Case study | Food & beverage warehousing
Forklift fleet right sizing with UgoPilot and operational data optimization
Key metrics
$1.12M saved globally over 18 months
through fleet reduction, energy optimization, and battery room elimination
–47% MHE required
while maintaining operational volume and production capacity
+484,000 pallets moved in the first 12 months
thanks to battery change elimination and improved truck performance
$55,000 in energy savings
from a reduction of 330,000 kWh, equivalent to 140 metric tons of CO₂ annually

Company overview
The customer is an American multinational food company operating numerous manufacturing facilities, corporate offices, and distribution centers in North America. Their 20,000+ employees are determined to lead the future of the food industry.

F&B warehousing and distribution

Trusted partner

United States
Challenges
The use case is about a USA based warehousing and distribution site, running a forklift fleet of over 135 trucks. 24/7 material handling operations were performed with a traditional lead acid and battery room infrastructure. They used a 1.7 to 1 battery to truck ratio and were seeking for optimization opportunities:
- How many trucks are required?
- How many forklift operators to employ in the context of the labor shortage?
Solutions
The performance of lithium-ion batteries against their lead acid counterpart justified the transition. The customer’s choice went to UgoWork, when compared with other lithium-ion solutions, because of the cloud-connected lithium-ion batteries, but most importantly on account of the UgoPilotTM software platform capabilities and energy expertise.

Insights from data trends and industry benchmark leading to fleet right sizing

Improved energy efficiency, electricity cost and CO₂ emissions reduction

Proactive service and cloud-connected batteries minimizing downtime

Turning fleet data into operational savings.
By turning operational data into actionable insight, the team uncovered how to do more with less while keeping performance high.
Benefits

Fleet right sizing
Reduction of 135+ to 75 trucks (47% reduction) confirmed by data and energy expertise, resulting in 800,000$ total annual savings
Cost reduction for truck maintenance
Less dependency to operator availability during labor shortage

Productivity increase
6,500 hours saved annually by eliminating battery changes
Truck performance (move/hour) improved by 5% with constant energy supply
Repurposing of the battery room in storage area

Energy efficiency
Less grid consumption due to lithium batteries energy efficiency (71% more efficient)
Proportional CO2 emission reduction
“Over the 14 months it took to optimize our first site, UgoWork provided recommendations that allowed us to gain speed and autonomy in reaching the same results in other locations.”
Facing similar challenges?
If improving efficiency and reducing fleet costs are on your radar, operational visibility could be your best next move.

