Greencore is a leading manufacturer of convenience foods, including a diverse selection of chilled, frozen and ambient foods. Since night-time deliveries are part of their service, they needed a more robust way to ensure their drivers’ safety who work alone.
About the company
Greencore is a large national company with over 12,000 employees within the UK and Ireland. Established in 1991 by the Irish government, Greencore has become the largest sandwich manufacturer globally.
As a leading manufacturer of convenience foods, they are notably known for supplying pre-made sandwiches to major UK supermarkets including M&S, ASDA, and Morrisons. Their product range also includes a diverse selection of chilled, frozen and ambient foods.
In 2020, Greencore achieved a revenue of 1.265B. Their future ambitions include driving sustainable growth in an expanding food to go market by increasing their value and relevance via their core promise: “Making every day taste better.
What were their goals?
A key aspect of Greencore’s businesses requires delivering supplies to their customers at night. This delivery schedule allows its customers to have their products ready for retail sale the following day.
The drivers in charge of sending the deliveries would be working alone at night. The delivery locations ranged from residential areas to shopping centres in the city. Based on the nature of the job, the lone risk assessment had identified dangers such as the risk of slips, trips, falls , road accidents, health issues (such as a sudden collapse) and crimes—especially in the city centre where crime rates are higher.
While Greencore’s vehicles have been equipped with GPS, and their drivers usually have personal mobile phones, these measures were not enough to ensure their drivers’ safety. For example, GPS will not indicate if a driver is in danger. Mobile phones, on the other hand, can be tricky in the case of an emergency. It might be troublesome for drivers to take out their mobile phone to contact their transport manager or dial 999 if they are being attacked, injured, or unconscious.
What did they do?
Greencore recognised the gap in monitoring the safety of their lone worker drivers. They needed a solution that would make it easy for their drivers to alert others if they are in danger, even if their drivers are unconscious.
To fill this gap, Greencore invested in lone worker devices for their drivers. These devices, which the drivers wear at all times, are equipped with fall sensors that will send out an alarm if it senses a fall. The devices also have a button that drivers simply need to hold for a few seconds to alert their team if they are in danger.
Next, Greencore set up three depots for monitoring across the business. They routed all the numbers to these three centres, so it essentially became one 24-hour call centre. Every alarm sent out from the lone worker devices would be picked up by this call centre.Â
Creating an in-house 24-hour monitoring system creates a direct communication between the Greencore monitoring team and the driver, thus enabling a faster response to issues and emergencies. Equipped with Protector by Vatix, the monitoring centre can view the real-time location of the driver on the activity map, all whilst speaking directly to them through the two-way audio. The monitoring team can even leave notes on the escalating situation to better record and review their emergency response procedures.
Finally, Greencore trained their call centre employees on how to respond to an emergency. Their drivers were also trained on how to use the devices and the importance of wearing their devices at all times.
Results
Since implementing the lone worker device and 24-hour remote monitoring call centre, Greencore’s drivers feel safer knowing that they can quickly alert their team and receive a fast response when they’re in danger. In the case of a critical emergency, this can even potentially save a life.
Greencore’s staff has given positive feedback about the lone worker devices. The positive feedback includes ease of use and simplicity. Another aspect of the system that received positive feedback is the automatic call back feature. This means that if someone at the call centre picks up the phone and the call drops off, the system will automatically call back until the other side reconnects.
Besides giving Greencore the peace of mind that their drivers are safe, this system can also help the company avoid massive delivery delays. Being able to quickly contact or respond to drivers when they’re in danger will enable the team to quickly come to the driver’s aid and simultaneously make contingency arrangements to ensure their deliveries are fulfilled; thereby helping the company avoid potentially huge losses.
“The feedback has been pretty good internally. We especially like the devices because of the simplicity. We can basically do something about any issue that crops up straight away.”
Leon Taylor
Road Safety Manager
