Bug-N-A-Rug Exterminators Case Study

About The Company

Bug-N-A-Rug Exterminators is a family-owned business based in Wilmington, North Carolina that offers commercial and residential pest management services and residential lawn care. With over 20 years of experience, they pride themselves on having the most qualified staff equipped with the best tools to treat any situation. They have three locations, 40 technicians, ten office employees, and four sales representatives.

The Challenge                                                                                                             

Since 1998, Bug-N-A-Rug was using a solution that had limited capabilities. For example, it really was just a database to hold customer information and had a very basic scheduling tool. There were no intelligent mapping tools, and they had to use a large map to place their technicians in groups for routing purposes. It also offered no mobile capabilities for their technicians to communicate back with the office. Additionally, they were using a lot of paper to print termite graphs. Each graph had to be printed for every single termite service. Keeping up with them was a challenge because they would get lost, and only one employee had access to them. They even had a dedicated, full-time employee whose only job was to manually print and invoice customers. Credit card numbers also had to be manually typed in every time they were used.

The Solution

Bug-N-A-Rug knew they needed a solution with more capabilities. So in 2018, after researching the Internet and talking to quite a few competing software solutions, they chose the FieldRoutesTM operations suite to help them with their business needs. With the Intelligent Routing and Job Pool features, they no longer need a large map to route their technicians. This makes their routes more accurate, and technicians don’t waste time and money while driving.

The interactive Dashboard provides valuable insights into their business. For example, it has made it much easier to identify which customers are past due for service and has enabled them to better track cancellations. They have also seen a rapid growth spurt with the commercial side of their business. Implementing FieldRoutes gives them the ability to share paperless, commercial trend reports with their customers online.

Lastly, their customers enjoy the convenience of accessing their own customer portal. They can make payments online, update their payment options, and access their service information all in one place.

The Impact

Implementing FieldRoutes has created much-needed efficiencies for their business. One of their favorite reporting features is the ability to access a specific group of customers due for service, export it to Excel, and then send out a mass email. Prior to this, an employee had to send an individual email to each customer. They also enjoy that the Visual Mapping feature provides a different color for each technician so you visually see where they are on a map and can plan and coordinate better routes.

Scheduling their technicians has been reduced from 3—3.5 hours down to 30 minutes. They also eliminated the headache of having to print termite graphs. Now, they’re all stored online and can be accessed by any employee. Another benefit they realized is that they no longer have to handwrite and snail mail wood destroying organism (WDO) reports for real estate agents. Using a pre-filled form saves them time, and they can easily email them, which saves money on postage.

In 2020, they saw a growing need for residential lawn care services and formed Bug-N-A-Rug Exterminators Turf Team. The FieldRoutes operations suite provided a convenient solution without the need to purchase and implement another software system dedicated to their lawn business.

Since implementing the FieldRoutes operations suite, Bug-N-A-Rug increased their customer count by 85% on average. Additionally, their total dollar amount collected increased an average of 8% and propelled them into the 2020 PCT Top 100.

Since implementing FieldRoutesTM software, Bug-N-A-Rug:

• Increased their average customer count by 85%

• Reduced scheduling from 3.5 hours to 30 minutes

• Made the 2020 PCT Top 100

"My favorite feature about the commercial side of FieldRoutes is the subscription settings. FieldRoutes allows you to assign specific times, dates, and technicians to individual accounts. This feature ensures that we never miss a service, and we can offer the best possible service to our customers. We have increased our commercial accounts since making the switch to FieldRoutes."

Michelle Beech, Office Manager www.bugnarug.com 670 Wellington Avenue Wilmington, NC 28401