How FedEx Saved $50,000 With PerforMax
April 3, 2019by performaxGeneral
“These are the indestructible doors at PerforMax”
How nice would it be to save $50,000 annually starting this year? Sound a bit impossible? A FedEx facility in Michigan did just that recently by partnering up with PerforMax Global. They saved $50,000 annually in maintenance and repairs on their steel industrial garage doors by switching to high-performance impactable doors. How did they do it? Drivers would hit the door, usually on the bottom edge before it rolled all the way up, causing broken slats or guides. While some vehicles driving in and out of the bays are only vans, some are the larger FedEx trucks that have much less headroom than the vans, leading to constant hits on their steel doors, with more force behind their impacts.
The Best Commercial Doors for Heavy Use
The solution for FedEx was high-performance rubber doors. Included with a high-performance door is the impactable design allowing it to break away from its guides on impact and fast opening speed. High-speed steel doors are an option, but are still likely to get damaged and broken on impacts. Even with higher speeds, collisions would cause a production shutdown for that bay and plenty of paperwork for the facility manager. With safety, time, and money being jeopardized any time a collision happens, FedEx needed a better solution. That solution came in the form of a MaxSpeed door from PerforMax Global.
Save on Facility Costs with Commercial Overhead Doors
Looking at the expense report for the month is a great way to see physical costs and profits. What may get overlooked is the cost for time lost which is a valuable resource that can be wasted and never returned. The expense of time and money are significant and wasting the two together is detrimental. Accidents happen and can’t always be controlled, so it’s best to minimize the risk. A high-performance door helps save both from being wasted.
Two Major Costs When Loading Dock Doors Break
When any loading dock door breaks, there’s an immediate cost that comes from the loss of productivity and time. These two factors are essential to ensure FedEx operates efficiently and smoothly everyday to fulfill their customer’s needs. When an overhead door that opens and closes 400-500 times a day for a 125 van fleet breaks, that’s time multiple drivers will have to wait to load up and go back out on the road making it harder to complete their goal to deliver packages on time. On top of the external time and productivity lost, there’s also the additional time spent by a facility manager to complete reports, paperwork, and deal with any other additional tasks after an incident.
Once logistics and safety actions are taken after the dock door breaks, the next concern is to repair the overhead door. Prices for emergency commercial overhead door repairs can reach nearly $3,000 to $5,000 in a worst-case scenario assuming that’s not on the weekend or after hours. That price can lower if the facility has time to wait for repairs for a few days, but those days will have a major cut in productivity with additional risk in security if the door is stuck open. Repeat the process when the same overhead door goes down again and repair prices will continue to rise all year, deeply impacting a company’s bottom line.
High-Performance Doors Reduce Maintenance Costs
A third factor that rarely gets taken into account is higher maintenance needed on a sectional door or commercial roll up door. PerforMax Global high-performance doors eliminate the need for high maintenance with a springless design. Any door that uses springs in its operation will need continual upkeep, usually after 100,000 cycles to stay functional and safe.
Considering the 500 cycles a day that this particular FedEx facility sees, that door would need maintenance after approximately 6 ½ months. While the door is out of action during maintenance, productivity is affected even when not broken. Springs that are not properly maintained have a high-risk factor to break, causing a door to fall with heavy force. Not only are the springs an issue in terms of maintenance and cost, but can pose a large safety issue.
3 Ways to Maintain Your Commercial Doors
PerforMax Global rubber doors have no springs in their designs. Instead of a 100,000-cycle rating, these doors boast a 1,000,000-cycle rating on the drives before requiring maintenance. The MaxSpeed, MaxPro, and MaxDock come with only five moving parts requiring simple and minimal maintenance. This is maintenance anyone can do. If there are any questions about them, 24/7 tech support is available to guide the process. Here are three things we recommended you do to reduce your maintenance costs on your high-performance doors:
- Grease the bearings: We recommend doing this every six months for high use doors and once a year for those that see less usage.
- Tighten Windlocks:If there have been impacts on the door, the windlocks can start to become loose. These should be tightened every 3-4 months
- Battery replacement:The safety edge transmitter that may come with a PerforMax Global door has a battery that needs to be replaced after a few years.
Simply by installing the PerforMax Global high-performance doors, maintenance costs are reduced from $50,000 a year to $0, in addition to saving your business time and frustration. A high-performance door not only solves maintenance costs, but it also increases safety, reduces energy costs, and has a high return on interest.
