“Before we implemented Podfather we produced an extortionate amount of paper,” commented Natalia Furlong, Chief Environmental Officer at Furlong Flooring. “This was costly to the business and costly to the environment. But the impact didn’t end there, paperwork has a cost to produce, takes time to fill out, has the potential to introduce errors if its wrongly completed or lost, and has a cost to store and then access.
“We were recommended Podfather so didn’t look elsewhere and to be honest we haven’t looked back,” she continued. “We have literally slashed the amount of paperwork we consume, we’ve improved driver efficiency, and therefore reduced the time spent on the road, and we’ve boosted customer service with automatic ETA notifications and ePOD documents.”
Furlong’s commitment to the environment is central to its core values and underlined by its ISO 14001 accreditation. The company has invested significantly in the development of initiatives that reduce waste, increase recycling and empower staff to think and act sustainably and has underpinned its approach with the ground breaking B.E.S.T. (Better Environmental Solutions Together) project. This allows Furlong to accurately evaluate its environmental processes from manufacturing to distribution and achieve effective, sustainable solutions.
Using Podfather, Furlong has introduced digital delivery manifests and delivery documents which can be updated in real-time and accessed by drivers using their mobile phones. This digitisation of delivery management has reduced the time and administration resource required to produce paper documents and has increased driver efficiencies as customer signatures and feedback are easily captured, recorded and shared with the back-office system giving management and support staff real-time visibility of the delivery operation.
Daily vehicle checks, guided and recorded using the Podfather app, are improving early notification of potential vehicle faults helping to improve workforce health and safety and further reduce Furlong’s environmental impact with a better maintained fleet.
“Podfather has enormous potential to improve the service we deliver to our customers,” added Les McCoy, COO at Furlong Flooring, “and we are currently only utilising a small proportion of its functionality. The support we have received so far has been exceptional so as we look to roll-out additional features and functionality I am confident we will reap additional benefits.”
The Furlong Flooring Group is Europe’s largest manufacturing distributor of flooring products. With over 40 years’ experience Furlong produces flooring for all uses, from light domestic to heavy commercial, at its state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Bangor, Co. Down. In conjunction with quality flooring products sourced via an exclusive, worldwide supplier partnership, this stocks four distribution centres in Ireland and the United Kingdom. The Dublin headquarters of Furlong Flooring services retail outlets across the island of Ireland using its fleet of 26-tonne rigid lorries to complete more than 100 deliveries a day.
