From Data Gaps to Data-Driven: How U.S. Xpress is Improving with Cetaris

About U.S. Xpress

U.S. Xpress is a leading truckload carrier providing reliable delivery services throughout the country. With a history spanning nearly 40 years, U.S. Xpress has developed expertise in logistics. Its growing team consists of over 5,000 employees, while the company maintains more than 7,000 tractors and 14,000 trailers.

The Complexity of Fleet Maintenance for Large Fleets

With such a substantial fleet, enhancements throughout their fleet maintenance operations can have major impact, while inefficiencies can have big consequences.

For Breanna Thacker, Corporate Tire Manager and Maintenance Systems Administrator at U.S. Xpress, maximizing these opportunities is essential to her role. She needs a reliable system that can accurately track and analyze costs, work, parts usage, purchase orders, suppliers, and more across their entire operation.

Without comprehensive visibility into this data, a fleet of U.S. Xpress’s size would face substantial inefficiencies in spending and labor productivity, which would compound quickly at scale.

A Fleet Maintenance Solution Built Over Two Decades

U.S. Xpress has leveraged Cetaris, the fleet maintenance software that helps keep businesses ahead of the curve with powerful predictive analytics tool, for over twenty years.

During that time, Cetaris has become central to their operations. “Cetaris is a huge part of our maintenance,” explained Breanna.

The system has transformed how U.S. Xpress gathers and uses business intelligence. Where data gaps once created blind spots, the company now has the visibility needed to drive continuous improvement.

For example, in the tire management aspect of her role, Breanna relies on detailed analytics. “We use the tire position to see what we’re replacing the most,” she explained, “to go and investigate and see if there’s problematic areas that we can resolve.”

U.S. Xpress also leverages Cetaris to gain visibility into shop volumes, parts usage, and inventory across multiple sites. With two decades of refined processes and accumulated data, they’re equipped to ask the right questions, uncover issues, and find new efficiencies – capabilities that have only grown stronger over their long partnership with Cetaris.

Advancements and Automation with Cetaris

U.S. Xpress has seen widespread improvements throughout their business since starting to use Cetaris.

With process automations, U.S. Xpress has become a more skilled workforce where staff can focus on impactful work over data entry. “We’re able to become a smarter workforce,” Breanna said. “We’ve captured things that we weren’t able to capture before because of the data and how it’s presented to us.”

At a cost level, U.S. Xpress is now armed with information that enables efficient spending and savings. One example is with the parts catalog feature. Even when multiple suppliers sell an interchangeable part under different SKUs, U.S. Xpress can easily view, identify, and purchase the best priced option.

Cost and process efficiencies also work together in other ways U.S. Xpress is able to leverage Cetaris. Speaking of the value in the VMRS and warranty features, Breanna explained that “We would not be able to capture what we capture without having to go through each individual work order.” Now, the company has refined its warranty team to prioritize much higher value work.

“It’s been huge for us,” Breanna confidently told us.

Setup for Success

While U.S. Xpress runs a complex maintenance operation with Cetaris, they have had easy access to everything they need to thrive.

“Cetaris offers a lot of help and support,” Breanna said. “You just need to reach out and utilize the resources that are available to you.”

“Using Cetaris for six years,” she said of her individual role, “I feel like I’m a pretty advanced user, and I find that it’s easy to work with.”

Ready to start optimizing your maintenance operation? Download the Guide to Optimal Part Inventory.