How a Diagnostics Company Created Great Shipping Solutions to Help Win a Large Hospital as a Client

An early-stage company providing cancer diagnostics solutions secured the deal of a lifetime working with one of the most prestigious hospitals in the country.

The Problem: Sample pickup issues at a large hospital

An early-stage cancer diagnostics company secured a deal with one of the most prestigious hospitals in the country for their cancer screening product. However, in the first few weeks of working with the hospital, problems emerged related to sample shipping. The hospital had a daily pickup with FedEx, but the pickup location was at a loading dock far from the offices of the doctors who were conducting the testing. 

Making matters worse, the receiving center for sample shipping closed at 3:30 PM in order to make the FedEx daily pickup time. Because the doctors were collecting samples well into the afternoon, this timing didn’t align with their shipping window. In addition to time-constraints, the temperature-sensitive samples needed to remain frozen on dry ice as soon as they were collected, making the logistics of storage and shipping a challenge. All of this combined to create a poor customer experience for the hospital that this diagnostics company was otherwise excited to work with.

The Solution: Using shipping for a great customer experience

In order to satisfy this new customer, our client reached out to Mercury in search of a top-quality shipping experience that could help them maintain their relationship with this major hospital. The first problem to solve was providing the doctors’ office with a properly-sized thermal package full of dry ice to the exact floor of the hospital on a regular basis. 

Instead of asking the hospital to store thermal containers themselves and attempt to arrange for dry ice delivery, the client could rely on Mercury to store the exact sized thermal packaging at a nearby location. Two times a week, when the doctors conduct testing, Mercury couriers arrive at the office’s suite at a designated time, bringing thermal containers filled with dry ice to collect the samples as they’re taken.

The next issue to solve was the restrictive timing from the hospital shipping center, which was limited by FedEx’s pickup time and internal procedures. In order to continue testing into the afternoon and to make sure that every single temperature-sensitive sample was shipped out that day, the Mercury courier brought the samples from the doctors’ office and directly tendered them to FedEx at a location that is open late into the evening. This allowed the doctors to test patients far later than they had previously been able to, while still properly storing and shipping out samples.

Finally, as soon as the samples were delivered to FedEx, Mercury’s client support team proactively tracked each sample. With an experienced team monitoring each sample as it moved through the FedEx network, issues could be found and resolved far before a FedEx scan would indicate a problem. Mercury’s team knows exactly where a shipment should be as it moves through the FedEx network, so that samples stuck in a  specified location for too long can be immediately researched and resolved. Still today, Mercury provides twice-daily reports of all samples inbound to this client’s lab so that they can provide updates to patients and doctors with complete visibility into their diagnostic kit shipping.

Each shipment is unique, and Mercury’s expert team provides a customized solution to meet your specific needs. Contact us to learn more.