plant has to "push" product out, AutoVLB relies on another system to create the optimized loads.  This system, called Automatic Constrained Dock Optimization (AutoCDO), creates a tactical plan that considers many factors -- from the cost of the load to the exact timing of items coming off the line.

To learn more, download an article that appeared in CSCMP’s “Supply Chain Comment”

A New Approach to Reduce Truckload Freight Costs

or call or Managing partner Thomas Moore 615-791-8000 or go to the contact us section.