Website_Early BF_640x340 Anon 1.png

Subscription Sale Pop Up - Anonymous

Supply chain

Events

Gateway

Breakbulk News

Container Shipping News

Port News

Trucking News

Rail News

Air Cargo Forwarder News

Air Cargo Carriers News

Transport, Trade and Regulation News

Logistics Technology News

Cool Cargo News

Special Reports

Press Releases

Marine terminals

International ports

Longshore labor

Truckload

Truck brokers

Maritime

Surface

Air Cargo

Magazine

Newsletters

Multimedia

White Papers

Intermodal providers

Commentary

Podcasts

Webcasts

Videos

Annual Review and Outlook

Top Rankings

Quarterly Intelligence Report

Intermodal Savings Index

Domestic Intermodal Service Scorecard

Breakbulk Quarterly Intelligence

Platts Containers Update

Custom Content

Resources

Last Mile News

Industrial Real Estate News

Media Kit

Other

Breakbulk carriers

Ro/ro cargo

Energy projects

Heavy-haul transport

Project cargo

Container lines

Trans-Atlantic

Forwarding

Asia-Europe

Trans-Pacific

Drayage

Port infrastructure

Breakbulk ports

North American ports

Flatbed

Trucking labor

North-American rail

International rail

Top 100 US Exporters

Top 100 US Importers

Top 25 LTL Trucking Companies

Top 25 North American Ports

Top 25 Truckload Companies

Top 40 Container Carriers

Top 50 3PLs

Top 50 Global Container Ports

Top 50 Global Transportation Providers

Top 50 Trucking Companies

Editorial Calendar

Rail Directories

<div class="phx-topic abstract-wrapper">Two major oil companies that virtually abandoned New York state as much as 10 years ago are back in </div>

Two major oil companies that virtually abandoned New York state as much as 10 years ago are back in

<div>Two major oil companies that virtually abandoned New York state as much as 10 years ago are back in the gasoline market there.Shell Oil Co., a unit of the Royal Dutch/Shell Group, and Sohio Oil Co., a subsidiary of BP America Inc., British Petroleum Co.'s U.S. affiliate, have been selling fuel in the state for about the last 60 days. Neither company markets directly; instead, they distribute through independent wholesalers.Shell is selling branded gasoline in upstate New York, an area it left in 1978, although it has continued its presence in the metropolitan New York City area.Sohio is coming back...

Two major oil companies that virtually abandoned New York state as much as 10 years ago are back in the gasoline market there. Shell Oil Co., a unit of the Royal Dutch/Shell Group, and Sohio Oil Co., a subsidiary of BP America Inc., British Petroleum Co.'s U.S. affiliate, have been selling fuel in the state for about the last 60 days. Neither company markets directly; instead, they distribute through independent wholesalers.Shell is selling branded gasoline in upstate New York, an area it left in 1978, although it has continued its presence in the metropolitan New York City area. Sohio is coming back to New York on an unbranded basis in five cities: Albany, Binghamton, Newburgh, Rochester and Syracuse, and is seriously considering reactivating its BP brand in the state. The company pulled entirely out of New York about six years ago. What lead to the change of heart? A Shell marketing executive who asked not to be named said the company left upstate because of poor logistics. In 1985, Shell enhanced its operations in other northeastern states when it bought 400 service stations in eight states from Atlantic Richfield Co. Suddenly, we had a profitable business, the source said. He also said that the freer trade in petroleum products that has developed worldwide over the last several years allows Shell more flexibility in obtaining supplies. The way we're going now, with jobbers, will be better. We can do an exchange or bring in bulk quantities, he said. A likely route is to bring barges through New York harbor, up the Hudson and into the New York State Barge Canal. And because the company will rely on independent distributors, rather than direct marketing, it will avoid investing in a huge physical plant. As for Sohio, in the early 1980s it was distressed that the New York state Legislature was considering a unitary tax bill that would put a levy on worldwide income. There was no way we could have made money, said Taylor Bassett, general manager of jobber sales. It was a straightforward decision on the economics, and we withdrew entirely. We didn't sell a drop in the state of New York. As it turned out, the tax law was repealed before it could take effect, but the company's decision stood. If you look at the market, New York sticks out; there's this big mass of geography, he said. BP has since assumed full ownership of Sohio and there has been a change of top management at the U.S. affiliate that has taken another look at the state. Sohio, which sold its New York assets, is also not considering direct ownership. Shell has signed supply contracts with three or four independent wholesalers, and is negotiating with others. We've signed some contracts, and we're selling some gasoline, not for more than the past 60 days, the Shell executive said. He declined to discuss the company's gallonage projections. We're very excited about Shell's return to New York, said Bill Campbell, president of Griffith Oil Co., Rochester, N.Y. Griffith is one of the larger independent firms, covering the western half of the state. It also handles Mobil, Sun and Citgo branded products. Mr. Campbell said some retailers are re-branding their gasoline stations to Shell, although he saw no closed stations being reopened. At Sohio, a source said the company will supply product to its market areas by exchanging product with other companies in the area, or by using terminals owned by other companies - a process called throughputting . Around the time that Shell and Sohio discontinued their New York operations, a number of other major companies, including Amoco Oil Co., Exxon Co. U.S.A., and Texaco Inc. also left, citing onerous taxes or high operating costs.

SHELL, SOHIO RENEW PRESENCE IN NY STATE GASOLINE MART

<div class="phx-topic abstract-wrapper">Key cost elements for brokers are the amount of time they spend assembling bid responses, and the lack of coordination between pricing analysts and sales teams that interact with shippers.</div>

Key cost elements for brokers are the amount of time they spend assembling bid responses, and the lack of coordination between pricing analysts and sales teams that interact with shippers.

Feature image

<div class="phx-topic">A potentially perilous truckload market for carriers and brokers is raising questions on whether the traditional request for proposal (RFP) process that shippers use to secure contract rates from brokers and carriers is overly cumbersome. Dry van rates on new contracts are, on average, 1% to 2% lower than the rates they are replacing, Chris Caplice, chief scientist at DAT Freight &amp; Analytics, said in a market update Tuesday. And Journal of Commerce truckload pricing data shows that current broker-to-shipper dry van spot rates are 3% lower than contract rates. That places even more pressure on brokers, in particular, to maintain margin on their sell prices to shippers, given 90% of truckload volume nominally moves on contract rates. Key cost elements for brokers are the amount of time they spend assembling bid responses, and the lack of coordination between pricing analysts and sales teams that interact with shippers, Eric Williams, CEO of truckload sales support software vendor Beagl, said on the Nov. 14 episode of TPM Today. Williams, a former executive with Target, DAT and XPO Logistics, said the average top 100 brokerage can spend 3,000 to 4,000 hours a year responding to bids from shippers. “RFPs take a long time to put together and respond to,” he said. “And sales is selling a rate on a page because pricing analysts don’t have enough time to put together a true value prop. I knew that because I had priced a lot of bids (during his time as a broker at XPO). And then at Target I recognized all the disjointed processes that go on at a broker. I felt that as a shipper.” <h3>Disjointed process </h3>Williams’ contention is that brokers don’t gather enough information from their current and prospective customers to make informed decisions on the breadth of a shipper’s bid, and that shippers generally lack information about their capacity providers’ networks. So both go in relatively blind to the RFP production and response process. Beagl’s main goal is to help brokers and for-hire carriers get more organized to respond to those bids. “The broker can sit in front of the customer and go lane by lane and say, ‘here are the lanes I want feedback on,’ versus the normal approach of ‘there are 4,000 lanes on your bid, I’m green on 300 of them, how much freight are you going to give me?’” Williams said. “The brokerage community is generally ‘we’ll take whatever we can get.’” That approach is hindering the brokerage industry, Dave Broering, former president of integrated logistics at NFI, and now an advisor to a range of logistics technology companies, told the Journal of Commerce. “Most brokers are just lobbing their rates back over the fence and not adding a lot of context to what they want or where they feel they can add value,” he said. “This is a huge issue for the industry and the general ‘blanket approach’ to quoting everything and not articulating value is something that hangs over all the providers in the industry where the many are making it tough for the few who really do try to be prescriptive in their approach.” Ken Adamo, chief of analytics at DAT, said much the same in a post on X Friday. “The biggest misconception I see in freight brokerage pricing is that you're competing against the most sophisticated competition to win shipper bids,” he wrote. “In reality, you're competing against your dumbest competitors who either don't know or don't care about market dynamics and will bail as soon as the market moves against them. Outside of driving the truck, pricing freight as a broker is the most difficult job in logistics.” <h3>Prediction assistance </h3>Technology won’t necessarily help brokers avoid the part of the cycle where their fixed sell rate drops below the spot buy rate, a scenario that squeezes margins and can theoretically spell the end of the broker. But it can help them predict when that will happen. “So they can look at their capacity solution and peek out in front and say, ‘OK, I’ve got all these shipments out of the Pacific Northwest,’” he said. “’Those are going to be more difficult to cover in November and December, but I have core carriers to cover those. Or, if I don’t, I know I have some work to do.’” Williams said the RFP represents “the single greatest revenue opportunity for each individual broker, but the processes are incredibly disjointed.” Those 3,000 to 4,000 hours spent annually responding to bids, which equates to 1.5 to two full-time employees, goes up for brokers “doing it right” and not just responding to bids with stale rate sheets. On the high end of the spectrum, a top five broker is likely employing 15 to 20 pricing analysts in a bid to get their pricing right on each lane, he said. Broering said NFI had a process that enabled the broker to respond to bids quickly “and without a ton of effort,” but that most brokers outside of the top 100 find the process “highly challenging as it’s a manual and bespoke process.” <h3>Normalization headache </h3>“The biggest time suck in these is the ‘normalization’ of the pricing template,” he said. “Most bids are a different format, but the pricing tools that people use have a standard template. So a ton of time is used to get that data out of the shipper-specific template and into the format where the broker can use it.” He added that “very few things piss off a shipper faster than [screwing] up their internal analysis because you transposed data wrong, but I’m not sure there is much that can be done on the shipper side here because of the number of RFPs that are handled internally and in Excel.” Broering said it’s unclear whether most shippers even care if the broker is able to target relevant parts of a shipper’s business because their bid process, and lack of focus on data quality, doesn’t support the idea they do. “If they actually did (care), they would create a process that allows for brokers to express that via the RFP,” he said. “Many (shippers) require brokers to fill out the whole bid to participate. Why? What’s the goal of that? How does that help this industry break out of that? Another way to do it would be for shippers to actually work hard to cleanse the data they are putting in the RFPs and have it represent some decent amount of what they can actually award. If I had a $1 for every lane I had been awarded but never received, I could buy us both very nice homes in the Caribbean.” Williams said his time at Target informed how shippers view the bid process, and where Beagl could help brokers and asset providers. Of Beagl’s initial 25 customers, about 80% are brokers and the rest are carriers. “One of the difficult things about RFPs as a shipper is you don’t necessarily have a great view into your partners’ networks,” he said. “At Target we went after that.” That included asking carriers to specify their “power lanes,” at which point Williams said he found out that a 300-truck fleet might only have four or five so-called power lanes. “And then I wanted to know at the origin point, were they deficit or surplus?” he said. “I wanted to partner with them where they were surplus because if I got them back into a deficit market, it was a match made in heaven. You could make the rate work, and the service was going to be there because they had surplus capacity and they needed to get back to service another customer and so they would prioritize you.” Williams said Beagl is far from the only technology player taking aim at the RFP process. Transfix, the former digital broker that sold its brokerage business to NFI and now sells technology to brokers, is another such example. “There are other great tools out there,” he said. “As brokers get more organized, that should translate into a little bit more smoothing of strategy and helping improve things.” Contact Eric Johnson at <a href="mailto:eric.johnson@spglobal.com">eric.johnson@spglobal.com</a>. </div>

A potentially perilous truckload market for carriers and brokers is raising questions on whether the traditional request for proposal (RFP) process that shippers use to secure contract rates from brokers and carriers is overly cumbersome. Dry van rates on new contracts are, on average, 1% to 2% lower than the rates they are replacing, Chris Caplice, chief scientist at DAT Freight & Analytics, said in a market update Tuesday. And Journal of Commerce truckload pricing data shows that current broker-to-shipper dry van spot rates are 3% lower than contract rates. That places even more pressure on brokers, in particular, to maintain margin on their sell prices to shippers, given 90% of truckload volume nominally moves on contract rates. Key cost elements for brokers are the amount of time they spend assembling bid responses, and the lack of coordination between pricing analysts and sales teams that interact with shippers, Eric Williams, CEO of truckload sales support software vendor Beagl, said on the Nov. 14 episode of TPM Today. Williams, a former executive with Target, DAT and XPO Logistics, said the average top 100 brokerage can spend 3,000 to 4,000 hours a year responding to bids from shippers. “RFPs take a long time to put together and respond to,” he said. “And sales is selling a rate on a page because pricing analysts don’t have enough time to put together a true value prop. I knew that because I had priced a lot of bids (during his time as a broker at XPO). And then at Target I recognized all the disjointed processes that go on at a broker. I felt that as a shipper.” Disjointed process Williams’ contention is that brokers don’t gather enough information from their current and prospective customers to make informed decisions on the breadth of a shipper’s bid, and that shippers generally lack information about their capacity providers’ networks. So both go in relatively blind to the RFP production and response process. Beagl’s main goal is to help brokers and for-hire carriers get more organized to respond to those bids. “The broker can sit in front of the customer and go lane by lane and say, ‘here are the lanes I want feedback on,’ versus the normal approach of ‘there are 4,000 lanes on your bid, I’m green on 300 of them, how much freight are you going to give me?’” Williams said. “The brokerage community is generally ‘we’ll take whatever we can get.’” That approach is hindering the brokerage industry, Dave Broering, former president of integrated logistics at NFI, and now an advisor to a range of logistics technology companies, told the Journal of Commerce. “Most brokers are just lobbing their rates back over the fence and not adding a lot of context to what they want or where they feel they can add value,” he said. “This is a huge issue for the industry and the general ‘blanket approach’ to quoting everything and not articulating value is something that hangs over all the providers in the industry where the many are making it tough for the few who really do try to be prescriptive in their approach.” Ken Adamo, chief of analytics at DAT, said much the same in a post on X Friday. “The biggest misconception I see in freight brokerage pricing is that you're competing against the most sophisticated competition to win shipper bids,” he wrote. “In reality, you're competing against your dumbest competitors who either don't know or don't care about market dynamics and will bail as soon as the market moves against them. Outside of driving the truck, pricing freight as a broker is the most difficult job in logistics.” Prediction assistance Technology won’t necessarily help brokers avoid the part of the cycle where their fixed sell rate drops below the spot buy rate, a scenario that squeezes margins and can theoretically spell the end of the broker. But it can help them predict when that will happen. “So they can look at their capacity solution and peek out in front and say, ‘OK, I’ve got all these shipments out of the Pacific Northwest,’” he said. “’Those are going to be more difficult to cover in November and December, but I have core carriers to cover those. Or, if I don’t, I know I have some work to do.’” Williams said the RFP represents “the single greatest revenue opportunity for each individual broker, but the processes are incredibly disjointed.” Those 3,000 to 4,000 hours spent annually responding to bids, which equates to 1.5 to two full-time employees, goes up for brokers “doing it right” and not just responding to bids with stale rate sheets. On the high end of the spectrum, a top five broker is likely employing 15 to 20 pricing analysts in a bid to get their pricing right on each lane, he said. Broering said NFI had a process that enabled the broker to respond to bids quickly “and without a ton of effort,” but that most brokers outside of the top 100 find the process “highly challenging as it’s a manual and bespoke process.” Normalization headache “The biggest time suck in these is the ‘normalization’ of the pricing template,” he said. “Most bids are a different format, but the pricing tools that people use have a standard template. So a ton of time is used to get that data out of the shipper-specific template and into the format where the broker can use it.” He added that “very few things piss off a shipper faster than [screwing] up their internal analysis because you transposed data wrong, but I’m not sure there is much that can be done on the shipper side here because of the number of RFPs that are handled internally and in Excel.” Broering said it’s unclear whether most shippers even care if the broker is able to target relevant parts of a shipper’s business because their bid process, and lack of focus on data quality, doesn’t support the idea they do. “If they actually did (care), they would create a process that allows for brokers to express that via the RFP,” he said. “Many (shippers) require brokers to fill out the whole bid to participate. Why? What’s the goal of that? How does that help this industry break out of that? Another way to do it would be for shippers to actually work hard to cleanse the data they are putting in the RFPs and have it represent some decent amount of what they can actually award. If I had a $1 for every lane I had been awarded but never received, I could buy us both very nice homes in the Caribbean.” Williams said his time at Target informed how shippers view the bid process, and where Beagl could help brokers and asset providers. Of Beagl’s initial 25 customers, about 80% are brokers and the rest are carriers. “One of the difficult things about RFPs as a shipper is you don’t necessarily have a great view into your partners’ networks,” he said. “At Target we went after that.” That included asking carriers to specify their “power lanes,” at which point Williams said he found out that a 300-truck fleet might only have four or five so-called power lanes. “And then I wanted to know at the origin point, were they deficit or surplus?” he said. “I wanted to partner with them where they were surplus because if I got them back into a deficit market, it was a match made in heaven. You could make the rate work, and the service was going to be there because they had surplus capacity and they needed to get back to service another customer and so they would prioritize you.” Williams said Beagl is far from the only technology player taking aim at the RFP process. Transfix, the former digital broker that sold its brokerage business to NFI and now sells technology to brokers, is another such example. “There are other great tools out there,” he said. “As brokers get more organized, that should translate into a little bit more smoothing of strategy and helping improve things.” Contact Eric Johnson at eric.johnson@spglobal.com .

Low truckload rates putting pressure on traditional RFP process

<div class="phx-topic abstract-wrapper">Rising e-commerce volume out of Vietnam is being piled on top of sustained and heavy demand for high-tech shipments, with space on freighters in short supply.</div>

Rising e-commerce volume out of Vietnam is being piled on top of sustained and heavy demand for high-tech shipments, with space on freighters in short supply.

<div class="phx-topic">High demand in the US ahead of next week’s “Black Friday” online shopping promotion is squeezing available air freight space out of Asia and driving up rates. The demand is particularly high on Vietnam–US routes with e-commerce volume being piled on top of sustained and heavy demand for high-tech shipments, with freighter capacity under growing pressure. While tightening capacity in the lead up to the official start of holiday shopping season is normal, the growing shipments from Vietnam reflects how importers are diversifying away from China amid the loss of a major demand driver: de minimis. Harsha Ranasinghe, global head air logistics, customer and products at Kuehne + Nagel, said the forwarder is currently operating 14 freighter flights per week between Vietnam and the US. “The demand is driven primarily by high tech, electronics and semiconductor cargo,” he told the Journal of Commerce Thursday. “We expect this trend to continue as Vietnam has emerged as a leading global growth market. Thailand is also experiencing significant growth,” he added. In a trans-Pacific market update by Honour Lane Shipping, the Hong Kong-based forwarder noted that rates on direct flights from Southeast Asia to the US West Coast airports were as high as $7.50/kg, and up to $8.50/kg to the US East Coast. “On the Southeast Asia air freight market overall demand is very strong and sustained, space is critical and solar cell products and e-commerce is hot in Q4 from Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia,” the market update noted. Rates on direct flights from Southeast Asia to the main hubs in Europe were reaching $6.80/kg, according to Honour Lane Shipping. <div class="wrapper-narrow"><dynamic-object type="jocchartid" resource-id="b6888bd9-e9f5-4f99-a176-3a5fb995e0e9"></dynamic-object></div>The available freighter capacity from Southeast Asia to the US was up 5% last week compared to an average of the previous four weeks, and up 9% on Southeast Asia–Europe routes, according to air freight analyst Rotate. A spokesperson for DHL Global Forwarding said the trends were “not out of the ordinary for this time of the year,” although he acknowledged “some elevated volume out of Vietnam and Thailand.” ”But we don’t believe that this represents a ‘super peak’ at present, and that doesn’t seem to be reflected in rates and capacity,” he added. <h3>Solid China e-commerce growth </h3>Air cargo volume and rates out of China are also rising sharply, driven by continuing e-commerce demand despite the US removal of de minimis exemption for low-value items earlier this year. Honour Lane Shipping’s update said e-commerce cargo continues to dominate the China-US corridor with tight capacity on direct flights across the Pacific. “The rate for JFK (New York) direct flights is expected to reach $7–$7.20/kg by the end of this week, reflecting intense competition for capacity,” the market update noted, adding that the Chinese e-commerce platforms and some high-tech brands have secured space through charter flights. Air cargo rates for direct flights from China to Los Angeles’ LAX airport are expected to hold steady around $6.20/kg, which Honour Lane Shipping said indicates “a high and stable market level.” The Freightos Air Index shows China-US rates increased 5% last week to $6.60 per kilogram, up from less than $5/kg in early October and at its highest level this year as peak season demand grows. Last year, rates hit a high of $7.30/kg in mid-December. China–Europe prices increased 2% to $4.01/kg last week, up from $3.50/kg level before Golden Week at the beginning of October. Ranasinghe said air freight rates were rising as demand ahead of Black Friday began to fill the available capacity out of Asia and the forwarder was working with the airlines to secure enough space to keep its shipments moving. Whether some of the demand was related to Christmas stockpiling was not yet clear, he added. ”Until now, we have not seen significant demand that can be directly related to Christmas, though this will likely become more apparent post Black Friday,” Ranasinghe said. Contact Greg Knowler at <a href="mailto:greg.knowler@spglobal.com">greg.knowler@spglobal.com</a>. </div>

High demand in the US ahead of next week’s “Black Friday” online shopping promotion is squeezing available air freight space out of Asia and driving up rates. The demand is particularly high on Vietnam–US routes with e-commerce volume being piled on top of sustained and heavy demand for high-tech shipments, with freighter capacity under growing pressure. While tightening capacity in the lead up to the official start of holiday shopping season is normal, the growing shipments from Vietnam reflects how importers are diversifying away from China amid the loss of a major demand driver: de minimis. Harsha Ranasinghe, global head air logistics, customer and products at Kuehne + Nagel, said the forwarder is currently operating 14 freighter flights per week between Vietnam and the US. “The demand is driven primarily by high tech, electronics and semiconductor cargo,” he told the Journal of Commerce Thursday. “We expect this trend to continue as Vietnam has emerged as a leading global growth market. Thailand is also experiencing significant growth,” he added. In a trans-Pacific market update by Honour Lane Shipping, the Hong Kong-based forwarder noted that rates on direct flights from Southeast Asia to the US West Coast airports were as high as $7.50/kg, and up to $8.50/kg to the US East Coast. “On the Southeast Asia air freight market overall demand is very strong and sustained, space is critical and solar cell products and e-commerce is hot in Q4 from Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia,” the market update noted. Rates on direct flights from Southeast Asia to the main hubs in Europe were reaching $6.80/kg, according to Honour Lane Shipping. The available freighter capacity from Southeast Asia to the US was up 5% last week compared to an average of the previous four weeks, and up 9% on Southeast Asia–Europe routes, according to air freight analyst Rotate. A spokesperson for DHL Global Forwarding said the trends were “not out of the ordinary for this time of the year,” although he acknowledged “some elevated volume out of Vietnam and Thailand.” ”But we don’t believe that this represents a ‘super peak’ at present, and that doesn’t seem to be reflected in rates and capacity,” he added. Solid China e-commerce growth Air cargo volume and rates out of China are also rising sharply, driven by continuing e-commerce demand despite the US removal of de minimis exemption for low-value items earlier this year. Honour Lane Shipping’s update said e-commerce cargo continues to dominate the China-US corridor with tight capacity on direct flights across the Pacific. “The rate for JFK (New York) direct flights is expected to reach $7–$7.20/kg by the end of this week, reflecting intense competition for capacity,” the market update noted, adding that the Chinese e-commerce platforms and some high-tech brands have secured space through charter flights. Air cargo rates for direct flights from China to Los Angeles’ LAX airport are expected to hold steady around $6.20/kg, which Honour Lane Shipping said indicates “a high and stable market level.” The Freightos Air Index shows China-US rates increased 5% last week to $6.60 per kilogram, up from less than $5/kg in early October and at its highest level this year as peak season demand grows. Last year, rates hit a high of $7.30/kg in mid-December. China–Europe prices increased 2% to $4.01/kg last week, up from $3.50/kg level before Golden Week at the beginning of October. Ranasinghe said air freight rates were rising as demand ahead of Black Friday began to fill the available capacity out of Asia and the forwarder was working with the airlines to secure enough space to keep its shipments moving. Whether some of the demand was related to Christmas stockpiling was not yet clear, he added. ”Until now, we have not seen significant demand that can be directly related to Christmas, though this will likely become more apparent post Black Friday,” Ranasinghe said. Contact Greg Knowler at greg.knowler@spglobal.com .

Black Friday demand tightens trans-Pacific air cargo capacity, elevates rates

<div class="phx-topic abstract-wrapper">While the conclusion of arbitration should provide more stability to shippers using Montreal, Canada’s other East Coast gateways will soon face their own contract negotiations.</div>

While the conclusion of arbitration should provide more stability to shippers using Montreal, Canada’s other East Coast gateways will soon face their own contract negotiations.

<div class="phx-topic">Arbitration hearings meant to reach a new deal between maritime employers and longshore workers at the Port of Montreal are expected to wrap up by early 2026, more than two years after the expiration of the last contract set off sporadic work stoppages at Canada’s second-busiest port. While the conclusion of arbitration should provide more stability to shippers using Montreal, Canada’s other East Coast gateways will soon face their own contract negotiations. Those talks come amid a push by the country’s biggest union to repeal the law that allowed the federal government to end the longshore strikes last year that hit both coasts. In September, arbitrator Maureen Flynn began the initial hearings between Montreal’s Maritime Employers Association (MEA) and the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 375 over a new contract for the union’s 1,300 members. Flynn was brought in this past May, after mediated talks in the first quarter of 2025 failed to produce a deal. <a href="https://www.joc.com/article/bc-ports-to-reopen-but-longshore-union-plans-challenge-to-back-to-work-order-5810473">Canada’s labor minister had ordered striking dockworkers at both Montreal and Vancouver back on the job</a> in November 2024, requiring their disputes go to arbitration due to the impasse at both coasts. But <a href="https://www.joc.com/article/montreal-port-employers-union-agree-to-mediation-in-talks-for-new-contract-5824318">the MEA had asked for more time in mediation with the union</a>, hoping for a more amicable outcome than arbitration. Speaking at a conference in Toronto in October, Paul Bird, chief commercial officer for the Montreal Port Authority, which is not a direct party to the contract talks, said that he expects the arbitration to conclude at least by the first quarter of 2026. “We were hopeful we would get a decision during the fall, but it’s maybe more realistic that were getting a decision during Q1 of 2026,” Bird said. While Montreal’s container count is up for 2025 following last year’s work stoppages, containerized cargo tonnage is about 2 million metric tons less than it was in 2019. Much of that drop happened in 2023 as the previous contract with Local 375 was expiring. Bird said some of that drop was the result of shippers deciding to reroute their freight due to concerns over work stoppages at the port. He said a new contract should give shippers confidence to bring more freight back through Montreal. “When forwarders and BCOs look at when the next contract anniversary is coming up, they start rerouting cargo or make plan B options,” Bird said. “We’ve lost some of those volumes that have been rerouted, especially through US East Coast ports. [Work stoppages] have led to a dip in volume that takes time to recuperate.” <h3>Halifax, Saint John contracts expiring </h3>In ending last year’s coast-to-coast longshore strikes, the labor minister used a provision of Canadian law called Section 107 that forces workers back on the job and to submit to arbitration with employers or otherwise face fines. The same provision was used on Canadian railroad workers and postal employees who also threatened to strike. However, that same provision failed to end a short-lived strike by Air Canada flight attendants this past August, after the government admitted it would fine workers or the union. CUPE, which also represents the flight attendants, said they are working with Canadian legislators to repeal Section 107, arguing the government abused its power last year invoking the provision. A challenge to the government’s ability to bring workers back on the job comes as its other East Coast gateways face pending labor negotiations. The contract covering 631 members of the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) at the Port of Halifax is expiring at the end of 2025. The union there has launched a publicity campaign against terminal operator PSA International, accusing it of foisting automation technology on the workforce at the expense of jobs. The Port of Saint John will also see two agreements covering 268 ILA members expire at the end of 2025. Canada has seen some 62 work stoppages across its transportation industry between 2023 and 2024, according to government statistics. Canadian National Railway Vice President Dan Bresolin said the frequent strikes are shaking the confidence of carriers and shippers to use Canada, especially at a time when it wants to diversify its trade routes away from the US. “It’s the trust that’s eroded a little bit,” Bresolin said at the Toronto conference. “We need to get back to where carriers can bring in bigger ships, bring more business through Canadian gateways. The last 18 months has impacted that.” Contact Michael Angell at <a href="mailto:michael.angell@spglobal.com">michael.angell@spglobal.com</a>. </div>

Arbitration hearings meant to reach a new deal between maritime employers and longshore workers at the Port of Montreal are expected to wrap up by early 2026, more than two years after the expiration of the last contract set off sporadic work stoppages at Canada’s second-busiest port. While the conclusion of arbitration should provide more stability to shippers using Montreal, Canada’s other East Coast gateways will soon face their own contract negotiations. Those talks come amid a push by the country’s biggest union to repeal the law that allowed the federal government to end the longshore strikes last year that hit both coasts. In September, arbitrator Maureen Flynn began the initial hearings between Montreal’s Maritime Employers Association (MEA) and the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 375 over a new contract for the union’s 1,300 members. Flynn was brought in this past May, after mediated talks in the first quarter of 2025 failed to produce a deal. Canada’s labor minister had ordered striking dockworkers at both Montreal and Vancouver back on the job in November 2024, requiring their disputes go to arbitration due to the impasse at both coasts. But the MEA had asked for more time in mediation with the union , hoping for a more amicable outcome than arbitration. Speaking at a conference in Toronto in October, Paul Bird, chief commercial officer for the Montreal Port Authority, which is not a direct party to the contract talks, said that he expects the arbitration to conclude at least by the first quarter of 2026. “We were hopeful we would get a decision during the fall, but it’s maybe more realistic that were getting a decision during Q1 of 2026,” Bird said. While Montreal’s container count is up for 2025 following last year’s work stoppages, containerized cargo tonnage is about 2 million metric tons less than it was in 2019. Much of that drop happened in 2023 as the previous contract with Local 375 was expiring. Bird said some of that drop was the result of shippers deciding to reroute their freight due to concerns over work stoppages at the port. He said a new contract should give shippers confidence to bring more freight back through Montreal. “When forwarders and BCOs look at when the next contract anniversary is coming up, they start rerouting cargo or make plan B options,” Bird said. “We’ve lost some of those volumes that have been rerouted, especially through US East Coast ports. [Work stoppages] have led to a dip in volume that takes time to recuperate.” Halifax, Saint John contracts expiring In ending last year’s coast-to-coast longshore strikes, the labor minister used a provision of Canadian law called Section 107 that forces workers back on the job and to submit to arbitration with employers or otherwise face fines. The same provision was used on Canadian railroad workers and postal employees who also threatened to strike. However, that same provision failed to end a short-lived strike by Air Canada flight attendants this past August, after the government admitted it would fine workers or the union. CUPE, which also represents the flight attendants, said they are working with Canadian legislators to repeal Section 107, arguing the government abused its power last year invoking the provision. A challenge to the government’s ability to bring workers back on the job comes as its other East Coast gateways face pending labor negotiations. The contract covering 631 members of the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) at the Port of Halifax is expiring at the end of 2025. The union there has launched a publicity campaign against terminal operator PSA International, accusing it of foisting automation technology on the workforce at the expense of jobs. The Port of Saint John will also see two agreements covering 268 ILA members expire at the end of 2025. Canada has seen some 62 work stoppages across its transportation industry between 2023 and 2024, according to government statistics. Canadian National Railway Vice President Dan Bresolin said the frequent strikes are shaking the confidence of carriers and shippers to use Canada, especially at a time when it wants to diversify its trade routes away from the US. “It’s the trust that’s eroded a little bit,” Bresolin said at the Toronto conference. “We need to get back to where carriers can bring in bigger ships, bring more business through Canadian gateways. The last 18 months has impacted that.” Contact Michael Angell at michael.angell@spglobal.com .

Montreal longshore arbitration expected to conclude in Q1 2026

<div class="phx-topic abstract-wrapper">A surge in replenishment activity in the US could turbocharge container shipping demand, while a wholesale return of container ships to Red Sea and Suez Canal transits would have a far-reaching market impact, speakers on a panel sponsored by the carrier said Wednesday.</div>

A surge in replenishment activity in the US could turbocharge container shipping demand, while a wholesale return of container ships to Red Sea and Suez Canal transits would have a far-reaching market impact, speakers on a panel sponsored by the carrier said Wednesday.

<div class="phx-topic">Restocking depleted inventories in the US and a return of Red Sea-Suez Canal transits are the two biggest uncertainties facing the container shipping industry next year, a group of industry experts said Wednesday. A surge in replenishment activity could turbocharge container shipping demand. But a wholesale return of container ships to Red Sea and Suez Canal transits would have a far-reaching impact, creating significant congestion in Europe, the Mediterranean and Asia that would also impact US East Coast services, they said. “Inventory restocking would have quite a big effect,” Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd, said during the online panel briefing organized by the company. Habben Jansen, who gave the odds of such a move at “well above 50%,” said restocking would likely increase container demand by more than 4% next year, compared with 4.7% growth so far this year. Fellow panelist Michael Aldwell, Kuehne + Nagel’s executive vice president for sea logistics, said the recent US government shutdown meant there were no reliable inventory statistics available, although it was assumed inventory levels have fallen to unsustainable levels amid the tariff-driven decline in shipments to the US. <div class="wrapper-narrow"><dynamic-object type="jocchartid" resource-id="b2c4ed98-5885-4436-931d-5f035f537df1"></dynamic-object></div>Containerized US imports from Asia have fallen from the year’s high of 1.81 million TEUs in July to 1.6 million TEUs in October, according to PIERS, a sister product of the Journal of Commerce within S&amp;P Global. The potential for the US to become more economically stable next year compared with the upheavals seen this year would “lead to substantial restocking,” Lars Jensen, CEO of consultant Vespucci Maritime and a Journal of Commerce contributor, added. <h3>Hapag has ‘a plan on the shelf’ for Red Sea transits </h3>Turning to the possibility of a resumption of Red Sea transits, Aldwell said aside from port congestion due to vessel bunching, there would also be landside bottlenecks with terminal congestion caused by shortages of trucks and equipment. He said carriers were likely to use both Red Sea and Cape of Good Hope routings in their schedules once it became clear the Red Sea was safe to use again, but there was still a lot of caution before that happened, with vessel insurance and crew welfare among the issues that had to be taken into account. Some carriers, including CMA CGM, have made a tentative return to the Red Sea since Houthi rebels announced a ceasefire, with several vessels escorted by naval ships. Habben Jansen said Hapag-Lloyd had no immediate intention to return to Red Sea transits, although it has “a plan on the shelf to follow” once it does decide to shift back. “The risk of significant congestion in the Mediterranean and North Europe is just huge,” he said of when carriers do return to normal transits. Jensen said assuming the latest ceasefire holds, the period after the Lunar New Year holiday in early March would be the best time to mitigate the impact from the disruption caused by transitioning back to Red Sea transits. He pointed out post-Lunar New Year is typically the slack season, so the combination of lower demand and vessel blankings would reduce congestion. Carriers have used the longer route around southern Africa since late 2023 when the Houthis began their attacks on commercial shipping to protest Israel’s move into Gaza. Contact Keith Wallis at <a href="mailto:keithwallis@hotmail.com">keithwallis@hotmail.com</a>.</div>

Restocking depleted inventories in the US and a return of Red Sea-Suez Canal transits are the two biggest uncertainties facing the container shipping industry next year, a group of industry experts said Wednesday. A surge in replenishment activity could turbocharge container shipping demand. But a wholesale return of container ships to Red Sea and Suez Canal transits would have a far-reaching impact, creating significant congestion in Europe, the Mediterranean and Asia that would also impact US East Coast services, they said. “Inventory restocking would have quite a big effect,” Rolf Habben Jansen, CEO of Hapag-Lloyd, said during the online panel briefing organized by the company. Habben Jansen, who gave the odds of such a move at “well above 50%,” said restocking would likely increase container demand by more than 4% next year, compared with 4.7% growth so far this year. Fellow panelist Michael Aldwell, Kuehne + Nagel’s executive vice president for sea logistics, said the recent US government shutdown meant there were no reliable inventory statistics available, although it was assumed inventory levels have fallen to unsustainable levels amid the tariff-driven decline in shipments to the US. Containerized US imports from Asia have fallen from the year’s high of 1.81 million TEUs in July to 1.6 million TEUs in October, according to PIERS, a sister product of the Journal of Commerce within S&P Global. The potential for the US to become more economically stable next year compared with the upheavals seen this year would “lead to substantial restocking,” Lars Jensen, CEO of consultant Vespucci Maritime and a Journal of Commerce contributor, added. Hapag has ‘a plan on the shelf’ for Red Sea transits Turning to the possibility of a resumption of Red Sea transits, Aldwell said aside from port congestion due to vessel bunching, there would also be landside bottlenecks with terminal congestion caused by shortages of trucks and equipment. He said carriers were likely to use both Red Sea and Cape of Good Hope routings in their schedules once it became clear the Red Sea was safe to use again, but there was still a lot of caution before that happened, with vessel insurance and crew welfare among the issues that had to be taken into account. Some carriers, including CMA CGM, have made a tentative return to the Red Sea since Houthi rebels announced a ceasefire, with several vessels escorted by naval ships. Habben Jansen said Hapag-Lloyd had no immediate intention to return to Red Sea transits, although it has “a plan on the shelf to follow” once it does decide to shift back. “The risk of significant congestion in the Mediterranean and North Europe is just huge,” he said of when carriers do return to normal transits. Jensen said assuming the latest ceasefire holds, the period after the Lunar New Year holiday in early March would be the best time to mitigate the impact from the disruption caused by transitioning back to Red Sea transits. He pointed out post-Lunar New Year is typically the slack season, so the combination of lower demand and vessel blankings would reduce congestion. Carriers have used the longer route around southern Africa since late 2023 when the Houthis began their attacks on commercial shipping to protest Israel’s move into Gaza. Contact Keith Wallis at keithwallis@hotmail.com .

US restocking, Red Sea return the two big unknowns for 2026: Hapag briefing

<div class="phx-topic abstract-wrapper">A series of freight-all-kinds increases since Oct. 1 has held up the spot market on the trade, with carriers aiming to sustain the pricing momentum through fourth-quarter contract talks.</div>

A series of freight-all-kinds increases since Oct. 1 has held up the spot market on the trade, with carriers aiming to sustain the pricing momentum through fourth-quarter contract talks.

<div class="phx-topic">Ocean carriers on the Asia to North Europe and Mediterranean trades will roll out yet another rate increase on Dec. 1 in a bid to extend an upward pricing run that began in October. It is the latest freight-all-kinds (FAK) increase to be announced on the trade lanes that have seen rate hikes every two weeks since Oct. 1. “Asia-Europe and Mediterranean rates are holding steady, supported by aggressive blank sailings during tender season,” Judah Levine, head of research at online freight marketplace Freightos, wrote in a market update this week. “This stability may reflect more aggressive blanked sailing campaigns for these lanes during the current tendering season, with some carriers announcing additional [rate increases] to push prices up to the $3,000-$4,000 per FEU level in December,” Levine said. On Asia-North Europe, Mediterranean Shipping Co. and Hapag-Lloyd will set their FAK rate at $3,200/FEU from Dec. 1. On Asia-Mediterranean routes, CMA CGM and Hapag-Lloyd have set their FAK rates at $4,000/FEU, while MSC has announced a rate level of $3,950/FEU from Asia to the West Mediterranean and $3,800/FEU to the East Mediterranean. <h3>Spot market momentum </h3>While the fortnightly FAKs have not enabled carriers to achieve all their sought-after increases, the price hikes have seen the spot rate on Asia-North Europe rise steadily from $1,300 per FEU on Oct. 1 to $2,300/FEU this week, according to Platts, a sister company of the Journal of Commerce within S&amp;P Global. Asia-Mediterranean rates have risen from $1,600/FEU on Oct. 1 to the current level of $3,000/FEU. <div class="wrapper-narrow"><dynamic-object type="jocchartid" resource-id="b07fd015-2b73-4e9d-a61e-e44aaa45715e"></dynamic-object></div>With tendering season for long-term rates on the European trades now underway, the higher prices are being supported by significant capacity withdrawals in the form of blank sailings. Carriers on Asia-North Europe have announced November blanks of almost 110,000 TEUs of capacity, with blank sailings of 56,000 TEUs set so far for December, according to Xeneta’s eeSea data. Both those numbers are expected to increase as new capacity continues to steam into service. Asia-North Europe carriers will deploy 1.12 million TEUs of capacity in December, a record that will be beaten in January, when 1.17 million TEUs will be in service, according to Xeneta. On Asia-Mediterranean, 100,000 TEUs are set thus far to be blanked in November and 40,000 TEUs in December, with 17,000 TEUs on tap right now for January, according to Xeneta. A record 842,000 TEUs of capacity deployed on the trade in December will be beaten in January when the deployed fleet hits 861,000 TEUs. Whether there will be enough demand to fill ships and hold up rates through December remains to be seen. The latest volume numbers from Container Trades Statistics are for September and showed that demand on Asia-Europe in the first nine months of the year was up 9.8% year over year. Contact Greg Knowler at <a href="mailto:greg.knowler@spglobal.com">greg.knowler@spglobal.com</a>. </div>

Ocean carriers on the Asia to North Europe and Mediterranean trades will roll out yet another rate increase on Dec. 1 in a bid to extend an upward pricing run that began in October. It is the latest freight-all-kinds (FAK) increase to be announced on the trade lanes that have seen rate hikes every two weeks since Oct. 1. “Asia-Europe and Mediterranean rates are holding steady, supported by aggressive blank sailings during tender season,” Judah Levine, head of research at online freight marketplace Freightos, wrote in a market update this week. “This stability may reflect more aggressive blanked sailing campaigns for these lanes during the current tendering season, with some carriers announcing additional [rate increases] to push prices up to the $3,000-$4,000 per FEU level in December,” Levine said. On Asia-North Europe, Mediterranean Shipping Co. and Hapag-Lloyd will set their FAK rate at $3,200/FEU from Dec. 1. On Asia-Mediterranean routes, CMA CGM and Hapag-Lloyd have set their FAK rates at $4,000/FEU, while MSC has announced a rate level of $3,950/FEU from Asia to the West Mediterranean and $3,800/FEU to the East Mediterranean. Spot market momentum While the fortnightly FAKs have not enabled carriers to achieve all their sought-after increases, the price hikes have seen the spot rate on Asia-North Europe rise steadily from $1,300 per FEU on Oct. 1 to $2,300/FEU this week, according to Platts, a sister company of the Journal of Commerce within S&P Global. Asia-Mediterranean rates have risen from $1,600/FEU on Oct. 1 to the current level of $3,000/FEU. With tendering season for long-term rates on the European trades now underway, the higher prices are being supported by significant capacity withdrawals in the form of blank sailings. Carriers on Asia-North Europe have announced November blanks of almost 110,000 TEUs of capacity, with blank sailings of 56,000 TEUs set so far for December, according to Xeneta’s eeSea data. Both those numbers are expected to increase as new capacity continues to steam into service. Asia-North Europe carriers will deploy 1.12 million TEUs of capacity in December, a record that will be beaten in January, when 1.17 million TEUs will be in service, according to Xeneta. On Asia-Mediterranean, 100,000 TEUs are set thus far to be blanked in November and 40,000 TEUs in December, with 17,000 TEUs on tap right now for January, according to Xeneta. A record 842,000 TEUs of capacity deployed on the trade in December will be beaten in January when the deployed fleet hits 861,000 TEUs. Whether there will be enough demand to fill ships and hold up rates through December remains to be seen. The latest volume numbers from Container Trades Statistics are for September and showed that demand on Asia-Europe in the first nine months of the year was up 9.8% year over year. Contact Greg Knowler at greg.knowler@spglobal.com .

Asia-Europe carriers to levy yet another rate hike on Dec. 1

Subscribe today using code BFW30 at checkout and save 30% on a Silver or Silver Plus annual subscription!

Subscribe Now - Anonymous to S/SP - Wide Box

BLACK FRIDAY SALE!

Get into a Gold subscription today and save $500 by using code BFW995 at checkout!

Subscribe Now - Anonymous to Gold - Wide Box

Use code GTW595 at checkout and save $900 on first year of an annual Gold subscription!

Upgrade Subscription - Gold Trials

Become a Gold Subscriber and Save!

Arm your team with the most trusted information portal for the international container shipping industry.

Group Subscriptions - Wide Box

Get into a group subscription today

Access Journal of Commerce content for 30 days

Free Trial - Wide Box

START A FREE TRIAL TODAY

The world of LTL is slow to embrace change. Business anachronisms permeate current supply chain processes. These vestiges of the way things used to work define the LTL freight transportation procurement process of many modern shippers.David Knuth, logistics specialist at IEWC, a global supplier of cable and wire based in Wisconsin, is happy to have modernized the RFP process, automating the entire LTL bidding procedure with Bid$ense, SMC³’s automated truckload and LTL freight transportation sourcing solution. But when prompted, he can still recall what once was.In his previous job, a large part of his duties were consumed by creating an intermodal bid package for carriers. In a spreadsheet, Knuth detailed the company’s volumes lane by lane, taking care to delete any errant keystrokes or misleading data. He would then email out the information to each carrier, taking time to respond to detailed technical questions about the spreadsheet data. Finally, he had to compile all the results, create an algorithm that would compare the carriers on each lane, and award the business.“It was a huge undertaking. It took about four months to do,” Knuth said of the old process. “It was almost a full-time job for that part of the year, every year.”In his new job at IEWC, he sat down with Bid$ense on day one and was amazed at the capabilities. Knuth had never before used a bid tool. SMC³’s latest versions of Bid$ense automate the process even further, taking truckload and LTL RFPs entirely online. The tool draws on RFP best-practices protocols to streamline the bidding communication process, enabling bidding carriers to respond accurately and promptly to shipper requests. The solution also does all the distribution work automatically, electronically submitting shipper bid data to carriers based on their actual service capabilities and performance records. Carriers are alerted with timely prompts for RFP deliverables, so shippers aren’t waiting by the phone for responses.Another benefit of automating the process is the data-cleansing assistance. When Knuth sent spreadsheets to carriers, data errors might cloud the bidding process; he might have to resend data or simply accept a price that did not truly reflect the costs of doing business. Data cleansing is incredibly beneficial, he said.The spreadsheet technique also made bidding analysis an onerous task. Since Bid$ense automates and streamlines the entire RFP process, intensive examination is now simple. SMC³ knows that each bid has more than one best outcome. With uniform responses from each carrier, shippers can quickly rank results and create an unlimited quantity of what-if scenarios to make the optimal procurement decision.Jesse Burnett of Central Garden &amp; Pet experiences many of the same benefits. Founded in 1980, Central Garden &amp; Pet has spent the last three decades growing from a small garden supply company to a provider of a range of products from dog chews and bird seed to soil supplements and natural insecticides. For much of its life, the company shipped these disparate goods via LTL and truckload carriers to retailers throughout the country, relying on each business unit to negotiate directly with their freight transportation providers. This arrangement worked fairly well for a small company, but as Central Garden &amp; Pet expanded, leadership decided to consolidate decision making.Burnett helped centralize the transportation decision making in 2015 with SMC³’s Bid$ense. Before Bid$ense, every business unit operated independently as far as negotiating with carriers.“There were a lot of different things just floating around,” he said. “We didn’t have master agreements in place; no national pricing at all. The pricing from carriers was just all over the place, depending on where you were.”The transformations he saw with Bid$ense were immediate. Burnett has been using the tool about every other year since its implementation at the company. Central Garden and Pet’s $19.6 million 2019 LTL bid saved the company just more than 9 percent when compared to its historical average. For Burnett, though, bid automation extends far beyond savings.“We knew that we weren’t getting the best pricing offer from our carriers just because nothing was centralized,” he continued. “We knew that if we combined everything from all these business units and paired it with one corporate offering, then it would drive some cost benefit with it.”When the company initially decided to centralize bid procurement, executives researched a number of different methodologies and technologies. In the end, though, Burnett found that Bid$ense was both widespread and well known, and that his carrier partners already knew how to use the application. Burnett also highlighted the data-cleansing process as a major benefit, saying the rigorous process ensures that carriers always return the best price.“It definitely has helped drive savings,” he said. “Any time you go out there and you drive that competitiveness with the carriers and they know they’re in a bid environment, it seems to sharpen their pencils.”Transportation procurement is an integral part of the modern supply chain. With Bid$ense, shippers can develop a strategic implementation plan that saves them time and money, but also helps them create strong relationships with their carrier partners. These carriers appreciate the solution’s data-cleansing process; when carriers receive a complete shipment history and future volume forecast, they don’t have to guess on pricing. Carriers that receive more data from shippers get a complete picture of that shipper’s freight, allowing them to accurately plan instead of simply preparing for the worst-case scenario. Clean data presented through an automated system can lead to both bigger shipment savings and a lasting partnership between carrier and customer.Whether customers are looking to streamline over-the-road transportation bidding by automating the RFP process or create an entirely new, centralized sourcing process, Bid$ense has the analytical horsepower to get the job done.SMC³ 2020 Customer Case Study

SMC3rates_shutterstock_5247046.jpg

Shippers save money, time with automated transportation bidding tools

If there’s one immutable truth in the world of logistics, it’s this: LTL is an inherently complex form of transportation. Tariffs, rates, DIM weights, transit times — it’s enough to confuse even seasoned logistics professionals. The solution to this knowledge gap has historically been on-the-job training or university supply chain education, but for a variety of reasons there is now a pressing need for third-party, remote LTL training that prepares logistics workers for transportation success. Global Scope Can Overlook Local Intricacies In the past, professionals looking to move into a supply chain career learned about the basics of supply chain from universities. However, many of these college supply chain programs are now global in scope, focusing on worldwide supply chain management instead of the intricacies of specialized domestic transportation. And even these programs, which used to be widespread, are becoming less common. LTL is not an industry of broad-brush strokes; supply chain professionals really need a pointillistic understanding of the logistics of LTL in order to excel in the industry. Accelerating Need for Dedicated LTL Education This lack of specified training put the onus on employers to prepare new hires with the LTL knowledge needed to do their jobs. Dedicated LTL study is a necessity, not a luxury. At the same time, changes in LTL and the broader supply chain world are accelerating. The reliance on e-commerce has ballooned since the start of the pandemic, and last-mile LTL shipments and related e-commerce strains on the supply chain won’t diminish once social distancing abates. That genie isn’t going back into the bottle. So supply chain employers need logistics workers that are fully versed in all aspects of the industry, ready to solve unique shipping and delivery problems based on their extensive supply chain knowledge But why care about LTL? It’s been reported that some shippers in today’s world are no longer concerned with what mode is used to ship their goods. A Multimodal Approach Ensures On-Time Delivery This mode agnosticism means supply chain stakeholders have to be well versed in all modes of transportation. As unforeseen weather events and other disruptions, such as protests, become more common, savvy logistics employees will need to be armed with familiarity of all modes, not just the most popular, to ensure that freight is delivered on time, without damage, and in the most financially expedient way possible. Offerings like SMC³’s LTL online education courses cover a wide range of topics from LTL basics and operations to more advanced concepts like pricing analytics and transportation law. The company also has plans to continually refresh content, adding new expert presenters and taking the feedback of students to make the courses even better as time goes on. Learn more about&nbsp;<a href="https://logisticstrainingcenter.com/smc3-courses/" rel="noreferrer" class="joc_admin__link">SMC³’s LTL Online Education program</a>&nbsp;and view the 2021 hybrid schedule, featuring live industry experts,&nbsp;<a href="https://www.smc3.com/onlinelearning2021/" rel="noreferrer" class="joc_admin__link">here.</a>

SMC3rates_shutterstock_5247046 (1).jpg

Filling the Supply Chain Education Gap with LTL Education Courses

In 1995, we began operations with a clear vision: to grow alongside Mexico and connect the world through our terminals. Our priority has always been to deliver excellence in service, foster economic development, and strengthen our communities. We firmly believe that progress is not only measured in tons of cargo moved, but in the opportunities we create. _______________________________________________________________ This year marks a significant milestone: SSA Marine Mexico celebrates 30 years of presence in the country, having established itself from day one as the leading port operator nationwide. Over the past three decades, we have built a legacy of reliability, innovation, and commitment to Mexico’s growth. Our journey has been defined by continuous evolution and a steadfast dedication to our mission. SSA Marine México currently operates in six of the country’s most important ports: Cozumel, Lazaro Cardenas, Manzanillo, Progreso, Tuxpan, and Veracruz. Additionally, we have signed a concession to operate a new multipurpose terminal in Guaymas, Sonora, expanding our footprint to the north of the country. We serve a wide range of segments including containers, general cargo, automobiles, cruise ships, hydrocarbons, and asphalt. As part of this ongoing commitment, SSA Marine Mexico continues to strengthen its infrastructure and capabilities. International trade remains a key driver of global economic growth, and we are proud to support this momentum. Through our continuous improvement strategy, we invest in cutting-edge technology and equipment to deliver more efficient and competitive services, contributing to the success of Mexican businesses. •	Manzanillo, Colima- Specialized Container Terminal I: On October 13, we celebrated the arrival of two new STS (Ship To Shore) Super Post Panamax dockside cranes. This $21.2 million USD investment significantly boosts our operational capacity, streamlining cargo reception and delivery processes. In line with our modernization efforts, we will also retire four of our oldest cranes, paving the way for a more sustainable and technologically advanced fleet that meets the evolving demands of international trade. With these upgrades, SSA Marine México now operates a total of 16 cranes along our 1,350-meter dock, reaffirming our position as a national benchmark in port <span class="joc_admin__inline-image joc_admin__inline-image-aspect-ratio-4_3 joc_admin__inline-image-position-left joc_admin__inline-image-size-large" data-figure-size="large" data-figure-position="left" data-figure-aspect-ratio="4:3"><img src="/content-assets/1760982635607_Manzanillo.jpg" alt="Image provided by SSA Marine" class="joc_admin__inline-image-inherit"> •	As for the Multipurpose Terminal and Specialized Facility, also in Manzanillo, Colima, improvement and conditioning works are planned, along with the acquisition of four E-RTG (Electric Rubber-Tyred Gantry) cranes to enhance operational efficiency and sustainability. •	At our Automobile and General Cargo Terminal in the port of Veracruz, we continue to lead with specialized value-added services that support our clients’ growth. Recent investments include a new washing cabin and a general cargo warehouse, increasing indoor storage capacity by 67%. •	Lazaro Cardenas, Michoacan – Specialized Automobile Terminal: we are working on the development of an additional 4-hectare storage space within our bonded area and a 10-hectare Vehicle Distribution Center (VDC). These enhancements, along with ongoing personnel and system improvements, will reinforce our leadership in automotive handling across the Mexican Pacific coast.<span class="joc_admin__inline-image joc_admin__inline-image-aspect-ratio-4_3 joc_admin__inline-image-position-left joc_admin__inline-image-size-large" data-figure-size="large" data-figure-position="left" data-figure-aspect-ratio="4:3"><img src="/content-assets/1760982742240_Lazaro.jpg" alt="Image provided by SSA Marine" class="joc_admin__inline-image-inherit"> Through these strategic investments, SSA Marine Mexico reaffirms its commitment to the sustained growth of Mexico’s foreign trade. By expanding capacity, modernizing infrastructure, and diversifying services, we continue to strengthen the country’s competitiveness in global logistics. Today, we celebrate three decades of dedication, innovation, and leadership, with deep gratitude to our employees, clients, and partners for being part of this incredible journey. LINK: https://www.ssamarine.mx/<span class="joc_admin__inline-image joc_admin__inline-image-aspect-ratio-16_9 joc_admin__inline-image-position-left joc_admin__inline-image-size-small" data-figure-size="small" data-figure-position="left" data-figure-aspect-ratio="16:9"><img src="/content-assets/1760982787360_SSA%20Marine%20Mexico%20logo%20150pxW.png" alt="" class="joc_admin__inline-image-inherit">

Manzanillo.jpg

SSA Marine Mexico: 30 years growing together.

BLACK FRIDAY SALE: Subscribe today using code BFW30 at checkout and save 30% on a Silver or Silver Plus annual subscription!

Subscribe Now - Anonymous to S/SP - Offer Box

SUBSCRIBE TODAY

BLACK FRIDAY SALE: Get into a Gold subscription today and save $500 by using code BFW995 at checkout!

Subscribe Now - Anonymous to Gold - Offer Box

UPGRADE TO GOLD AND SAVE: Use code GTW595 at checkout and save $900 on first year of a Gold subscription!

Upgrade Subscription

GET INTO A GROUP SUBSCRIPTION: Arm your team with unlimited Journal of Commerce content

Group Subscriptions - Offer Box

Group Subscriptions

START A FREE TRIAL: Access Journal of Commerce content for 30 days

Free Trial - Offer Box

Free Trial

Monthly publication providing an editorial deep dive into global supply chain news

Journal of Commerce Magazine - Rectangle Box

Journal of Commerce Magazine

An in-depth analysis of transport trends in the multipurpose and heavy-lift fleet segment

Breakbulk Report - Rectangle Box

Breakbulk Quarterly

The only editorially independent conference for the breakbulk & project cargo industry

Breakbulk Conference - Rectangle Box

Attend Breakbulk26

Customers scoring their intermodal partners to identify the best service providers

Intermodal Service Scorecard - Rectangle Box

Intermodal Service Scorecard

The premier conference for the global container shipping and supply chain community

Latest News

More News & Analysis

Low truckload rates putting pressure on traditional RFP process

Black Friday demand tightens trans-Pacific air cargo capacity, elevates rates

Montreal longshore arbitration expected to conclude in Q1 2026