What’s happening in the logistics world?
More of the same and it’s actually getting worse at a majority of the ports in the United States. The grid lock seems to be getting worse and we can only hope that Golden Week will provide some reprieve and allow the system to catch up. These vessels departing China now should hit the US west coast in three weeks and the east coast in five weeks.
What are the major issues that persist?
1. Real-estate
The terminals are maxed, trans-load warehouses are operating 24/7, and yard space is full across the country. Record volumes using the same amount of infrastructure along with difficulty returning empties = no space to park anything. More on that here.
2. Chassis shortage
This continues to be a problem due to unprecedented volumes along with issues returning empties. Many larger retailers/BCOs have gone into the charter vessel program to try and solve the space problem out of Asia, but they are now running into new problems once the cargo hits the coasts. Truckers don’t have the excess capacity and many of these charters use lease containers, which many terminals are not accepting. This means many truckers are not accepting orders off these charter vessels. This further exacerbates the real-state and infrastructure problems at the terminals.
Plenty of trucks, but no chassis available……………….
This is what trying to return an empty lease container off a charter vessel can look like.
Where’s the worst of it?
LA/Long Beach and Savannah are the two ports that continue to have the most vessels off shore at anchor. LA/Long Beach has 70 and Savannah has 24. Now the congestion issues are hitting the local and national news.
BK’s advice
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