You can have the right staff, the right clients and the right service mix, but without the proper tools, jobs don’t get done. That’s why tracking inventory is such a crucial process for getting, or staying, efficient. Without a process in place to ensure trucks are leaving with the right equipment, you’re losing time and money.
At Todd’s Enviroscapes in Louisville, Ohio, all tools are assigned to a specific truck or trailer, so crews don’t have to spend time pulling tools from the shop every day. Operations Director Dave Lint says the company also does that for accountability.
“If a crew leader has a tool, knows it’s supposed to be there every day, knows he’s ultimately responsible for it – if you can do that – it’s a great start,” he says.
In each truck or trailer, there’s a labeled spot for everything from WD-40 to shovels to lawnmowers. Every last item is numbered and assigned, and accounted for on a checklist.
If workers forget a crucial tool for the job, they either have to run back to the shop, wasting time and gas, or go to a local hardware store to save time, but end up spending more. “You would have added cost whether stuff would be lost or forgotten on jobsites, or whether it’s your output,” Lint says.
The landscape installation and maintenance company puts the crew leader in charge for each tool, but the supervisors at each location double-check inventory and sign off on it, giving everything two sets of eyes.
Todd’s Enviroscapes starts the inventory process around Thanksgiving, depending on the weather, when trucks are transitioning from lawn care to snow removal. “The beginning of the season really is end of the season,” Lint says. “So going into spring, I know what needs to be replaced on the trailers or the trucks from last season.”
But it’s never too late to get started, and it’s important to keep checking inventory throughout the year. Crews are trained to do inventory at the end of the day so that nothing is left on the jobsite, and supervisors go through the checklist once a week.
When it comes to building the inventory list, Todd’s Enviroscapes adds in about 10 to 15 percent extra, depending on the tool, so that there isn’t any downtime due to broken equipment. Extras are stored in a locked area to help keep track of them.
“If we have 20 shovels at a location, we’ll have two or three on hand that are spares so if a crew would break a shovel during the day, when they come back that night, we would have one to send out so that they’re not going out that day without something they need,” Lint says.