Every supply chain manager eventually faces the dilemma of an out-of-stock or a line-down situation. In that kind of logistics emergency, next-day shipping isn’t good enough. The cost of failure is dramatic. A real, working solution requires an urgent, dedicated resource to make a delivery across town, the state, or the country within a day – or even hours.
Getting the replacement part or out-of-stock inventory delivered within a city or region requires freight forwarders to tap contract expedited trucking services. Or, the supplier itself assigns a person to be the pickup and delivery resource, using whatever truck or van is available. For longer distances, 300 miles or so, air freight comes into play. There are a lot of moving parts to consider.
No matter the circumstance, executing the first- and last-mile requires forwarder intervention and management – from marshaling trucking services to coordinating with airline schedules. It’s inefficient, sub-optimal and exceptionally expensive. All of those factors make same-day services a “break glass in case of emergency”-only option for most supply chain managers.
Until now.
Bringing the speed and scalability of on-demand ground delivery networks to air cargo
Same-day delivery over the ground has become a competitive advantage for supply chain managers battling customers’ high expectations for urgent deliveries. Roadie has been right there with companies across a range of industries to develop a flexible, scalable on-demand delivery network that rewrites the script for same-day. We’re helping retailers, business owners and logistics managers drive value, increase revenue and build stickiness with customers who need a superior delivery service.
And now, that same flexibility is available for shipments that need to go just about anywhere in the U.S. With our partnership with Delta Cargo, it couldn’t be easier to send something across the country, same-day. Delta Cargo’s DASH® Door-to-Door is a first-of-its-kind service that offers shippers a turnkey, same-day delivery option – one that fills in the gaps in speed, reliability and flexibility left by courier and forwarder services.
How cross-country, same-day works
DASH® Door-to-Door is a same-day priority service, with a money-back guarantee. Once the service is selected on deltacargo.com, a TSA-approved Roadie driver is seamlessly matched to pick-up from the business location. The shipper can opt-in to receive a notification confirming shipment details, pickup location, and details about the Roadie driver, or check the status of the shipment anytime at deltacargo.com. DASH® Door-to-Door is currently available from 34 U.S. cities into 65 U.S. cities, with additional cities to be added in the coming months.
Delta Cargo provides the scheduled “line-haul” service through the thousands of city-to-city airline routes Delta Air Lines operates daily, utilizing the belly space of the aircraft for cargo. Roadie provides the first- and last-mile pickup and delivery, either from airport to airport or door to door, leveraging everyday people in their personal vehicles already headed in the direction of the shipment.
Instead of managing each component of an incredibly complex delivery, supply chain managers are quickly connected to a pickup driver, airline flight and delivery driver. A few quick clicks and the shipment is on its way. On top of reducing complexity in booking, DASH® Door-to-Door makes it easier to project a reliable ETA, get all-inclusive pricing and track a shipment in real-time to its destination.
No matter the use case, we can deliver
We recognized early on that people are busy, short-staffed and don’t want to have to deal with arranging the first or last mile leg of a same-day delivery. It can be a complicated, time-consuming process – time that the customer often doesn’t have, or that their urgent need won’t tolerate.
Combining Roadie’s crowdsourced, on-demand network of drivers with Delta’s scheduled flight services gives the consumer a more responsive, convenient, reliable and cost-effective option than couriers or forwarders. We’ve seen a wide range of uses, from automotive parts and replacement components going to a plant for an emergency repair, to aircraft parts, construction supply delivery, time-sensitive legal documents and passports.
DASH® Door-to-Door even presents a new option for freight forwarders in cities where they don’t have a presence, aren’t represented by an agent or otherwise aren’t able to cover. It allows them to extend their network footprint without putting their own boots on the ground.
A new narrative for traditionally complex logistics
More than ever before, logistics managers (and their 3PLs) face an ever-evolving list of business priorities that require flexibility, reliability and innovation. It’s a response to ever-increasing pressure to accelerate supply chain velocity and delivery of goods to meet ever-tighter delivery windows. And it demonstrates how sophisticated technology developers combined with forward-thinking freight operators are rising to the same-day challenge with unique, scalable, cost-effective solutions.
