Amid the public buzz surrounding the change in the way ocean carriers operate their chassis fleets in North America, another less publicized but arguably equally significant transition has been taking place: There has been a tidal shift in who actually purchases and controls trucking moves.
For most of the 2000–2010 timeframe, 70 percent of the inbound and outbound trucking moves associated with international transport in the United States have been controlled and purchased by ocean carriers. However, in the past two years, carrier-controlled haulage has plummeted to approximately 35 percent of the market, ceding ground to “merchant haulage” as shippers and their logistics providers take over control.
This shift brings with it an opportunity.
Traditionally, intermodal haulage has been purchased on a round-trip basis. The assumption has always been that the trucker must pick up and drop off an empty container from the terminal/ramp at the start or finish of every laden move. Pricing has been set accordingly, factoring in the cost of an empty leg and resulting in a “street-turn incidence” of barely 5 percent for intermodal trucking, compared with perhaps 95 percent for major truckload operators. As fresh entities step up their haulage share, they have an opportunity to shake up the whole market.
Competent buyers and sellers could benefit significantly from a splintering of the round-trip intermodal status quo and the formation in its place of a dynamic haulage market based on one-way pricing, and being able to capitalize on boxes controlled by truckers “out on the street.” Containers could be turned efficiently between import and export moves without incurring the deadhead leg back to the terminal, bringing individual cost savings of 15 percent to 20 percent.
Systems to support a new trucking model exist today, successfully proven in overseas markets such as Europe. North America now has the opportunity to follow suit and make that new order a reality.