The Delivery Bottleneck Staffing Alone Won't Solve This Year-End

The holiday surge means more packages, but stairs are the one problem that scheduling more drivers doesn't solve. A driver working with hand truck carts still has to make the same climb one flight at a time, no matter how many employees are on the schedule that day.

Hiring More Drivers Doesn't Fix a Flight of Stairs

Delivering more packages for the holiday surge while tackling stairs is a major problem, and scheduling more drivers doesn’t solve it. A driver working a walk-up with a traditional aluminum hand dolly still has to carry items up or down flight after flight, one trip at a time, and that per-stop time doesn’t shrink no matter how many trucks are on the route that day. Staffing up for volume without addressing that specific stop type just means more drivers hitting the same wall.

One Tool for the Stop Extra Staffing Can't Speed Up

A powered stair climbing appliance dolly is built for exactly that stop. The powered stair climbing dolly carries a load up or down a flight without a driver hauling it step by step. For a route with a real share of older, walk-up buildings, that’s the piece of the plan that staffing and routing alone were never going to solve on their own.

Why Stairs Beat Every Other Bottleneck on the List

Every other bottleneck on a year-end route has an easy fix: add staff, tighten the routing software, extend shift windows. Stairs are the one variable none of those fixes touch, which is what makes it the biggest bottleneck on the list. A building with no elevator adds the same fixed cost to a stop in January as it does during the busiest week of the season, and no amount of volume planning changes that math. Solving for it is what turns a difficult stop into a normal one.

About Magline

From traditional dollies for final-mile routes to powered stair climbing options for demanding deliveries, Magliner hand trucks cover the full range of commercial material handling needs. The equipment is built from corrosion-resistant aluminum, designed to handle the loads commercial teams move every day, and configurable to meet specific job requirements. Warehouse managers, logistics coordinators, and delivery teams across industries count on Magliner hand trucks to get more done with less strain.

Get your routes ready for the holiday volume increase with Magliner hand trucks at https://www.magliner.com/

This article was originally published on magliner.com’s blog here.