Skargarda – full freedom of maritime transport
Client:
Skärgårda is a shipping startup. It offers flexible deliveries to your home, pier or boat, directly from selected online stores in Sweden. Its boats are able to travel to hard-to-reach places, which results in a rapid growth of tourism in previously poorly connected locations.
Industry:
Transport & Logistics
Country:
Sweden
Service:
Software development
Challange
The Stockholm archipelago consists of approximately 24,000 islands and islets. Once inhabited mainly by fishermen and farmers, today it is one of the most important summer holiday destinations for the Swedish people. With the rapid growth of tourism on the islands, there has emerged a need for delivery of supplies to holiday homes.
The aim of the project was to enable easy transport of various types of products (from food to sports equipment and building materials) to even the most inaccessible parts of the archipelago. Due to the challenging location of some of the islands, it was necessary to carefully check their position on the map and meticulously plan the delivery process.
Solution
Working on the project involved defining the users and their usage context to design visual communication and user-friendly tools tailored specifically for them. The primary user of the application is a person vacationing on one of the archipelago’s islands. The visual identity, information architecture on the website, and a plugin for external suppliers were all designed with this user in mind. The other users of the application include the courier (the person operating the boat responsible for delivering and unloading packages) and the administrator, who manages the packages and plans the delivery route.
The website was enhanced with a tool for handling deliveries for couriers and end-users. The application was equipped with a plugin necessary for integrating the system with external suppliers. Communication is bidirectional. The system receives data from users at the time of purchase, processes it, and sends it to the application’s management panel. Here, the administrator prepares the delivery route, as well as the date and time of the shipment to a specific location. This is made possible through the integration of BEST and ICA. The user receives SMS and email notifications with information about the order status.
Impact
The main advantages of the developed solution include:
- enabling delivery of goods to some of the hardest to reach places (even those without their own address)
- development of tourism in previously poorly connected areas
- the ability to integrate with external vendors
- the ability to use the application on any device type, regardless of Internet access or weather conditions
Summary
Access to everyday products in the most inaccessible parts of the Stockholm archipelago has never been so easy. Food, sports equipment or even building materials – the Skärgårda system makes it possible to easily transport all product types and sizes to even the most inaccessible places.
