Leading Operator, VPNE, Leverages BI to Increase Revenue and Reduce Costs

The challenge

With over 100 locations under management, each with different PARCS equipment, and its' own unique suite of data – how can VPNE efficiently manage and track the performance of each of its locations?

The goals

1. Streamline parking management

2. Optimize pricing and inventory allocation across VPNE’s portfolio

3. Increase revenues and reduce costs for VPNE’s clients

The results

• Optimized pricing per location by gaining the visibility needed to understand price elasticity, resulting in an overall revenue increase

• Automated processes and increased operational efficiency

• Differentiated their business through a data-driven management strategy

It all starts with the flow of information – or data. VPNE manages over 100 locations up and down the East Coast. Each location has a unique parking revenue control system, mix of monthly and transient parkers, online reservation platforms etc.

The foundation of any business intelligence and yield management program is a single information system where all unique data sets are consolidated, tracked and measured.

With Smarking, VPNE aggregated all transaction-level data across various parking access revenue control systems (PARCS) into one single platform.

Smarking’s robust integration suite – capable of integrating with over 40 different parking technology providers – gives VPNE the flexibility they need to serve their clients while providing a single source of record necessary to build a business intelligence and yield management program.

The solution

Smarking’s Parking Data Management System and Yield Management Analytics help VPNE manage all their locations through one platform, optimize price points across channels, and track and measure the impact of business decisions with data.

Implementing the solution

The airline and hotel industry has successfully leveraged business intelligence and yield management programs for years, and the parking market exhibits the same critical dynamics:

1. Fixed, perishable inventory

2. Constantly varied demand

VPNE brought the Smarking team onboard and implemented the business intelligence solution at a handful of locations. Over the next two years Nick Litton, COO of VPNE, and his team expanded the program to over 40 garages in the Boston region, with plans to onboard the whole portfolio.

Along the way, the VPNE executive team provided the sponsorship, mentoring, and training necessary for successful implementation. Partnering with Smarking meant that jobs would change – no more manual excel reporting, forwarding emails up the chain of command, manually consolidating numbers along the way.

Management styles would need to change too. Business intelligence and yield management programs take much of the guesswork out of day to day operations – it was important to train VPNE staff to understand where data should lead decision making, and how garage managers’ intuitive knowledge of local dynamics should help inform those decisions.

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