Sambrook's Brewery reduces planning time by 50% and can now service both B2B and B2C customers pre and post-lockdown
Duncan Sambrook founded Sambrook’s Brewery in 2008 when there were just five breweries operating in London. With his vision of bringing brewing back into the heart of London, Duncan pulled ex-brewer David Welsh out of retirement and back into his dungarees and wellies.
They wanted to offer something different – a local London brewery that sourced and sold everything locally; including hops from Kent and malts from Wiltshire.
Together they converted an old photography studio in Battersea into the brewhouse, and in November 2008 the very first cask of Wandle rolled out the doors.
Today, Sambrook’s Brewery has expanded to Wandsworth Town; offering tours at Battersea, and a new tap room and visitor centre at Ram Brewery.
Despite their growth and success, Sambrook’s Brewery faced sudden and significant challenges as a result of COVID-19. The businesses they had previously supplied were shutting down rapidly, leaving them with a drastically reduced customer base.
The team at Sambrook’s responded quickly, recognising an opportunity to pivot and sell directly to individual customers at home during the crisis.
They rapidly launched a home delivery service, catering to new customers across the M25. By repurposing their existing fleet—previously used to supply businesses in the area—they were able to rebuild operations and, within just a couple of weeks, had gone from near-zero business to a steady flow of orders.
However, this new B2C model brought fresh challenges. Having spent 12 years nurturing relationships through reliable delivery schedules and fixed routes, the shift to residential deliveries—with widely dispersed addresses—introduced a new level of complexity.
As order volumes increased, so did the time required to plan routes. The team soon found themselves spending hours each day manually coordinating deliveries, leading to extended working hours and delays in getting drivers on the road.
Sambrook’s knew there had to be a better solution.
They spoke to their brewery management software provider, BrewMan, who recommended MaxOptra for its route optimisation capabilities and seamless integration with the BrewMan system.
Sambrook’s Brewery were up and running with MaxOptra in just two days. They received support from the Implementation Team, who helped them get to grips with the system and fully embrace the new process.
This support was particularly valuable for Duncan, who explained that due to COVID-19, Sambrook’s were operating with a skeleton crew. It was therefore crucial that the entire team understood and adopted MaxOptra. This eased the burden on Duncan, who had previously been responsible for manually planning routes, and allowed the workload to be shared more evenly.
Duncan noted:
“The whole team wanted the business to grow, especially during such a difficult time, and they all knew that route planning was key to this. After seeing MaxOptra in action, the team quickly bought into the vision and were all on board.”
By using MaxOptra, Sambrook’s Brewery halved the amount of time they spent on route planning. As a result, there were no longer delays in getting drivers on the road, ensuring deliveries could be made on time.
Duncan continued:
*”MaxOptra really made us challenge what the best routes are. We previously relied on our Transport Manager’s local knowledge of London—dividing routes by postcode. MaxOptra looks at routing completely differently, focusing on the addresses that are genuinely closest together for the fastest route, and taking us out of a postcode mindset.
When you see the guys get back and beat their predicted time, you know the routes must be right!”
Sambrook’s Brewery were excited about using the MaxOptra system in the long term, particularly as it had opened them up to an entirely new customer base.
They planned to continue delivering to both B2C and B2B customers post-lockdown—expanding their reach and managing the process effectively.
They were already looking at how to get more out of the system as more staff returned to the business. In particular, they aimed to make full use of MaxOptra’s reporting, review, and feedback functionality to further enhance their distribution operation and support the continued growth of Sambrook’s Brewery.
"MaxOptra really made us challenge what the best routes are. We previously relied on our Transport Manager's local knowledge of London - dividing routes by postcodes. MaxOptra looks at routing completely differently, focusing on the addresses closest to each other for the fastest route, and taking us out of a postcode mindset."
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