The transport of heavy loads is a fundamental part of many industries, such as manufacturing, construction and certainly intentional trade. However, moving bulky and heavy goods can pose a number of significant logistical challenges, both in terms of efficiency and cost. Handling, packaging, special shipping requirements and other factors can add significant additional costs if not handled properly. Despite this, there are some effective strategies to reduce these costs and thus optimize the transport of heavy loads.
In this article, we’ll explore and share three essential tips to help you reduce the costs associated with hauling heavy loads. These recommendations focus on certain key aspects, such as the optimization of packaging and cargo consolidation, the implementation of multimodal transport strategies and the negotiation of rates and contracts with logistics service providers.
Optimizes packaging and cargo consolidation.
Adequate packaging or packaging is essential to be able to protect the cargo during transport. There are a number of risks and dangers for the merchandise as it can end up badly damaged or broken, this can eventually have a significant negative impact on the final costs. To reduce packaging costs, it is important to optimize it through the following suggestions.
- Resorting to light but resistant materials such as bubble wrap and corrugated cardboard, these offer good production without adding unnecessary weight.
- Design packaging efficiently, maximizing the use of space and avoiding any empty space. This will give more security to your cargo that will not have a place to move and get damaged.
- Consider cargo consolidation to get the most out of the capacity of the container or truck in question. When combining different merchandise in a single shipment, the number of trips is automatically reduced and therefore transportation costs are minimized.
Implement multimodal transportation strategies.
This form of transport is an effective strategy to reduce costs when transporting heavy loads. It implies combining different modes of transport such as road, rail, sea or air, to take advantage of each one. In this way the costs are reduced and your merchandise obtains more than one advantage in its transport, here we suggest some strategies.
- If the distance your cargo must travel is quite long, sea transport is the most cost-effective option. This transport is usually cheaper than air transport.
- For the terrestrial sections, the best transport would be the train. Since it can handle long, straight journeys, the ideal is to take advantage of the capacity of this medium to transport large volumes of cargo at relatively high speeds.
- Use trucking for the last mile or to access remote destinations where other modes of transportation are not feasible.
Negotiates rates and contracts with logistics service providers.
The negotiation of rates and contracts with service providers is one of the key strategies to reduce costs in the transport of heavy loads. It’s important to build strong relationships with your providers and look for opportunities to negotiate competitive rates. Some recommendations to carry out said negotiations are the following.
- Do in-depth research to be able to identify different providers and compare them with each other. From the services they offer to the rates they handle. If you know the market you can identify when it is appropriate to trade.
- Use data and statistics of your cargo volumes to be able to support your position and also improve conditions.
- Consider the possibility of establishing long-term agreements with the suppliers that you have chosen and that are reliable, this may mean a reduction in costs since it is possible to obtain a preferential rate.
- Do not hesitate to negotiate the terms of the contract, payment terms and how to carry them out, insurance and responsibilities and all the fine print that this entails. Transparency is the most important thing, by knowing all the details you can have better control of what happens with your load. You can also minimize risks and conflicts.
Additionally, you can include in your strategies the possibility of using third-party services to facilitate operations and reduce costs. Services of cargo agents and logistics operators such as Newtral Argentina, who have experience in the efficient management of the transport of heavy loads. We can help optimize.
Heavy cargo handling can be expensive, but by adopting these effective strategies, you can see a big difference in your logistics costs. The optimization of packaging and cargo consolidation, multimodal transport strategies and rate and contract negotiations are our recommendations. But remember that there are many different strategies that can also work. Each company is unique and each merchandise is different, so they may require different approaches. It is vital that you evaluate the needs of your particular case, that you analyze the current processes and look for places of opportunity to implement any type of strategy in your supply chain.