This case study provides a brief overview of the process behind developing the RunTrac mobile app and how it effectively addressed logistics and operational challenges in the construction and warehousing industry.

Project Description:

<aside> 🚚 RunTrac is a delivery logistics platform designed to eliminate chaos in construction and warehousing operations. Unlike generic delivery apps, RunTrac focuses on industrial workflows, where delays cost thousands per hour and miscommunication cascades into project-wide failures.

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Introduction:

<aside> 📜 Let’s start with a story.

Imagine this: You order your favorite sneakers online. The retailer promises delivery in "2-3 days" but offers no exact date. Later, you get a text: "Your package will arrive in 2 days!" On delivery day, there’s no time window—just a vague "12 PM–2 PM" alert. You have a meeting at 1 PM, but you’re forced to wait, unsure when the delivery will arrive. You call the driver, but they’re just as clueless. Frustrating, right?

Now, imagine this happening at a construction site: A site manager schedules a plastering team to start work at 8 AM Monday, relying on a warehouse’s promise to deliver plasterboards by then. The driver says, “I’ll try to come early, but no guarantees.” The workers wait idle, costing the company $500/hour. Delays cascade: electrical work gets pushed, painters reschedule, and the project’s timeline—and budget—implode.

This is the chaos that plagues delivery logistics in construction and warehousing. Unpredictable timelines, miscommunication between drivers and warehouses, and costly delays are the norm.

Enter RunTrac: We built an integrated platform to replace uncertainty with precision. By connecting drivers, warehouses, and site managers in real time, RunTrac turns “I will try” into “it will arrive at 8:00 AM”

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Problem statement

<aside> ⚠️ Construction and warehousing teams face costly project delays due to unreliable delivery schedules, poor communication between drivers and sites, and a lack of real-time coordination tools—resulting in wasted labor hours and missed deadlines.

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Key challenges

<aside> ⛰️ In the construction and warehousing industries, delivery delays aren’t just inconvenient—they’re catastrophic. Site managers schedule crews, rent equipment, and coordinate subcontractors around promised delivery windows, only to face:

• Unpredictable ETAs: Drivers and warehouses relied on vague updates like “I’ll try to come early,” leaving managers guessing.
• Miscommunication: Critical delays were reported via fragmented calls/texts, often reaching stakeholders too late.
• Costly Idle Time: Workers and machinery waited hours for materials, burning up project budget in labor and operational costs.
• Cascading Delays: A single late delivery derailed entire project timelines, pushing deadlines by days or weeks. </aside>

Business goals

<aside> 💼 Design a platform to address the least focused but high impact problem of the construction and warehousing industry:

• Reduce Operational Costs for Clients: Minimize financial losses caused by delivery delays and idle labor.
• Improve Customer Retention for warehouses: Lower churn by solving critical pain points (e.g., miscommunication, unpredictable ETAs).
• Expand Market Share: Differentiate from generic task-management tools (e.g., Asana) by catering to industrial workflows.
• Strengthen Projexn’s Ecosystem: Integrate RunTrac with Runboard Pro to create a seamless workflow from project planning (Runboard) to execution (RunTrac).
• Increase Enterprise Adoption: Position Runboard Pro and RunTrac as the go-to delivery logistics platform for mid-sized/large construction and warehousing teams. </aside>

Target users and roles

<aside> 👨🏽‍🦱 Drivers: The main users of the app are the truck drivers of the warehouse. The warehouses are flexible with their delivery process, some of them has their own truck and pool of drivers, in some places they have their own drivers and connected external drivers who work as delivery partners for the warehouse.

Dispatch managers: Drivers are the users of the app, but the deliveries are scheduled by the warehouse person or dispatch managers. They influence the drivers workflow by controlling their schedules.

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User stories

<aside> 👨🏽‍🦱 As a Dispatch Manager:

• I want to create delivery orders and attach all the requirements of the delivery as requested by customers and communicate the same to my drivers so that the delivery is completed as promised.
• I want to see the status of deliveries and track delivery time so that I can update customers when they request an update.

As a Driver:

• I want to see all the deliveries I need to complete for the day so that I can plan my day better.
• I want to see all the details of the delivery so that I can complete the delivery without any errors.
• I want to communicate with my warehouse and customers about the current delivery status to avoid receiving calls while driving.
• I want my route to all the delivery locations to be planned before I start my day so that I don’t have to worry about where I am headed after each delivery. </aside>

Research and validation

<aside> 💡 We began with a whiteboarding session involving the CEO (a construction/warehousing veteran) and key stakeholders to map pain points. To validate these claims, we visited warehouses to observe their daily operations, focusing on order fulfillment bottlenecks.

Understanding the Existing Workflow:

We observed warehouses to map their order fulfillment process, breaking it into key stages:

Step 1: Order Intake

• Orders received via phone calls from customers.
• Warehouse managers manually note details and input them into an existing software (functional but outdated).

Step 2: Order Structuring

• The software generates a delivery docket (list of items, order number, requested delivery date).
• Dockets are emailed to customers and printed for warehouse workers.

Step 3: Picking & Packing

• Printed dockets are pinned to a large physical whiteboard.
• Warehouse pickers prioritize orders based on docket placement (top-to-bottom).
• Pickers collect items from shelves, mark availability on the docket, and move goods to loading docks.

Step 4: Truck Assignment

• Trucks are assigned to fixed geographic zones (e.g., "North Sydney," "West Sydney").
• Drivers check the whiteboard each morning to see their assigned deliveries.

Step 5: Delivery

• Drivers take printed dockets, load trucks, and complete deliveries.
• No system to notify customers or sites about delays or ETAs.

Root Causes & Business Opportunities:

Core Problems Identified:

• Communication Black Holes:
  • No real-time updates between order takers, pickers, and drivers.
  • Customers left in the dark about order status.
• Fragile Dependency on Individuals:
  • If a picker or driver called in sick, workflows collapsed.
• Manual Processes = Costly Delays:
  • Drivers idled for hours due to dock congestion or late packing.
  • Stock updates lagged by days, leading to mismatched orders.

Business Opportunities for RunboardPro and RunTrac:

1. Automate Order Status Updates
   • Replace whiteboards/dockets with real-time digital tracking.
2. Centralize Communication
   • Connect order takers, pickers, drivers, and customers in one platform.
3. Dynamic Scheduling
   • Optimize truck assignments based on real-time factors (dock availability, traffic).
4. Stock Visibility
   • Sync inventory data to prevent overselling and mismatched orders.

Stakeholder Validation

• CEO Quote: “The whiteboard system works until it doesn’t. One sick day, and the whole warehouse grinds to a halt.”
• Driver Feedback: “I’d show up at 7 AM, only to wait 2 hours for my truck to be loaded.”
• Warehouse Manager Pain Point: “We lose clients because we can’t tell them when their order will arrive.”

User Quote:

“The whiteboard was our bible—until someone spilled coffee on it.” – Warehouse Manager

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