LeanLogistics Wins Award

HOLLAND — LeanLogistics is helping companies cut shipping costs — and getting noticed along the way.

Instead of dealing separately with multiple carriers and multiple systems, companies can contract LeanLogistics and gain access to over 2,000 carriers without making a capital investment in technology equipment.

In recognition of this contribution, LeanLogistics was selected as one of Food Logistic magazine’s Top 100 Technology Solutions. The company is being recognized for best practice application implementation with major food industry and CPG (Consumer Packaged Goods) clients, including Barilla America, Chiquita, Meijer Inc., PepsiAmericas, Pinnacle Foods, Procter & Gamble and Unilever.

In 1999, the company began trying to determine the shipping needs of companies and then developing a program to help them. After 18 months, Meijer Inc. became the company’s first client.

Chris Timmer, vice president of customer solutions for LeanLogistics, said the company developed transportation management technology to aid companies with their logistics.

“It’s a new, emerging concept within a technology sector,” he said.

The program, called LeanLogistics On-Demand Transportation Management System, saves the customer from having to invest in hardware or software, allowing them to invest more in service. The customer sends its information to LeanLogistics, where it is integrated into the system.

“What we do is, we take that away from organizations,” Timmer said of the technology costs.

Companies would normally pay $1 million to $2 million for the equipment needed, Timmer said. With LeanLogistics, they pay less than a percent of their transportation costs and can reduce the transportation budget by 5 percent to 15 percent. Contracts are normally signed for three to five years, Timmer said.

“Because of our pay-as-you-go model, it allows them to align value with expense,” he said.

Timmer said the benefits of the program are lowering costs, reducing risk and providing better service to customers.