Brief Timeline History: Sea freight Forwarding

The world was surrounded with a huge amount of bodies of water. Before the invention of technologies, people was not able to go through neighboring countries without being stopped by the unstoppable bodies of water that could swallow them up but for some reasons people was still able to advance on their natives ways and resulted to innovations that changes how living works.

Innovations that conquered the world little by little extending to the birth of business. As for business concerns, people had come grown to developing new technologies each day. They’ve developed such inventiveness that even transporting good through the sea is made possible. Created wonderful watercraft ready to carry large sum of loads. And given way to make freight forwarding a reliable way of delivering goods.

Sea transport, people’s way of carrying goods from one place to another by means of a vessel. Upon the idea of the sea transport, ship transport has been the familiar name, this transport could either be by a boat, ship, sailboat or barge to any distance may it be through oceans, lakes, canals, and along rivers. In simplest terms, it is any material that could be moved through the sea.

Shipping containers have been around for quite some time but when you go 60 years back, such machinery has not been possible and this luxury of having goods transported through the sea was just a dream of the visionary.

I think it’s about time that we delve into the goodness and greatness of the before and rise of shipping containers. On what was the means before such has been invented and how it finally came to be.

Before the rise of Shipping Containers

It was of known facts that people has been able to transport not just themselves but food and other goods as well just ask the Egyptians, Greeks, Roman and more recently the British. Though they may be able to ship goods themselves, it was clearly not under any standards resulting to slow and ineffective process.

Break bulk cargo has been the popular choice at that time where they store the goods in a warehouse and load them by hand onto the ship once it is ready for transport. And the ships could only carry 200,000 pieces of cargo.

It was until early 1900’s that the issue of lack of standardization has been greatly seen which slowed the flow of business for quite some time. This method has been so slow that transferring cargo from ships to train became a cry for help. For centuries, this method was the only way to transport goods. Imagine how tiring and slow it must have been.

The name Malcolm Mclean

Malcolm Mclean born on 14th November, 1913, an American businessman. On 1935, he co-founded Mclean Trucking Co. together with his sister Clara Mclean and his brother Jim Mclean. The trucking services included delivery of empty tobacco barrels.

In 1950, a successful Mclean with 1750 trucks and 37 transport terminal has experienced dilemmas in his business. Then came the fining of overloading cargoes. From then on, it hit him, an idea that spark into a vision that could change transporting goods for ages.

He idealized of constructing a standard sized trailer and then be loaded to boats exceeding the loading capacity of the trucks he once used. From such brilliant idea, he abandoned most of his trucks and focused on transporting goods through the sea.

From then on his trucks has been the way of transporting goods in short, intrastate deliveries. Hence being able to diminish levying fees which were introduced in the time.

Birth of Intermodalism

On the 26th of April 1956, Ideal X has sailed the seas from New Jersey to Houston. Due to having features of lockable containers and offers 25% discount on cargo transport that greatly affect how goods should be transported.

It was since 1960 when intermodal shipping container has been the favorable choice of sea freight. It was solely base in these two (2) reasons:

One was due to the vision of Mclean that helped eliminate dockside break bulk unloading bottlenecks.

Another was the introduction of standardization of container sizes giving way to mass production of container-handling equipment and a large sum of investment on ships.

From then more innovation has been made possible. The biggest container ship that ever sailed the seas was constructed for Maersk (Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller) which can hold up to 18,270 TEUs (9,135 boxes).

Advantages of Shipping Container

Containers have been so much help it could give you these advantages than inland transport: standardization, flexibility, costs, velocity, warehousing, security, and safety.

From such innovation, business expansion was made possible and reaching offshore deliveries is now easy breezy. Being able to widen your reach could mean to more potential customer could see the business leading to more opportunities and success.

Brief timeline history: Sea freight forwarding was brought to you by Metro Combined, the leading land, sea, and air freight forwarder here in the Philippines.

Read More

Traffic Congestion: A Threat to Economic Growth

Everyone who has been on the streets of Manila will surely understand the struggles one must need to go through in order to get to a destination. Looking around your immediate location will make you understand that this issue is not just a result of poor urban planning or lack of discipline; many other matters also make every day traveling feel like a torture. This is not just a problem for commuters and motorists, but also a hazard in the economic growth of the Philippines.

The condition of the public roadways in the Philippines has been a constant threat to businesses in providing quality services. This is not just limited to freight forwarding businesses, delivery services, and couriers. To start off, setting deadlines with the clients can end up in conflict if the traffic congestion isn’t put into consideration. Every minute that is lost while stuck in traffic can also mean added production cost in form of gasoline. The extended hours on the road also means extended hours exposed to possible accidents on the road. These are the reason why it is necessary to plan ahead and consider the threats that may occur while on the road to avoid additional expenses. 

So how is the traffic congestion hurting us as a nation? To put it simply, the traffic congestion is hindering even the littlest of the citizens in fulfilling their occupational obligations. It is both physical and mentally straining which may also hurt their individual affect work performance. Collectively, that could hurt us as an economy. This could mean a decline in the business performance and may discourage foreign investors. Without these Investors, there won’t be enough jobs to provide to the continuously growing population of the country. 

If you will try to identify the main cause of the traffic in the Philippines, you will realize that I will take enormous efforts to resolve it. The government hasn’t been lying down either in trying to address the issue of traffic congestion in the country. They are constantly searching for solutions that will make it bearable for everyone to travel and to enforce order. These are: 

Number coding scheme

Image Source: abs-cbn

The Unified vehicular Volume Reduction Program (UVVRP) or Number Coding is a traffic decongestion scheme which bans private and public utility vehicles from plying the roads on weekday peak-hours. For more information about this, visit MMDA – Things you need to know about the number coding scheme

Truck ban ordinance on main roads

Cargo trucks mostly used in a trucking services are motorized vehicles intended to carry cargos having a gross capacity weight of more than 4, 500 kilos. Refer to MMDA – Truck ban ordinance for further information.

Bus segregation scheme

Image Source: manila.coconut.co

Bus segregation scheme tends to limit the location the buses can stop to load and unload passengers. Visit Rappler - INFOGRAPHIC: How to find the right bus on EDSA for a visualize simplification.

Road widening projects

Road widening projects have taken effect to accommodate more vehicles on the road. This was under Republic act no. 917, for a broad explanation of this law just visit Official Gazette – Republic Act No. 917.

The traffic congestion in the country is a problem that is hurting us as a nation and needs to get addressed to keep us moving forward. It is not just an issue that freight forwarders or delivery services should learn to adapt to. With these numerous schemes being implemented and only minimal observable improvement, maybe it's time we start addressing the issue from a different point of view. Market localization and decentralization, anyone?

Read More

Brief Timeline History: Warehousing

Today’s youth have been lacking time to look back on our rich history. Why won’t we begin with a timeline of the history of warehousing. Warehouse services are quite an essential when starting in an industry where you supply stocks and goods. Did you know that warehousing started in Ostia, Rome. Warehouses are mostly commercial buildings that acts as storage for goods. Warehouses are valued most by importers or exporters, manufacturers, etc. who needs a large area for storing huge amount of product inventory. By history, they mostly have built-in areas for the unloading and loading of goods and one of the busiest areas of the business. 

Early Rome

Ruined Warehouses in Ostia, Rome.
Image source: Wikipedia

Some of the documents found stated that the warehousing industry started in a large neighborhood called Ostia. Way way back in the fifth century, major shipping ports has a nearby warehouse for easy storage and forwarding large amount of goods. On those times, European explorers have created a route designated for such occasions made it possible for easier storage and movements of goods. 

Though at that time warehousing are still primitive and yet to be improved, this shows effective storage for it could provide secured storage and distribution of inventory.

The Industrial Revolution

Watts Warehouse in Manchester
Image Source: Wikipedia

This was on the 18th and 19th centuries, were people took on progression as an essential tool in development. They’ve started making machineries that could make forwarding a lot faster than what was present on that day and made warehouses, a business necessity. Through this, supply chain, a sequence of process responsible for the production and distribution of a commodity, has been a good source of income and made way for the business to start booming. 

Industrial revolution was more noted in the north western England of Manchester where they took warehouse designing more lavishly decorated. All the five types of developed warehouse was mostly seen on Manchester. 

At those times, most products needs time maturation in order to be sellable and this made warehouses more popular than they already were.

Twentieth Century Progression

Twentieth Railway
Image source: Dominion

The twentieth century gave way for the construction of rail warehouses wherein travelling through neighboring countries or state could be easily done. This popularized in North America’s extensive railway channels. Through such innovations, doing business with countries nearby has been possible and made faster and easy. 

With this transportation, new warehouses were built on ideal locations known to have good commerce and become a center for business.

Mid Twentieth Century

This has been the era of modern warehouses wherein they have been dependable on heavy machineries such as cranes and forklift used in moving large amount of goods in a short period of time and made way to mass production of goods. From this huge demand for warehouses, new warehouses were being built from time to time. To this day, they have been an essential to the ever growing supply chain of goods and products. 

Upon seeing the progress of warehouse services shows signs of growth in the business industry. From the start of warehouse establishment at ancient Rome to the modernized supply chain of the twentieth century have clearly evolve the industry’s look of business world. 

Upon the opening of new opportunities for warehouse services, choosing for the right warehouse services could be a tough decision. But through research and article reading, one can make the right choices for the business growth.

This warehousing history was brought to you by Metro Combined.

Read More