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In college I learned about the Just-in-Time supply chain model in regards to Toyota and how it was far superior to the massive build up of inventory that was standard in the early days of Ford. After the crisis in Japan earlier this year I was going to make a blog post about how when a chain is so efficient to the point that there is no inventory buildup and then a natural disaster hits your operations immediately stop. I held off on making a post about it because I felt that it might have been out of the scope of this blog but with the recent tornado in Missouri in addition to someone making a similar argument in Transport Topics, I decided to briefly bring up the issue.
In Transport Topics May 23, 2011 issue there is an editorial “Rethink the ‘Just-in-Time’ Delivery System” by Julian Keeling which talks about the same idea but he noted a system I never heard of called “Just-in-Case” (JIC). JIC is basically the idea of consolidating shipments and doing them in advance to avoid the potential immediate stop in productions in case of any unexpected delays but it requires inventory to be built up which goes against the idea behind JIT system. The benefits of JIC are that it puts less strain on the supply chain because they will have more room to deal with problems as they come.
At Great Western Transportation we always recommend shipping important loads out a few days early to compensate for any unforeseen circumstances so that productions will not be held up. Please visit our Truckload Trucking and LTL Trucking pages to learn about the options available to you when deciding to ship your product. If you have any questions please do not hesitate to call us at 1-800-972-8484.
TractorHouse.com and Machinery Trader are popular websites where people can buy and sell farm or construction equipment from other people. The problem with buying any heavy machinery is that you have to move it once you buy it and often encourages people to buy locally even though there may be better deals in other locations. A solution is to use a flatbed carrier like Great Western Transportation to move your equipment or machinery from the seller’s location to the location you want.
Flatbed Trucks are popular for farm and construction equipment because they can be loaded and unloaded quickly without a dock. Great Western Transportation’s Flatbed Trucking service has all types of flatbed trailers to fit the needs of your Tractorhouse.com and Machinery Trader shipments so feel free to call us or visit our flatbed trucking page and click on the quote button.
In the May 2, 2011 issue of Transport Topics newspaper there is an interesting article “Truck Order Backlog Grows; OEMs Impose New Surcharges” by Frederick Kiel and it talks about how there is the largest backlog of orders for new trucks since 2006. This article is interesting because it further demonstrates the truth in Great Western Transportation’s blog post about “Tightening Truck Capacity” and how the demand for shipments is outstripping the supply of available trucks from Trucking Companies to do them.
Automotive manufacturers although glad to see an upsurge in orders are hesitant to ramp up productions as they are unsure if the demand will continue in the long run. The last thing they want to do is increase productions and hire new employees only to have to downsize and let them go soon after. What can be learned from the article is that the economy is improving but there will still be a truck shortage from Trucking Companies for a long time, which will require more strategic planning when deciding to move products.
Great Western Transportation knows the issues in the industry and has the experience to help you understand them and work around them so you can move your product the right way by using us as your Premier Trucking Company.
At Great Western Transportation we understand how important your machinery is and how if they are damaged in transit or late you may have to stop production. Our Heavy Haul Trucking team makes it a priority to understand your needs and do our best to accommodate them whether it is using tarps to protect from the weather, using special securing measures, or acquiring the correct permits to make sure your machinery is safe during the whole trip.
Great Western Transportation’s Heavy Haul Trucking team knows that the best way to protect your machinery is to understand what it is you are shipping by getting the weight, dimensions, and type of product so we can best fit it to the right heavy haul trucking equipment. Knowing all the details about your machinery including when you need it allows us to make sure that we can ship it safely and timely with the necessary items in place so you can rest assured that your machinery will be delivered to your expectations.
The Heavy Haul Trucking team at Great Western Transportation is always available to answer any questions you have so feel free to call us at 1-800-972-8484 or request a rate quote.
As tight as capacity has been over the last 60 days, it will grow even tighter over the next six months with the up turn in the economy and the normal seasonal surge of freight movement. Simply put, there is not enough trucks nationwide to cover the freight available.
The shortage of drivers, coupled with the surge in our economy, has further heightened the capacity issue. While some regional and national Less- Than-Truckload (LTL) carriers have been overburdened because of the loss of competitors and capacity to business failures, it is primarily truckload carriers that have been forced to turn away business due to lack of personnel and equipment.
The best means to secure trucks is with as much advance notice as possible for both Truckload and LTL shipments. Better pricing and availability can be achieved through greater lead-time. Truckload availability seems to be much better on Mondays and Tuesdays and it would be to your advantage to plan shipping of your truckloads for those days.
If we at Great Western Transportation may answer any questions or assist you in any manner, please do not hesitate in contacting us at your earliest convenience.
Great Western Transportation offers many services with one of our premier specialties being Flatbed Trucking. Flatbeds are trailers with no walls and are ideal for unloading and loading when there is no dock or when the product won’t quite fit in the confines of a dry van.
Flatbeds are very commonly used when moving construction equipment because often the location of the equipment is at constructions sites that don’t have access to docks and need the ability to load from the side with either a crane or forklift. Although construction equipment is very commonly associated with flatbed trucks, there are many other types of products that commonly move on flatbeds like pipe and steel with options to tarp the product so it is protected from the weather.
There a few different types of trailers in the category of flatbeds that offer abilities to fit different needs like easier loading and offloading and more room to fit items so that they better fit the dimensions required by law without requiring permits. Common types of flatbed trailers are the regular straight flatbed which is usually 5 feet high and the step deck which is a trailer that attached to the hitch of the truck but then dips down to about 3 feet high allowing you to fit items that are larger in height.
 
A good example to illustrate how the different flatbed trailers can suit different needs would be moving a piece of machinery that is 10 feet high. With a regular flatbed the highest you can generally go is 8’6” but if you use a stepdeck you can generally go up to 10’6” and still be within the dimensions set by the Department of Transportation.
At Great Western Transportation we have experienced professionals who know exactly what type of trailer you need based on the type of product and its dimensions. Feel free to visit our Flatbed Trucking page or give us a call if you have any questions we may assist you with.
Over-dimensional / Overweight shipments, also known as Heavy Haul shipments, pose special challenges for shippers. Often times a shipment is both over-dimensional as well as overweight in nature and therefore may require special routings in order to travel only on the highways that permit vehicle weights that can accommodate them in the Continental United States, Canada, and Mexico. The most common types of heavy haul shipments are large pieces of machinery for construction such as excavators and dump trucks.
Heavy Haul shipments frequently require special trucks and trailers that can carry the size of what you’re shipping. They may also require the purchase of special permits issued by the various governmental agencies, States, and municipalities through which your shipment will travel.
Some pictures of what heavy haul trucking looks like are below:
 
Visit Great Western Transportation page for more information and a rate quote.
Slashdot reports of a interesting article at Singularity Hub about how 10,000 shipping containers are lost at sea each year;
“Right now, as you read this, there are five or six million shipping containers on enormous cargo ships sailing across the world’s oceans. And about every hour, on average, one is falling overboard never to be seen again. It’s estimated that 10,000 of these large containers are lost at sea each year. This month the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) sent a robotic sub to investigate a shipping container that was lost in the Monterrey Bay National Marine Sanctuary in 2004. What’s happened to the sunken shipment in the past seven years? It’s become a warren for a variety of aquatic life on the ocean floor, providing a new habitat for species that might otherwise not be attracted to the area.”
From the comments at Slashdot it sounds as if cargo ships often purposely dump containers to help stabilize the boat and do so quite often. Further, according to commentators, the companies that ship their products from overseas are so large scale and ship in such large quantities that it’s to be expected to lose a few containers and don’t actively investigate. It doesn’t sound far fetched at all considering the size of these container ships and amount things get “lost” in transit anyways.
If we at Great Western Transportation were ever to lose your container on one of our Heavy Haul Trucking trailers we would never hear the end of it!
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