Commentary

It seems as if a fundamental change is occurring in the ocean shipping industry, and it all started when shippers grew nervous about last year’s negotiations between the International Longshore and Warehouse Union negotiations and Pacific Maritime Association.

The need for innovation in the rail industry is even greater today than it was when RailRoader technology emerged, and the environment perhaps less hospitable than it was then.

For the last four years, Bradley S. Jacobs has been one of the more interesting people operating in the global freight supply chain. Like the portfolio of companies he’s building, the XPO Logistics CEO is rapidly broadening that description to fit the global stage.

There’s one potential solution to the congestion the ports of Los Angeles-Long Beach and New York-New Jersey face that rarely gets discussed amid talk of chassis pools, truck appointments and extended gate hours. It would relieve pressure on terminal gates, on chassis and on drivers. The solution, some believe, is on-dock rail.

The role of cold storage operators continues to morph into that of a 3PL. Strangely enough, some customers aren’t aware of the expanding suite of services their cold storage providers offer, even though it’s evolving customer demands that prompted this very transformation.

As the industry catches its breath after the struggles on the West Coast, we are less than a year away from a potential new risk of long lines and more confusion across the U.S.

When Presidents Xi Jinping and Barack Obama signed a new climate agreement in September, they took a critical step in bilateral cooperation to combat global climate change. The two of us were recently invited to China to share experiences—in the United States and Holland, respectively—in cleaning up air pollution at ports and reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the shipping industry, while maintaining growth.

Carriers are always at liberty to verify any and all aspects of the shipping description provided by the shipper, to the extent that they affect the rate to be charged and in all other regards. The most common type of correction that carriers make is the shipment weight.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s comprehensive new Automated Commercial Environment is a historic step toward modernizing inefficient customs procedures. But it also puts a greater burden on shippers and their customers to keep their data orderly and up to date.

The Port of New York and New Jersey and its new port commerce director, former Port of Los Angeles executive Molly Campbell, face a challenge: The port must solve its current congestion issues before the next wave of big ships hits New York-New Jersey, probably next year.

How does a corporate culture motivate its employees to look forward to reporting to work each day because they love their jobs and the companies they work for? That concern is even more pressing because the transportation industry is facing a labor shortage.

Inventories are likely to grow at an elevated pace through 2015 and into 2016, matching elevated sales. The inventory-to-sales ratio is too high, but much of the elevation has been compositional. It is a simple matter of retail segments that require a higher inventory ratio have out-grown sectors without.

A multitude of panelists at the FTR Annual Conference once again tried to peek over the horizon to evaluate the future of freight. For me, the biggest take-away from the event is the growing likelihood of yet another freight disruption, courtesy of the U.S. government.

With much of our surface transportation infrastructure decaying and becoming functionally obsolete, we can’t wait 40 years for Congress to confront the threat posed to our economy by inadequate railways, tunnels, bridges and roads, including those connecting to seaports.

Dealing with a container ship incident has gone from a puzzling and troubling situation, to one that can be fairly described as an absolute catastrophe as they continue to grow in size.

Proofreading a contract is a critical part of contractual relationships. You can’t expect the judicial system to overlook your errors or to correct them.

As the summer draws to the close, no resolutions are in sight for the issues plaguing the container shipping industry: overcapacity and low productivity at West Coast.

Tankers and dry bulk ships reached their maximum size years ago and haven’t grown much since. To repeat a question posed countless times already: Are container ships, which have never stopped growing, finally approaching the upward limits of size?

A provision in the U.S. Senate-approved highway bill would index Customs user fees to inflation and divert the increased fees to fund programs in the bill. With severe shortages of Customs and Border Protection staffing at ports around the country, diverting funds to pay for unrelated projects is a misguided and harmful idea.

Despite the deadline extension for full implementation of Customs' Automated Commerce Environment, shippers should not let up on their implementation efforts, and should strive to meet the new ACE timeline.

It's National Truck Driver Appreciation Week, and shippers need to pitch in. Those that don't become more "driver-centric" in their outlook will face rising costs, and potential penalties under new regulations.

Concession to shippers from major carriers FedEx and UPS have dulled the impact of dimensional weight pricing initiatives announced last year.

Transportation remains a fairly specialized field, with aspects that are unique to it and requiring knowledgeable managers to deal with providers on which the organization must rely. And, as in many areas of commerce, there are specialized terms that must be learned and properly understood by those responsible for an organization’s forays into fulfillment of its needs in that field.

Executed properly, inventory optimization reduces the incidence of out-of-stock products, minimizes carrying costs, increases fulfillment speeds and preserves gross profit margins.

A California policy directive will impact everyone that handles or receives domestic and international freight including warehouses, distribution facilities, airports, ports, trucks, railroads, manufacturers, agriculture, retailers and final mile delivery.

Typically, once a U.S. longshore negotiation is settled, the affected ports revert to a state of normalcy despite whatever disruption occurred during the talks. U.S. West Coast negotiations over the past 20 years have never been without disruption but were always followed by near-normal operations that lasted in some cases for years. The six years leading up to the June 30, 2014, expiration of the recent agreement between waterfront employers and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union saw only sporadic disruption. But there is a difference between then and now: The current agreement reached on Feb. 20 failed to resolve all issues and one in particular — chassis maintenance — stands out as holding the potential for sparking further disruption and uncertainty for shippers.

There will be a peak season, a little later than normal in the trans-Pacific, perhaps, and carriers could indeed reap the benefits of higher pricing.

As Americans prepare to celebrate workers and their contributions this Labor Day, now is the perfect time to highlight the importance of improving our highways for the sake of our nation’s prosperity.

Comparing trucking related deaths to domestic airline related deaths is like comparing apples to oranges.

The container shipping industry is nearing that tipping point where several carriers are going to get out because they have no real choice, or those that can will sell or merge. The financial communities aren’t anxious to get involved further, and the government entities involved are seeking what they hope to be viable alternatives.

How Beijing’s double dose of news in recent weeks — reportedly ordering a merger of state-owned Cosco and China Shipping that would create the world’s fourth-largest container shipping operator, followed by a stock market-rattling devaluation of the Chinese currency — plays out not only could dictate the course of trade and how it moves for the foreseeable future. It also might be the springboard to much-needed and long-awaited container shipping consolidation that could bring stability to oceanborne transportation providers sorely lacking it.

A motor carrier has filed a lawsuit against a shipper after it was not paid for its services. The shipper did pay the middleman broker, but the broker never forwarded payment to the carrier, and has since disappeared. What is the best road for the shipper to take? Go to court? Make a second payment? Negotiate a settlement? Read on.

The turbulence sweeping global stock markets during the past few weeks is a belated recognition of what people involved in supply chains, including container shipping, have known for a while: Apart from a few bright spots such as U.S. imports, growth globally is slowing, in large part because of the slowdown in China, and with it has come growing overcapacity and heavier rate pressure in global container markets.

If you're thinking about starting a freight brokerage business or evaluating whether it's worth increasing investment in your existing company, there are three main reasons why it makes sense.

Legal though it may be to exercise set-off without even giving a motor carrier a chance to respond to your claim, it is arrogant and just plain rude. And it can get you into trouble.

The trucking industry has been clamoring about impending doom from industry regulations and the persistent shortage of qualified drivers since the end of the economic recession in 2010. Inability to add capacity and skyrocketing operating expenses are the two most often cited outcomes resulting from these industry changes. Although the long-term impact of these developments is yet to be determined, however, carriers’ second-quarter earnings show the gloomy scenarios aren’t affecting the bottom lines of the largest carriers.

On the putting green, the golfer who putts last has the advantage of watching his predecessor "show him the line." There is valuable information to be gleaned if his attention is focused on the details. For instance, he can determine many uncontrollable factors like the speed, slope and characteristics of the green that influence the ball. He must have knowledge of these details in order to determine the ball’s path and the power of his stroke once he is over the ball.

UPS's acquisition of Coyote Logistics is just the latest in a rash of acquisitions by asset- and non-asset-based service providers looking to offer end-to-end supply chain solutions, on the North American and international stage and in an increasingly complex market that requires the precision only technology can provide.

The soon-to-be-released electronic logging mandate is often depicted as a time bomb that will reduce truck capacity, driving smaller carriers and independents off the roads. There will be some reduction in available capacity once the mandate takes effect, sources tell JOC.com. But in the long haul, expanded use of e-logs and onboard computers, combined with other technologies, will help carriers, large and small, and shippers unlock truck capacity.

I wrote on the topic of additive manufacturing, better known as “3D Printing,” two years ago as industry analysts were heralding its envisioned impact on manufacturing as nothing short of the next industrial revolution. So what happened to manufacturers’ predictions that they’d be making their own widgets on site, and the dramatic sea change that this would have on international supply chains?