Case Studies

How Rindle helped GameTruck streamline processes and boost company-wide productivity

  • Company

    GameTruck logo
    GameTruck
  • Customer

    Brandon Wiele COO

Overview

GameTruck has a nationwide fleet of more than 100 trucks packed with state-of-the-art party entertainment equipment, including video game theaters, LaserTag, GellyBall, and more. They started in 2006, and began franchising in 2008. Today, their certified GameCoaches deliver fun to more than one million kids every year.

Highlights

  • Challenges

    • Defining and streamlining processes at a growing company.
    • Managing projects in a complex, fast-moving business.
    • Communicating real-time process status across the entire team.
  • Solution

    • Easy-to-use kanban format means quick staff adoption.
    • No-code customization makes it easy to design processes to suit.
    • Creating custom fields instantly helps keep context clear.
    • Real-time status updates make communication a breeze.
  • Results

    • Twice the features of the competition at half the price.
    • Saves time, eliminates confusion and boosts efficiency.
    • Greater team member satisfaction.
    • Increased productivity throughout the company.

The Challenge

Optimizing processes and communication at a fast-growing company

GameTruck's business model means they must handle a combination of traditional project management alongside the complexities of running a franchise company. Over the years, as the company grew, they needed a way to keep day-to-day processes organized and streamlined while they continued to build on their success.

Brandon Wiele is the Chief Operating Officer at GameTruck. He says that in the beginning, they tried quite a few different solutions, including Asana, ClickUp, and Trello. None of them was quite the right fit.

We used Trello for a while, but we abandoned it when they got bought out and their pricing structure became astronomical. For us, Trello just wasn't cost effective anymore. After that, we ended up going through a bit of a journey through different software options.

For a while, they used Google Docs and Google sheets to manage everything. But they still weren't getting the functionality and ease of use they needed.

They had heard of Rindle. But they were initially a little skeptical about whether it could deliver everything they needed in terms of both project management and process management.

Because I was always putting everything into LiquidPlanner myself, people didn’t see when I updated their to-do lists. They weren’t engaged in the process. Sometimes, they didn’t log into it all week.

Because of the unique requirements of the people they work with, Alva and her team also had to be able to account for specific needs that went along with each individual entrepreneur.

Rindle isn't one of the big names out there, which put us off a little bit at first. But we were willing to try something new. I have a software background, so I'm pretty capable when it comes to evaluating software. Even if it's not the biggest name on the block, that doesn't mean it can't do what we need.

The Solution

Easy-to-use, easy-to-customize process and project management software

Making the transition to Rindle went smoothly. The platform uses a tried-and-true format that is instantly familiar to anyone who has ever used a kanban board or an app like Trello.

It's pretty easy for us to tell whether our staff is going to use a tool or not. With Rindle, the adoption was quick. The staff picked it up and started using it without a whole lot of reminding or prodding from us.

That quick adoption process allowed for a minimum of downtime, and yielded productivity gains almost immediately.

We were up and running within a few days. Our Trello background helped there, so it felt very familiar to our staff. They were able to jump right in and be productive with it right out of the gate.

In many of GameTruck's processes, they need to constantly track a large volume of very specific information. For that reason, the ability to create custom fields on the fly proved tremendously helpful.

We like the ability to very quickly automate a lot of custom field management. Being able to move things through stages and have different custom fields is really useful in keeping the context clear as we move something through the process.

In addition to helping define processes, Rindle also helps the team stay up-to-date on their real-time status. It helps avoid miscommunications, false assumptions, and confusion. That's because everything the team needs to know is highly visible. All of the important information is collected together in one place, with live updates.

For the most part, our team is really good about knowing what they need to do. But sometimes, they might not be so great at communicating to the rest of the team about where they are in the process. Now we can have every process clearly defined, and give visibility to the entire team about where we are with any given project. It's great. Rindle put it all in one place for us.

One of the biggest differences that sets Rindle ahead of other platforms is its limitless customization. GameTruck didn't have to change their real-life processes to fit the platform. Instead, they were able to easily customize the platform to suit, with no code needed.

A lot of other tools were forcing us to do things their way. But I didn't feel like that was ever the case with Rindle. It stays out of our way when we need it to. We didn't have to change our approach to projects or our processes to make it work.

More than just a traditional project management tool, Rindle helped the entire GameTruck team quickly get on the same page with their processes.

Rindle is a great mix of project management and also process management. It lets us design things around how we want to run the business, instead of trying to make something work inside a tool.

The Results

Twice the functionality for half the price

In a fast-paced entertainment business with so many moving parts, it's difficult to put an exact number on the efficiency boost gained from using Rindle. But the results make it clear that the platform helped increase productivity throughout the entire company.

It's hard to put a number on it, but it does make us faster and more responsive. It's saving us minutes here and there in each department and each role in our company. And all of those minutes add up to something significant.

One of the notable differences about using Rindle compared to other apps is just how much happier the staff is about using the platform.

With some of the other platforms we used, the common things we'd hear from the staff is that it's just too much work, or it's in my way, or it feels like a chore to keep up with it. But when it comes to Rindle, we don't hear any of that. Which is nice, because that means our team is focused on doing the work they need to do.

For GameTruck, using Rindle saves time, eliminates confusion, and helps everybody on the team work more efficiently. That helps them put more trucks on the road every day, and deliver more unforgettable entertainment to kids across America.

We get to make people happy every day. Not everyone gets to say that.

When asked how effective the platform is at doing what he needs it to do, Wiele gives Rindle high marks.

I would say 9 out of 10. It's easy to use, and it does a great job for us. With some of the other tools we tried, we were spending probably twice as much money for only half the features. I'd say Rindle is an excellent value.