FedEx party at Villa Creek: Eyes Wide ....?

Cellar Rats (ITB)
1

I want to switch our cross-country shipping from UPS to FedEx Ground. Taking advantage of the Wine Institute discount on shipping (40%!) and the fact that FxG waives the fee for Adult Signature Required will help us keep our shipping rates reasonable. I can choose to switch only the cc shipments and keep CA shipments with UPS, which provides one-day delivery to most areas, or make a wholesale switchover.

Knicker alert: We offer our customers a choice of UPS, Fx, FxG and Golden West. But most people, hard though it may be to believe, want the winery to decide on the carrier, so I also need to choose a default shipper.

Thursday evening, the local FedEx salespeople held an RSVP cocktail party at Villa Creek. I talked to the organizer, Jeff, last week. I told him I would be switching over, but that I had some concerns. I asked him a series of questions to which he had NO answers. I promised him that my employee would attend and that she (and others) would be expecting answers. He promised to “look into those issues.”

Here are the questions:

  1. How are cross-country packages shipped–by air, rail or truck?
  2. Where are the local and regional terminals/hubs?
  3. At what time of the day/night do shipments hit the road for delivery?
  4. How are wine shipments protected from temperature changes?
  5. What about the spotty customer experience reports with FedEx Ground franchisees?
  6. Are you training franchisees in how to handle/protect wine and other perishable goods?

My employee, Carissa, is a Reese Witherspoon look-alike, and she looks much younger than her years; you’d also never guess that she was formerly in high pressure sales so she knows the lingo. Here’s her report.

She cozied up to 4 different sales reps, including Jeff, and got vastly different answers from each. They avoided real answers, clearly didn’t know what they were talking about, and kept trying to redirect her to their “rollout announcements” and “key takeaways.” She would do that thing with her dimples and say, “Now back to my question …”

  1. FxG packages are shipped by truck. (UPS cc shipments go by freight rail.)
  2. Santa Maria and LA. (Same as UPS). They thought. But they weren’t entirely sure …
  3. 7 am. or 9 am. For business addresses. One rep said there was no guarantee that residential delivery addresses would leave in the morning. So a package destined for inland California might not leave until 11 am or later. (UPS trucks leave Santa Maria between 3 and 4 am.)
  4. Here’s where they kept talking about the anticipated “rollout” of some sort of temperature-insulated “beta packaging”. Turns out it’s a bin that would hold prepackaged wine shipments inside the trucks. They provided no implementation date, no production specs, no test results. They kept stressing that Fx is completely automated, packages are “constantly moving” and on conveyors. Big deal? Carissa got no answers to temperature conditions inside the hubs, or info on when the trucks are loaded vs. when they leave. The Fx reps disparaged UPS for loading trucks by hand, although UPS clearly does it faster. (The local UPS hub stores wine shipments for the few hours they are there in the central part of the warehouse, which is coolest. Trucks are loaded inside the building and hit the road in the wee hours of the morning.)
  5. No answers.
  6. No answers.

One of the female reps (who as it turned out was the new “wine” manager from Sacramento) was getting sloshed on wine and she walked up to a male rep that Carissa was talking to and said, “Watch out for this one, she’ll suck all the answers right of ya.” She also told Carissa about the fabulous trip she just won for hitting her sales numbers.

The reps mentioned proudly that they were upgrading their software to print the Adult Signature Required right on the label, so we would no longer have to affix the blue stickers. “UPS was amazed that we could do that,” one rep said. (Newsflash: UPS has been doing this for almost 10 years.)

They handed out impressive brochures about the Wine Institute and talked up the discount, but failed to specify that the discount does not apply to Air shipments.

All in all, it was a disgustingly poor and unprepared performance to a room full of wine professionals.

Other notes on customer service:
I have never had any luck re-routing a FedEx shipment mid-stream, but with UPS I can do it easily, instantaneously.
Some UPS hubs have a piss-poor customer service attitude. I have never had anything but pleasant exchanges with FX CS reps, and in clear English too. Haven’t always gotten my request processed but they are unfailingly polite about it.
The FedEx software sucks; the UPS software is slick.
Our local UPS drivers are either related to or associated to winery families. They go out of their way to make return trips and to arrange their schedules and truck space for us during shipment seasons. The FedEx drivers could care less. But they’re always polite.
I really DON’T want to split our annual shipments evenly among 3-4 carriers–we get so many mid-stream changes and special requests that tracking and customer service on our end will become a nightmare, especially during the fall shipment that coincides with harvest. On the other hand, I could insert code into our wine club database (I designed my own) that will specify the default shipper of choice for each individual customer.

My decision? We’ll be using Golden West for most local and regional shipments. For cross country, Fedex Ground for the next few months and next major shipment. See how it goes. I do have some faith that the people who actually do the work are smarter than their salespeople. Customers seem to love the service, which is the most important thing, and it does have more options for home delivery times.

2

Mary,
Fed Ex approached me recently to attempt to get us to change our carrier, I found it frustrating when I dealt with the Fed Ex rep trying to get answers. They offerend a program w/discounts but I could never get them to give me details that made sense for our shipping program and how the program actually works. We’ve been using UPS and they offered a detailed incentive program that made sense and they also made it easy to understand.
Have you ever used OnTrac ? It used to be called CalOvernight. They now delivery to 4 or 5 western states and for overnight they are pretty competitive with pricing. I realize most of our states are max 2 days delivery but for those that want it next day they aren’t bad.

3

Carrie, last I heard, OnTrac wasn’t picking up in our area, although that may have changed by now. I haven’t even thought to check back with them about it; I guess I assumed that if/when service became available here they would let us know. I have heard only glowing reviews for Golden West and I’m very excited to be starting with them for western states this spring.

4

For local/regional shipments, have you looked into Golden State Overnight (GSO)? The few times I’ve had my wine shipped by them, service was awesome - delivery was VERY early in the morning - and the prices were 50% cheaper than FedEx/UPS for the same delivery. K&L uses them, along with a few wineries that I’ve done business with, but I can’t remember names right now.

I’d be absolutely delighted if more wineries would offer them as an option.

5

FedEx does it as well, have for years. But always require that stupid sticker anyways.

“ASR” is clearly printed on the label. ASR= Adult Signature Required.

“$AW” is also clearly printed but ASR is the Adult Signature, $AW means it is wine.

6

Mike, actually I am referring to GSO. Sorry. I think they started out as Golden West Overnight, or maybe it was a merger of two smaller carriers, anyway I still think of them as Golden West Overnight. God, I’m getting old! Now I know why Italians use their fingertips when discussing family–I have to start at the top of the lineage and work my way down until I hit the right niece or nephew, like a cog looking for its notch.

7

Quiz for Jeff!
Can you tell me what’s wrong with our NY “Required Language” label? [drinks.gif]

Contains Wine
For Personal Use and Not For Resale
Signature of Person Age 21 or Older Required for Delivery
Delivery to an Intoxicated Person
Is Forbidden by Law
And Probably not Advisable Anyway

And our AZ “Required Language” label?

Delivery to
Residential Addresses Only
(Although how the AZ Dept. of Liquor expects people to stay home to sign for the wine
and still have disposable income is beyond us . . . )
freethegrapes.org

8

HA! Don’t worry; I seem to be doing a good job establishing myself as the youngster on this board!

And that’s great to know about GSO - you should subtly notify all of your customers that they are crazy for not using GSO if the service is available to them! [berserker.gif]

9

I could have answered your first question, but only that one. I actually asked someone at FedEx because I was convinced that a Next Day Air package going from Portland to Seattle would never see an aircraft because of the proximity. Turns out that there’s something in their agreement with the USDOC (Contract of Carriage, perhaps) requires that Air shipments actually go by air and ground shipments by ground.

10

GSO delivers here in Nevada ( all Copain orders, some KL ) and they are absolutely superior to all other shippers. Always deliver before 10:00 AM and have re-routed for me a couple of times when I called the same day.

11

Bob, air cargo companies (the few that are left anyway) are pretty efficient. They don’t require trained flight attendants, food, luggage, first class, business class, sober pilots, champagne, seat sanitizing, bathroom sanitizing, functional mini-entertainment units, ticket checks, or any of that folderol. They can take off from Portland at 7 pm, unload in Seattle at 8:30, be in Vancouver B.C. by 10 pm. They have their own terminals, and can pretty much unload their cargo by shunting off a few large pre-sorted bins. I have much admiration for freight and mail pilots. My first hero was Antoine de St. Exupery, and I’ve read every single book he wrote. My second, Ernest Gann. My son (who is named for my first tragic hero in a Gann novel) was almost born in a mail plane taking off from Orcas Island. Viva la mail pilots! [cheers.gif] [drinkers.gif]

12

GSO is by far the best shipper in CA. WHy every winery in CA doesn’t use it is beyond me. Too lazy to use more than one carrier? Shrug.

13

Mary . . . food? What food? [rofl.gif]

14

Maybe, Charlie. But keep in mind that wineries, and vineyards, don’t grow in asphalt. FedEx Ground only became available to remote vineyards in Paso Robles in the last two years. GSO also in the last two. Five years ago, Dan and I begged FedEx Air for a daily pickup option and were told we were “too far out.” Since we are shipping heavy units from remote, hard-to-access-and-gasoline-intensive areas and do not have the multiples necessary for discounts, vineyards get short shrift and higher rates from some carriers.

15

I’m only guessing. It does not say “check ID”.
It does not say “no signature release, driver release or indirect delivery allowed”
And it does not say that the shipper (you) certifies you are complying with all FedEx requirements and laws in the destination state.
It does not say “recipient” mustbe at least 21 years old"

ASR is different than the recipient.


And I think it needs to say “contains alcohol” and not “wine”

And suprisingly enough most of these choice phrases are shipper specific. UPS and FedEx both have different language and no one at ATF requires them to do this.

16

Pfft. [nea.gif]

Hint: It’s like that I.Q. question, “How many months have 28 days?”

17

Another GSO fan here. I’ve been bugging our office people to start using them.

18

Thanks Mary.

19

If you’re a woman, isn’t the answer, “Every last damned one until I pass 50?” [berserker.gif]

20

strictly from a consumer perspective i opt for winery pick-up whenever that is offered. gets my lazy azz to travel to wine-country, always a huge +, and i know the bottles get back to my crib in cool comfort.

now if gas will just stay S of $3/Gal…