The ever-changing landscape of the transportation industry continues to force shippers and 3PLs alike to, once again, evaluate their processes, efficiencies, and business objectives for the coming year. With little to no relief in sight to help manage the growing supply chain challenges, it’s critical now more than ever to look to technology solutions to help streamline efficiencies and manage costs to combat the most basic of industry challenges… labor shortages and rising costs.
When you think of freight visibility, what does that mean to you? Is it just about knowing where your freight is or when it will arrive at its final destination? Is it knowing that it was put on the truck and is on its way or is it knowing in real-time where that freight is throughout its entire journey from order placement through delivery? Or is it all of those things and more? The term freight visibility is changing as the industry adapts to the new reality – one that is driven by ecommerce and the Amazon Effect. But no matter what it means to your company, visibility is necessary for properly managing freight, labor, costs and customer service.
With the advent of the Internet of Things and the promise of artificial intelligence and machine learning right around the corner, digitization is impacting just about everything these days – including the logistics industry. Although, the industry is typically slower to adopt new technologies because of the complexity of the supply chain and the headache (and cost) that updating legacy programs and solutions would cause. However, as challenges increase and consumers become more acclimated to all things digital, the logistics industry, including the LTL sector, is realizing the need to get on board with digitization.
There is no denying it. Overhauling or updating legacy technology platforms is a big task. However, the opportunities it presents outweigh the challenges to performing the updates. Plus, as the transportation and logistics industry become more digitized, companies that don’t upgrade to fully automated technology, including volume-pricing APIs, are going to be left behind.
’Tis the season for general rate increases (GRIs)! LTL carriers across the board are releasing an increase on their base shipping rates. To date, Old Dominion Freight Line announced a 4.9% GRI, Saia announced a 5.9% rate increase, ArcBest implemented a 5.95% GRI for LTL services, Yellow installed a 5.9% increase and Forward Air implemented a 6% GRI.
Fueled by the pandemic, the logistics industry has been involved in a multi-year trend to adopt technology that replaces paper forms with digital information.
The annual transportation RFP process has been like the weather – everybody complains about it, but nobody can do anything about it. However, that's no longer true. Shippers and carriers have technology-driven alternatives that don't require making educated guesses about transportation rates a year in advance.
