Round Table - What should you do when your carrier simply doesn’t operate anymore?

Peter Rentschler - CEO - Metafora - Boulder, CO Bill Priestley - Producer - FreightWaves NOW

• “How should shippers think about diversifying their Supply Chain in 2023?”

  - Ultimately diversifying is a risk management strategy. When the pandemic hit it showed massive flaws in Supply Chains, across the world we had over-rotated towards Global Supply Chains without redundancy for near shoring- I see two major components to diversifying Supply Chain - 1. around geographically where you’re producing / sourcing from (e.g., are you a North American business with all mfg in Asia?) and 2. diversifying your transportation and logistics partners to derisk (e.g., the number of and types of carriers / brokerages / 3PLs you work with)- Data-driven decision making is critical here. Designing a regional, national and / or global supply chain depending on where you source from, where your customers are and where you handle logistics from

• “We’ve seen the headlines around challenges in the labor market - Union strikes, layoffs, staffing issues - how does that impact the above?”

  - It makes it that much more important to diversify the partners you work with. While we’ve had material warnings ahead of potential strikes / labor issues (UPS, Yellow, Rail, Longshoremen) - it can take months to source new T&L vendors and on-board them- Have to talk about bankruptcies too - Surge Transport a $150M+ brokerage filed for chapter 11 this week, trucking companies of all sizes filing for Bankruptcy to restructure. Given all the PE money and low performance of portfolio companies I expect to see more

• “What are 3 things shippers can do to prepare?”

  - Evaluate where your suppliers are located and if there are options to vertically integrate within those countries (e.g., manufacturing in South America with materials from South America) to reduce dependencies on global transportation- Review your transportation providers and consider adding new ones. Healthy mix of direct with carriers and 3PLs can lead to the best pricing and coverage in case of unexpected issues.- Identify someone on your Transportation or Logistics team to monitor the news and performance around your major transportation providers. Having someone responsible is the best way to ensure coverage.

• “What about our T&L viewers

  - what can they do?”- Use this as a sales tactic - “when was the last time you evaluated your T&L providers? I don’t need or even want all of your business, but I’m certain there are lanes we’re experts in that can help de-risk your business in case of unexpected disruption.” Many great relationships happen after months of persistent follow-ups lead to a phone call from the prospect, “Hey our vendor just fell off this load, can you get a truck to ABC location for pickup today?”

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