Retailers Increasingly Turn to FourKites to Drive End-to-End Supply Chain Visibility

CHICAGO – May 19, 2020 – FourKites^®, the #1 real-time supply chain visibility platform, today announced that its momentum in the retail sector continues to accelerate, as evidenced by unprecedented growth in new customers, total shipments tracked, miles travelled, carriers onboarded and geographies covered, amongst other key metrics. Critically, FourKites’ retail customers increased on-time, in-full (OTIF) deliveries by 38% and reduced dwell time by 14% between October 2020 to March 2021, compared to the six months prior.

Over the last six months, FourKites’ retail customer base grew by 20%; tracked shipments increased 77% in North America, 52% in Europe and 158% in Asia Pacific; and carrier onboarding rose 30% to a total carrier count of nearly 600. Moreover, total miles travelled by FourKites retail customers were up 117%, to just under 2 billion miles. Notably, during a period in which consumer behavior has demonstrably shifted to ecommerce, FourKites saw a 67% growth in LTL shipments and 152% growth in parcel shipments over the last six months.

FourKites was recently recognized in the 2021 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Real-Time Transportation Visibility Platforms for its ability to execute and with the furthest completeness of vision out of 14 companies evaluated. Gartner also recognized FourKites for its particular expertise in the Retail industry. 

As shipping volumes increase and more retailers leverage the platform, FourKites continues to exercise its vision and deliver industry-first innovations specifically designed for, and often in collaboration with, its retail customers. Recent new capabilities and enhancements include:

• FourKites Retail Manager and Merchandiser Apps provide users with real-time shipment tracking and predicted ETAs via their mobile devices so they can spend more time re-stocking and working on promotions instead of waiting for late shipments or dashing from store to store. FourKites’ solution also enables direct messaging with the driver, keeps a record of all past deliveries and provides ETAs for the next day’s shipments.

“Our store managers use the FourKites Manager App,” said Adrian Santos, corporate director of transportation at Grocery Outlet. “It helps them manage labor better while giving the transport team more visibility in coordinating the final-mile deliveries.”

• Recent enhancements to Appointment Manager make calendar blocks more flexible, helping stores better manage back-room operations and optimize labor to focus on sales and customer service.

• Inbound shipment visibility: FourKites’ Network Visibility has been enhanced to allow retailers, vendors and carriers to see and collaborate on inbound pre-paid shipments to optimize staffing and manage capacity. More than 50,000 shipments are shared with retailers on a monthly basis.

• FourKites is the only real-time visibility platform that offers multimodal SKU-level tracking, enabling customers to track shipments across their entire lifecycle using their associated PO number. FourKites co-innovated this solution together with major grocery retailer Meijer. The retailer ties real-time transportation visibility to purchase orders — not just loads — in order to optimize delivery of over 220,000 active SKUs to its 250+ stores.

“Visibility has been hugely valuable for us, and as a large retailer and shipper, adding PO lifecycle visibility means we can identify critical orders faster, eliminate inefficiencies and make better decisions on lead times,” said Paul Thompson, Inbound Logistics Director, Meijer.

• Instant Messenger: FourKites enhanced its instant messaging features to enable workers in track-and-trace and dispatch, drivers and warehouse personnel to share documents, photographs and notes for any given load.

• Direct Store Delivery: New Direct Store Delivery tracking enables FourKites users to track last-mile shipments from local warehouses to retail outlets, giving retail workers immediate visibility into shipment ETA via their mobile devices.

To learn more about FourKites real-time visibility innovations for retailers, visithttps://www.fourkites.com/industries/retail/.

About FourKites 

FourKites^® is the #1 supply chain visibility platform in the world, extending visibility beyond transportation into yards, warehouses, stores and beyond. Tracking more than 1 million shipments daily across road, rail, ocean, air, parcel and courier, and reaching 176 countries, FourKites combines real-time data and powerful machine learning to help companies digitize their end-to-end supply chains. More than 500 of the world’s most recognized brands — including 9 of the top-10 CPG and 18 of the top-20 food and beverage companies — trust FourKites to transform their business and create more agile, efficient and sustainable supply chains. To learn more, visit https://www.fourkites.com/.