Career
The saying “teamwork makes the dream work” might seem like a cliché, but it has been proven true at the AsstrA international corporate group. According to a Deloitte study, working in teams helps to reduce the amount of time spent on tasks and improves the productivity of each employee. Furthermore, when working in a team an employee’s work quality is 73% higher than when working alone.
While team members naturally have personal goals and ambitions, by working together they can respond more effectively to unexpected challenges and force majeure situations. Strong teams, from global corporations for example, also want to work with other strong teams and are a key asset when landing leading brands as new Clients.
In March 2020, a German manufacturer of skin care products began a new chapter in their logistics story after lengthy discussions with AsstrA Express Delivery team members from the company’s Magdeburg, Warsaw, and Prague offices.
The AsstrA experts presented possible ways to optimize the Client’s current logistics supply chain and showed the advantages of direct Less-Than-Truckloads (LTL) shipments which the team recommended based on their industry knowledge and long experience with small shipment management. The Customer’s groupage delivery scheme with transshipments in numerous warehouses had been resulting in low quality and unsatisfactory KPIs. The Client entrusted AsstrA to deliver 500 loads as a pilot.
Christian Eckstein
“Thanks to our experience with LTL shipments, our commitment to punctuality, and our knowledge of the transport system, we were able to keep our word and consistently show good KPIs throughout the whole year. The Client was also pleased with the team’s fast response times. The Express Division always plays to win and was happy to take on this challenge for this global brand,” comments Christian Eckstein, Head of AsstrA’s Express Delivery Division.
The project was launched in the spring of last year with a probation period from 1st March 2020 until 28th February 2021. By the end of last year, the team had completed 395 LTL shipments. Most of them were made from Germany and Poland to France and Sweden.
The COVID-19 pandemic made completing these transport orders particularly challenging. In a time of worldwide uncertainty and daily market fluctuations, ensuring high quality, offering competitive prices, and achieving good KPIs are not so easy. Daily communication between AsstrA team members and the Client were critical success factors behind uninterrupted shipments.
“The pandemic was an unwelcome part of reality that we had to learn to accept. Here and there, AsstrA was ready to take on additional costs on particular Trade Lanes in order not to endanger the relationship in the first year. So far we have also been able to cope with Brexit by clarifying and preparing for all customs issues in advance. This success will help us get more orders not only for our Express Division but also for the company as a whole,” says Christian Eckstein.
For 2021, the team has already won a subsequent tender from the Client for an additional 1000 LTL shipments. The Client is also running a pilot project with AsstrA for Full-Truckload shipments to Kazakhstan and Poland.