Choosing the best asset tracking for your business needs from Jewlery to Cargo Ships

Key Takeaways:

• GPS asset tracking allows businesses to monitor the location and movement of valuable assets, from small items like jewelry to large machinery.
• Various tracking devices are available, including portable, hardwired, and satellite trackers, each suited to different needs.
• Customizable tracking platforms offer features like interval tracking, geofences, speed alerts, and on-demand tracking for enhanced asset protection.
• The right GPS tracker can help prevent theft, improve asset management, and ensure the safe transportation of goods.

Our favourite sci-fi television shows and movies often depict GPS trackers as tiny devices able to be hidden inside the smallest spaces, or even embedded inside of humans to track their every move. Of course, this is fiction, but while the technology isn’t quite there yet, it’s undeniable that GPS tracking technology has become quite advanced.

Tracking the whereabouts of your resources is almost becoming a necessary aspect of doing business. Business owners often need to keep a close eye on important assets: from fleets of company vehicles to expensive equipment to shipments of cargo. GPS asset tracking has come a long way in recent years, making it completely possible for you to keep track of your most important assets, even from halfway around the world.

What is Asset Tracking?

Asset tracking refers to the method of using GPS to stay up to date on the whereabouts of specific objects or vehicles. A business owner or private consumer may choose to utilize asset tracking for a number of reasons which may include:

• Asset is valuable and owner wants to ensure that it's not lost
• Multiple assets are on the move and the owner wants to be able to keep track of all of them
• Owner cannot be present for the movement of the asset and wants to ensure its safe travel
• Asset is not supposed to be on the move and owner wants to be able to check its location and ensure that it's still safely in storage
• Business owner is hoping to ensure timely travel and/or arrival of shipment
• Valuable items are being kept somewhere unusual; for example, a collection of artwork or artifacts is being showcased in a gallery or museum and the owner wants to be assured of their safe keeping

What Kinds of Assets Can be Tracked?

The kinds of assets that can be tracked are nearly limitless. While it is most common for business owners to track fleet vehicles driven by their employees, it is also possible for them to track other objects as well. Some of these may be:

• Pharmaceuticals
• Jewelry
• Shipments in transit
• High end products
• Merchandise
• Valuable collections
• Containers on cargo ships
• Artwork or artifacts

Nearly anything that a business owner or private consumer may wish to keep an eye on can be tracked. Custom GPS tracking devices can be created for tracking unique objects in the event that the market does not provide the right tool. For example, tracking a shipment of pharmaceuticals would require a custom device that can be embedded inside of a pill bottle, while tracking the whereabouts of jewelry on the move would require a special jewelry box with a custom-designed commercial tracking device nestled inside. It is possible to design customized GPS tracking devices to meet your specific tracking needs.

What Tools are Used to Track?

It is true that GPS trackers themselves have gotten progressively smaller, but at the present time most GPS housing devices still need to be big enough to hold a sizable battery and antennas for communicating with satellites and cellular towers. There are a number of unique mini GPS trackers available on the market, each of them able to achieve specific tracking goals.

A portable GPS tracker, like BrickHouse Security’s Spark Nano, is easy to transport from one location to another. This tracker can be placed inside of a container or vehicle being used to transport goods so that the owner can monitor movement. This is one of our most diverse GPS trackers when it comes to covert tracking. It is most often used in the shipment or movement of assets, vehicles, or people, sometimes for loss prevention purposes.

Our Livewire Dash and Livewire Volt GPS tracking devices can be hardwired directly to a vehicle, running off the car’s power instead of a separate battery. These devices allow owners to see the whereabouts of the vehicle at all times and they can be completely hidden from the knowledge of the driver, if desired. These GPS tracking devices are most often used to track the whereabouts of company fleet vehicles, heavy equipment, or vehicles being used to transport valuable assets.

If you are looking for versatility and a long battery life, the Eon GPS tracker features the easy portability of the Spark Nano, with a battery suited to long-term asset tracking. The device features built-in magnetic mounts and can run for up to 100 days on the same charge. It is most often used to track the whereabouts of heavy machinery or equipment in the field. It’s also a popular device for use by private investigators or loss prevention professionals.

For tracking shipments of cargo containers or vehicles transporting shipments across great distances, satellite trackers like our Sat Track and Sat Track Micro GPS World Trackers are your best option. It’s important to remember that satellite trackers may operate with less overall accuracy in the middle of the ocean or in wilderness areas. Also, when placing your satellite tracker on your asset, the tracker needs to be positioned where it will always have a view of the sky, or it will be impossible for it to communicate with the satellites.

All of these asset tracking devices work by communicating with Global Positioning Satellites around the world, as well as local cellular network towers, to communicate the location of the device back to you. Depending on your needs and uses, it is also possible to customize the user interface to ensure that you’re receiving the information that you need about the whereabouts of your property.

Customizing Your User Platform

The platform used by all of our devices at BrickHouse Security is designed to be flexible and customizable, ensuring that you’re tracking your assets to the best of your ability. Some of the features of our GPS tracking software include:

• Ability to change interval tracking to help conserve battery and tracking costs
• Geofence setup and alerts to let you know when the object or vehicle you are tracking has gone outside of a designated area
• Speed alerts so you know when your vehicle is traveling faster than it should be
• On-demand tracking which allows you to identify the present location of your asset or vehicle to confirm that it is where it’s supposed to be

There are also many possibilities when it comes to customizing your GPS tracking user platform and setting it up to ensure that it meets your exact needs. Our team can help you customize this.

Choosing the Right GPS Tracking Device for You

Whether you are selecting a merchandise tracker to monitor the transportation of a small valuable asset or a commercial tracking device to monitor the shipment of a large cargo container on a ship, you can rest assured that the technology you need is most likely available. With a wide variety of tracking devices on the market, and the option to create customized housing and user interface programming, you can ensure that you have the ability to track exactly what you want, how you want, and when you want.