Capability: Route Optimisation

The challenge

For some years Tesco analysts have used map data from CACI to help define store delivery catchment areas. They have also used data from CACI to help them understand where the uptake of the company’s home delivery service was likely to be highest.

Latterly Tesco.com,  Britain’s biggest grocery home shopping retail business, has introduced a new, more advanced routing and scheduling system to plan home deliveries by its fleet of over 2,000 vans; and in the light of its established relationship with CACI, the retailer again turned to the company to supply appropriate digital map data for both the UK and Ireland.

The solution

To work on this software, CACI has supplied Tesco with map content: Premium vector street-level map data, which includes essential routing information such as one-way streets, banned turns and address ranges. It has also supplied Andes raster mapping, which is derived from the HERE data and provides a visually pleasing version of the data for display and presentational purposes.

Tesco.com generally delivers to homes from 8am right through to 11pm from Monday to Friday, as well as up to 10pm at weekends, so it is vital for the company to be able to route its vehicles to take account of changing traffic speeds and flows at different times of day and at weekends.

CACI has therefore also supplied Tesco.com with Traffic Patterns, a data set that contains average traffic speed on individual road segments, calculated from past traffic flow measurements and differentiated by time of day and day of the week.

The benefits

Digital map data assembled, prepared and formatted by CACI (formerly Mapmechanics) is playing a key role in the continuing expansion of Tesco.com.

According to Ben Dito Smith, the Location Strategy and Analysis Manager for Tesco.com : “Efficient, timely delivery is a fundamental feature of our home shopping proposition, so it is essential for us to use the most appropriate software and data available for our delivery planning system.”

He adds:

We have found that CACI is very well equipped to provide exactly the mapping and demographic data we need. The CACI team are responsive and helpful when it comes to advising on the best products for our requirements, and good at supplying the data in an appropriate format.

Tesco.com delivers to consumers’ homes from larger retail stores and from a small number of specially designed dotcom stores. The home shopping business on its own now turns over more than £2 billion.