PortaPottyBossPro Blog — Routes & Dispatch

When to Add a Porta Potty Route (and a Truck) Instead of Stretching the Ones You Have

Every growing portable toilet company hits the same wall. The routes you have are full. Drivers are finishing later every week. Same-day calls cannot be fit anywhere. The question is whether to stretch what you have or add a route, which usually means adding a truck and a driver. The previous article, Measuring a Porta Potty Route: Stops per Day, Miles and Dollars per Truck, covered the numbers to track. This one covers what those numbers say about growth.

Signs a Route Is Full

A route is full when it cannot absorb normal variation. Some signs:

• The route finishes late most days, not just on bad days.
• Overdue pins keep showing up in that route's area on the Waiting List.
• Every same-day call in that area causes a problem.
• Hand-tuning the order no longer saves meaningful time.
• The driver is consistently on overtime.

One of these on its own may just mean a rough month. Several together, week after week, mean the route is at capacity.

Try the Cheap Fixes First

Before buying a truck, make sure the routes you have are as good as they can be:

• Redraw area borders so trucks are not crossing paths.
• Tune route order and check the auto-route option for each route.
• Fix service frequencies that are too short and pump units that are barely used.
• Move flexible sites to lighter days.
• Separate deliveries from service if one truck is doing both.

These fixes often buy a few months of growth. Closest First or Furthest First: Choosing Route Order From the Yard and Splitting Porta Potty Work Across Trucks Without Crossing Paths cover the first two.

Signs It Is Time to Add a Route

When the cheap fixes are done and the routes are still full, the signs that you need another route usually show up as lost money:

• You are turning down new work or pushing new customers out a week.
• Service quality is slipping, and customers are noticing.
• Overtime costs are climbing toward the cost of another driver.
• Your best customers are getting late service because the route is too long.

At that point, stretching costs more than adding.

Do the Math on a New Route

Before committing, rough out what the new route would carry. Use the dispatch board totals from your current busiest days to estimate how many stops and dollars the new route would take over in its first month, and add the new work you have been turning away. Compare that to the cost of the truck, the driver, fuel and insurance. If the new route covers its costs with the work you already have, plus a little growth, it is a safe step. If it only works with work you hope to win, think about a part-time or seasonal option first.

Remember the softer costs of not adding a route, too: a tired driver who quits, a customer who leaves after the third late service, a contract you could not bid on.

Where the New Route Comes From

A new route is carved out of the existing ones. Look at the Waiting List map and the current area splits. The new route usually takes the edges of the two or three busiest routes, giving each of them breathing room, plus new work that has been hard to fit.

Do not hand the new truck all the worst stops. A route made of everyone else's leftovers is scattered and inefficient, and the new driver will hate it. Draw a real area for it. Give the new driver a few steady service sites on each route day so they learn the loop, and ride along for the first day or two.

Setting It Up

In PortaPottyBossPro, add the truck, add the employee with a PIN, and assign the employee to the truck. Then, on the dispatch board, assign stops in the new area to the new truck on its route days. Customers whose day changes should hear about it; two-way texting from the office makes that a quick message.

You are never billed per user, so adding a driver does not add software cost on its own. If the larger crew means you need a bigger plan for more texts or features, plans are Start, Pro and Crew at 59, 89 and 199 dollars a month.

Growth Without a New Truck

Sometimes the answer is not a whole new route. A second shift on an existing truck, a part-time delivery driver on event weekends, or a helper on the biggest construction route can add capacity without a new truck payment. Look at where the bottleneck really is: trucks, drivers or hours.

Check the Result

After adding a route, measure again. Stops per day, dollars per day, miles and hours for every truck should settle into a healthier range within a few weeks, and the overdue pins should clear. If they do not, the new route may need its borders adjusted. For more on route planning and dispatch, see PortaPottyBossPro portable toilet route software.