Logistical problems are the bane of any freight moving operation, but they especially affect those that are required to send some goods via sea freight services. However, such problems may be eased with the combination of different services as part of a more complete transportation system. By use of such intermodal distribution, many problems related to the timeliness and difficulty may be eliminated.
While they cannot generally work alone, air freight services can expedite shipping in many cases. An aircraft is usually faster than an ocean going vessel, and it can therefore carry goods more quickly than its marine counterpart. This is especially important in cases where an item truly needs to arrive on a very tight schedule. Medical freight and many types of postal mail, for instance, will need to rely on the speed of shipping by air. wholesale trailer parts
However, sea freight services shine when it comes to bulk shipping. An airplane simply can’t carry the high volume of traffic that a ship can. Modern bulk carries have incredibly vast capacities that were once completely unheard of. However, the shipping container has really revolutionized sea freight in the present day.
In fact, the modern shipping container is a marvel that is largely unrivaled in its method of moving goods that are easily packaged into massive metal boxes. These intermodal containers, as their name suggests, can then take advantage of several types of land transportation. They may be placed onto railroad flat cars or moved by tractor-trailer assemblies.
On the other hand, the combination of both sea and air freight fulfills a niche that other methods can’t. For instance, the speed of aircraft allow for various samples of new merchandise to be flown between new nations. These samples can precede the actual goods, which could be then loaded in bulk on vessels and sailed to their new destination once the preorder is approved. This sort of useful combination allows both air’s speed and water’s bulk loading capacity to be used to their fullest extent.
If a portion of an order needs to arrive faster than the rest of the goods, this portion may also be flown. The remainder of the stocks, which may be too heavy or bulky to fly, can then continue to be shipped in the conventional fashion. For instance, small machine parts that were immediately needed to continue manufacturing in an area could be flown to their destination. Common shipping containers can then move the machines to supplement or replace these, which are assumed to be too large or heavy to transport by plane in a cost effective manner.
No one method of transportation will ever fully supplant all others. By using each to its fullest advantage, a shipper can attain the lowest cost for the amount of freight they’re shipping. Therefore, strategic use of both sea and air freight will allow for the best deal to be worked out. Moreover, one can save a great deal of time by matching up the freight being shipped and the method used to move it.
