PREPARE THE PUBLIC RELATIONS ENGINE

Speaking to a friend in the global toy sales business he tells me he has added US$15 million to his annual budget to cater for increased shipping costs. I happened to wander into a bicycle shop and the two ‘old hands’ there told me that they just couldn’t get bikes to sell. “Haven’t had any for ages, impossible to get hold of – now we are just living off the repair and maintenance side of the business.”Even worse, I went into a restaurant, well known to me, and they advised: “no Sauvignon, supply chain problems!”

The general public are beginning to feel the pain of messed up supply chains, port congestion, unreliable schedule and delivery times, and all at prices that are on the march upwards. There is a tangible feeling of frustration among cargo owners trying to feed their respective businesses and individuals awaiting or wanting to send goods.

It’s rather like that feeling you get when your wading through an automated telephone system hoping to eventually speak to a real person – will it ever happen? There is little reason to believe that there will be any relief in the short-term – demand, in the context of messed up supply lines, continues to outstrip available capacity in major trade lanes, notably trans-Pacific.

Expect an even more frustrating and expensive environment going forward – for business and the general public. In turn, be prepared for supply chains and the players in them to come under much more public scrutiny. There is nothing like a combination of poorer service and rising costs to bring matters under the spotlight – politically, in professional forums and at the grass roots public level.

There are always targets in such scrutiny and without doubt it is shipping that will be the prime candidate in this respect but there will also be others. Complaints have been building for a while, the noise is getting louder – it is getting political as well, as evidenced by the Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) probe into surcharges imposed by eight liner operators.

It doesn’t help that shipping lines are making so much money out of what is a painful period for cargo owners – that just “rubs salt into the wound.” There is a part of me that thinks, well these “happy days” have been a long time coming for shipping lines, maybe they deserve it – but of course I am not paying directly for freight transport or picking up the higher tab involved.

The message is clear – until such a time as the wave of new container shipping capacity ordered begins to feed through if you are in the front line of supplying logistics services, and particularly if you are a liner operator or congested port/ terminal, then prime the public relations engine. Without doubt going forward it will be needed to mount the case for the defence!