Pheasant and other wild bird deliveries are a year-round job at MacFarlane Pheasants. In the fall and winter, we are delivering mature birds. During the spring and summer, we are delivering chicks. Local trips are easy to plan, but many of our routes take 30 hours of driving and are a little more complicated. We typically make more than one stop in an area so even loading the birds is a complex procedure.
We do about 150 long trips during the year. Careful planning and great drivers help us make our deliveries on time, regardless of how far our drivers travel.
Sarah Baker, MacFarlane’s Office Manager builds a trip for customers in a specific area. She provides the drivers with the directions they need to serve individual customers. We travel all over North America so the trips could be anywhere in the US or Canada.
Chris Theisen, the Logistics Manager is responsible for planning the best route with the given constraints of individual customers. After that, he plugs in the mileage to get an estimated arrival time. The drivers’ fuel stops and rest times are built into each trip. Customers are notified of the date and time they can expect their deliveries after the routes are planned.
Typical Driving Schedule
8 hours on
8 hours off
2 hours on
2 hours off
We have a GPS device in all of our trucks that allows us to track the drivers’ progress in real time. After they get back to the farm, we can look at the trip in its entirety and see if there were any problems along the way. It’s a good tool for helping to plan future trips. If you have questions about your deliveries please contact [email protected] or [email protected].
