CPC Logistics is a major last-mile delivery operation serving retail store locations across the country, making roughly 800 store deliveries per week. The driving environment is demanding, covering urban and suburban locations, tight approaches, low overhangs, pedestrian traffic, and a constant rotation of new and unfamiliar sites.
Curt Ryan is a Regional Manager at CPC, a role that includes overseeing several safety functions across the fleet. He brings 22 years of industry experience to that work, including a decade as a driver. He went on to serve as safety supervisor and then operations manager before taking on his current role. That progression gives him a view of driver safety that is grounded in what it actually feels like behind the wheel.
The Challenge
A Backing Problem That Existing Tools Couldn’t Solve
Backing accidents had become a recurring issue. Every store location is different — varying approaches, dock configurations, obstructions, and hazards that drivers encountering a site for the first time simply could not anticipate.
Curt had already built one of the more sophisticated location-information systems in the industry. Drawing on his decade as a driver, he created a dedicated website with approach instructions for every store location. Drivers could look up a store number before arriving and know exactly how to get in safely. The system worked. Over time, across roughly 900,000 total deliveries, only two accidents occurred at locations where the driver had used the website. Both drivers who had accidents admitted they hadn’t consulted it.
That last detail revealed the core problem. The website put the right information in the right place. It did not put it in front of drivers at the right moment.
What Came Before Safety+
As backing incidents increased — a category the website alone was not covering — Curt tried several additional approaches to push safety information to drivers:
- Mass safety text messages, sent weekly or biweekly
- Monthly safety newsletters
- Periodic policy reminders by email
None of it worked consistently. The common failure was the same in every case: these methods required drivers to engage with the information on their own time, away from the vehicle, before the trip or after it. By the time a driver was approaching a tight dock at the end of a long week, the newsletter from two Tuesdays ago was not accessible.
The Solution
Safety+ Custom Zones: In Every Truck, Every Day
CPC Logistics implemented Safety+ by Fleetworthy, specifically the custom geofence zone capability, which allows fleet safety teams to configure location-triggered in-cab alerts that fire automatically as a driver approaches a designated zone. No action required from the driver. No phone interaction. The message appears on the existing ELD screen at the moment and location it was designed for.
For Curt, the value proposition was direct: “The hazards don’t move. The messages need to be here, at this spot. That’s what custom zones do.”
Initial deployment focused on backing approach alerts at store locations — reminders to get out and look, warnings about specific obstructions, and guidance on the correct approach line. The alerts carry CPC’s own branding and are recognized by drivers as coming from their safety team, not an anonymous third-party system.
Deployment: 950+ Locations in 48 Hours
Curt’s commitment to the rollout matched the scale of the problem. Working with the Fleetworthy team, who pre-configured the alert templates, Curt and his team went through 500 locations by late morning of the first day. By the end of the push, more than 950 store locations — 650 across the national network plus 300 in New York — were live with custom zones.
“The alert is where it needs to be. It doesn’t matter if the driver has 26 years of experience — if it’s their first time at that location, they get the alert.”
— Curt Ryan, Regional Manager, CPC Logistics
The configuration process involved reviewing each location, confirming zone placement and trigger points, and adjusting alert messages where site conditions warranted. It was methodical work done at unusual speed. Curt started at 2 or 3 in the morning.
The Results
85% Fewer Backing Accidents — and the Headline Use Case
The headline result: CPC Logistics went from 8 backing accidents in the prior fiscal year to 1 in the current fiscal year — an 85% reduction. The single remaining incident occurred at a location that highlighted the ongoing evolution of the alert program rather than a failure of the approach.
The improvement at one major nationwide retail client stands out specifically. That client represents a significant volume of CPC’s weekly deliveries. The backing accident rate at those locations, which had been a persistent cost and liability, has been essentially eliminated since Safety+ deployment.
“We went from 8 backing accidents fiscal year to 1 backing accident this fiscal year. That’s an 85% reduction, just backing alone.”
— Curt Ryan, Regional Manager, CPC Logistics
Additional Use Cases
The Tandem Axle Problem
CPC has a distribution center policy requiring drivers to move their trailer axles back at the end of each day before dropping. An in-house driver was flagging violations 5 to 7 times daily. Curt set up a custom zone at the entrance to the trailer yard.
A month later, the same driver reported moving back only one or two axles. The issue had not gone away entirely — drivers dropping at the dock side of the DC were still missing it. Curt added a second zone on the opposite side. Within hours it was live. The in-house driver no longer raises the issue.
The tandem story illustrates the core operational flexibility: a problem identified on Monday can have a geofenced alert live by Monday afternoon.
Cheetah Arrival and Departure Compliance
When CPC’s major retail client switched to a new manual arrival and departure system — requiring drivers to log arrivals and departures at each location — compliance quickly became a problem. Drivers were missing the step, creating reporting gaps that the client flagged.
Curt’s team reconfigured the existing store location zones to swap out the backing reminder for a Cheetah arrival prompt. The update was completed across all locations in a matter of hours, with several team members working in parallel. Within two weeks, missed arrivals and departures were no longer a client issue.
Text-to-Speech: The Next Frontier
CPC is currently piloting Safety+’s text-to-speech alert capability, which delivers zone messages as audible in-cab announcements rather than requiring drivers to read a screen. For urban environments — particularly New York City — where visual attention is at a premium, an audible reminder to watch for an overhang or a yellow post is operationally preferable to a screen-based alert.
The pilot is early, but the use case is clear: in dense traffic, the safest alert is one the driver hears without ever looking away from the road.
Why It Works
Curt attributes the program’s effectiveness to a single principle: the information is there when and where the driver needs it, regardless of experience level, fatigue, or how many times they’ve visited that location.
Data he pulled using AI on CPC’s five-year accident history confirmed what the custom zones are designed to address. New drivers (under one year) have elevated accident rates on Tuesdays and Wednesdays — consistent with the challenges of early-career information overload. Seasoned drivers (five-plus years) have 70% of their accidents on Fridays and Saturdays — consistent with end-of-week fatigue and complacency. The custom zone alert reaches both groups without singling anyone out.
The alerts are also recognized as coming from CPC’s safety team. Drivers do not experience them as a generic third-party system. That attribution matters for compliance and for safety culture.
“I fell in love with this because I can’t be in every truck. I’ve got new hires, I’ve got seasoned guys, I’ve got new locations. The custom zones — that’s how I’m in every truck, every day.”
— Curt Ryan, Regional Manager, CPC Logistics
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