What Supply Chain Needs is Long Term Thinking

We all know there is a conflict - a push / pull relationship if you will - between delivering current results and looking out to the long term.  The story goes that the short term are the "table stakes" meaning you have to deliver those in order to earn the right to think long term.  This makes sense.  After all, you would not want your company to go out of business in the short term just to ensure some long term plan is in place.

However, I do not believe that is our problem.  Actually, the issue is the other way around.  Very rarely do I see real true long term thinking.  How could you identify if your organization is spending too much time on the here and now versus setting up your strategy for the long term?  Here are some indicators to look for:

1. Do you have any projects which span multiple years?  This is really a key indicator of strategic versus tactical thinking.  Tactical thinkers believe that somehow, magically, the whole world changes at the beginning of every year.  This, of course, is not true and therefore a strategic thinker is one who delivers todays results while working on a multi year strategy.  Very few real strategic plans and projects can be done in one year. 
2. Does your bonus plan involve a strategic component?  If you are paying bonuses to your employees, especially senior manager and above, only on a yearly basis (they start and stop in a year) than you must likely are too entrenched in tactics and are not thinking strategy.  A way to ensure some strategic thinking is occurring is to provide bonuses based on some kind of 3 year (or maybe even 5 year) result.  Why?  Imagine you want to create an incentive to your team to redesign your supply chain network for the future.  This is at least a 2-3 year project to get it installed then, most likely, another year or two to find out if it actually works.  If you provide bonuses to hit timelines and finish tasks then you are not paying for performance rather you are paying for activity.  Pay for activity and you will definitely get more activity - just not sure that is what you want. 
3. Every performance appraisal should have multi year projects on it.  Remko van Hoek (Twitter handle @remkovanhoek - Global Procurement Director for PwC and Visiting Professor at Cranfield School of Management) stated in an exchange that he has always had multi year projects on his goals for the last 3 roles he has been in.  This is the sign of a very strategic organization.  He also suggested said in a response to my tweet:  "Begin and end with the customer, think supply chain holistically, not silo, individual or quarterly gain".  Good advice and if you follow that you are pretty well assured that you will be thinking long term. 

Finally, I would like to address the issue of longevity in roles.  One of the big strategic problems is the speed with which people move around.  How can you ask someone to be strategic when they will be measured on just what they do this year and, if they do well, they will get promoted and move on.  For key roles (such as VP of Supply Chain) you have to inform them they will be in the role for 5 years and they will be measured on a 5 year performance cycle.  The first year or two are set up, then the last year 2 -3 years are execution.  Then and only then will you know if they did well and if they thought of and implemented a great strategy.  

If they come into a role, do some quick fix (slash costs) then get promoted I can assure you it will be a disaster.  

In the end, how you set up your culture and your rewards system will determine if you have a great strategy or just a bunch of disparate tactics. 

Warren Buffett once said (paraphrase):  Our business is not based on the orbit of the earth around the sun - meaning they do not set arbitrary targets and deadlines based on when January 1 comes along.  You should avoid doing that as well. 

Continue the conversation on Twitter using hashtag:  #Thinklongterm

XPO Logistics and 3PD - An End Run Around Coyote Logistics?

Back in November of 2012 I reported on XPO Logistics and their "insane" growth pattern.  The company, and its CEO Bradley Jacobs, seem to have no lack of money or desire to expand and acquire. In that post I said you should watch this company and time will tell. 

Today supported my claim I made back in November in a big way.  They have purchased one of the premier home delivery or "final mile" companies in the Country - 3PD.  This puts XPO in an entirely different league than most brokerage houses because it puts them squarely in the middle of a growing trend:  Final Mile Logistics. 

I have reported on FML extensively as well and now it appears there is a marriage made in heaven.  It will be interesting to see if the two can be brought together.  One thing this acquisition does prove is XPO logistics is not just about "dialing for diesels" but rather they want to get into the heavy lifting of logistics.  I think it also shows incredible foresight as the mega trend story for sure is the massive growth of this final mile segment.  Will a broker model win out over an asset based model?  Do they serve the same customer?  Can XPO overcome the inherent high costs of home delivery?  

All of this is yet to be seen and I can say however it appears that if anyone can do this right it will be XPO Logistics. 

Now the question is where does this leave the fast growing upstart, Coyote Logistics and the old guard of brokerage C.H. Robinson?  Coyote has grown rapidly and shown a great skill set in putting new and innovative technologies to use.  However, this move by XPO Logistics appears to be an "end around" around, over, and through Coyote's model.  Does this leave Coyote to be just "another broker" while XPO logistics is now branching out into more innovative services?  The initial reaction would be yes however I do think time will tell.

As far as C.H.Robinson is concerned, I think they will continue to be the "broker to the stars" - meaning a big brokerage house for huge industrial shippers.  I am not sure they will compete in this space with XPO Logistics or even want to.  

Finally, I must say the reaction of the market is ludicrous.  If I were a gambling man I would short the hell out of this stock.  Right now we are talking about a company (XPO) that is losing money and losing a lot of it.  Even with this purchase and even if 3PD is wildly profitable it does not change the fact that the base business is losing money.  Further, there is a real question if there are any core synergies between a truck brokerage company and 3PD beyond the fact that they do not own assets.  I just cannot in my wildest dreams comprehend how this purchase could or should add 15% to the value of the company.  

But, again, as I am fond of saying... we shall see. 

Read into The Earnings Statements - Freight is Soft - Beyond the Hype

I found something very intriguing for shippers in the JB Hunt earnings release and it had to do with the ICS (Integrated Capacity Solutions) earnings.  Essentially, the group is a broker so they act a lot like an actual shipper.  They have loads and they go to the open market to procure those loads.  Here is what the results say:

• Revenue - $132M up 20%
• Operating Income - $4.2M up 113%

That is telling as the OI is increasing at a dramatic pace over the revenue.  Why is this?  In their words:

"Operating income increased 113% over the same period 2012 primarily due to increased revenue and improvement in gross profit margin. Gross profit margin increased to 11.8% in the current quarter vs. 10.6% last year. A softer carrier environment contributed to the increase. " [Bold is mine]

So, those who are closest to the market are telling you there is a soft carrier environment out there.  A good line to have when a carrier comes in to tell you how tight the market is and why they need a rate increase.  With Revenue in a quarter of about $130M that makes this entity a $520M shipper - many shippers have a lot more freight than that and should be able to get the same results.

I am not picking on JB Hunt here, they are an incredible company, I merely use these results and statements to show what is really going on  - beyond the hype. 

Carbon Offsets Should Be Part of a Sustainability Program

When I talk sustainability, either individually or in groups, the same consistent theme comes from middle management:  We will do it if it also makes economic sense (i.e., immediate payback) but we will not do it if it "costs" us.  Very few companies and people today will execute sustainability projects purely because it is the "right" thing to do.

The problem with this however is that it is tough, if not impossible, for the free economic market to put a true cost on environmental issues.  The "cost" is down the road and the "benefit" of destroying the environment is now and that leads to distorted ideas and distorted business decisions.  I heard a person say a the Alternative Clean Transportation (ACT) conference this week that our minds would adjust if we thought:

"Rather than thinking we inherited the earth from our parents, we should think like we are borrowing it from our children."

When you think about borrowing the earth you think about what state it will be when you leave it regardless of whether there is a cost now.  And that leads you to build out a very detailed sustainability practice regardless of the immediate payback.  And this leads us to this great post about carbon offsets.

Yes, as Marc Gunther mentions, carbon offsets are so 2007.  Essentially the idea was you would either voluntarily or involuntarily (through mandatory carbon offset markets) buy into offset projects to help mitigate the long term damage any action you take may have on the long term of the environment.  This led to the EU carbon markets and now the California Carbon Exchange.  The problem right now is the price of a ton of carbon is far too low.

Some point to the fraud which naturally was part of these markets as proof they did not work - kind of like saying because people get murdered in Chicago it is proof the laws against murder are not good for society.  This is a ridiculous argument.  The fact there is fraud says more about the general business community than it does about the markets.

In the end, to build a true sustainability program you have to invest beyond the hear and now from an immediate business case, you have to acknowledge the markets do not properly price issues like carbon emissions, global warming, rise of sea levels etc. etc., and you have to be willing to do something about it.  I am not saying you have to bankrupt your company in the defense of the environment but I am saying you have to realize that the market does not price 400ppm of carbon in the atmosphere properly. The carbon which brought us to 400ppm was catastrophic (see where some say 350ppm was the tipping point) and the marginal cost should have been astronomical. But, alas, it was not; it was essentially free.  That is a market which is not working properly.

Will Monday Morning, July 1, be Y2K All Over Again?

The fear mongering that has gone on about the hours of service (HOS) changes taking effect on Monday remind me a lot of the Y2K fear.  For those who were around then remember the TV networks showing every major city in the world as Y2K hit?  The idea was to see if the lights all turned out, the computers shut down and some sort of Mad Max - Beyond The Thunderdome scenario would start?

Well, here we are again.  The transportation industry believes the world is coming to an end when the hours of service are installed on Monday.  And, as in Y2K and in CSA, it will be a big thud as it relates to the scare tactics.  I have heard everything from 10% capacity reductions to almost 0 so even the "experts" appear to be making this up.

And, of course, all estimates assume perfect productivity today, perfect execution today and that there is no way for the transportation companies to improve productivity - through efficiency - to offset any reduction due to HOS.  They essentially assume perfection and tell the shipper to be ready to pay up.

As one example of how ridiculous this argument is, this blog claims it will mean "15 minutes of lost productivity per driver per week" as if this is a catastrophe.  Is our industry really working at such efficiency levels that we cannot possibly overcome a 15 minute loss in productivity?

I have said this before and I will continue to say it - our industry seems to have lost the desire and ability to drive productivity.  Part of this is because we blame all these external issues for our problems. Stop looking at the externalities and start looking for ways to improve.  Once we change our mindset to actually look at what we can do we may be surprised that we can actually make dramatic, 10x level changes in productivity.  

For those who still think this is a train wreck and continue to predict the ruin of civilization as we know it due to hours of service, I offer you a scene from Mad Max:

What Can Logisticians Learn from Emergency Room Doctors - The idea of "Thin Slicing"

I have read a lot about "control towers" and "big data" lately as I am sure many of you have.  This has led me to ask myself, "What will I do with all that data"?  More so, I also ask myself, "does more data really result in better decisions or does it get in the way  - create so much "noise" that I cannot even see what is really going on"?  In previous times we would ask ourselves if we could see the forest through the trees?

Back in 2011 I had actually wrote about the idea of control towers and said I was a big fan - as you can see my ideas and thoughts are "maturing".

As I thought about that question I was also, luckily, listening to the audiobook called Blink by Malcolm Gladwell ( of Tipping Point fame) and he talked about how too much information can, indeed, get in the way of good decisions.  In an example of the Cook County (Chicago) emergency room he talked about the idea of "thin slicing".  Thin slicing is the idea of taking just a few critical points of data and using those to make swift and accurate decisions.  Let's follow his example of the emergency room.

Before thin slicing, if a person came to the ER with chest pains (a very common issue in emergency rooms around the country) the doctors, nurses and technicians would run a battery of tests - height, weight, blood pressure, etc. etc.  Tons of tests and the idea was to get as much data as possible - Big data".  However, the success rate of diagnosing whether those chest pains were in fact a heart attack or were they just something else less important was not very good.

So they tried something different.  What they did is reduce the amount of data the doctor saw.  They realized most of the tests and the data coming from those tests were just noise and were not pertinent to the decision of whether the chest pain was a heart attack. In Gladwell's own words:

One of the stories I tell in "Blink" is about the Emergency Room doctors at Cook County Hospital in Chicago. That's the big public hospital in Chicago, and a few years ago they changed the way they diagnosed heart attacks. They instructed their doctors to gather less information on their patients: they encouraged them to zero in on just a few critical pieces of information about patients suffering from chest pain--like blood pressure and the ECG--while ignoring everything else, like the patient's age and weight and medical history. And what happened? Cook County is now one of the best places in the United States at diagnosing chest pain.

By reducing the amount of data provided, the doctors actually were able to make better decisions.

What does this have to do with logistics?  I am consistently inundated with requests and ideas on Big data, collecting tons of data, control towers to see "everything", full visibility etc. etc.  and I ask myself, do I really need all that data and if I had it what would I do with it?  Then I come back to this example above and see the real secret in all this is not big data but pertinent and actionable data.  In fact, I am starting to think big data may be a front for intellectual laziness.  Because a logistician can't figure out what they really need they just say "let's capture everything".  And, of course, software providers are quick to jump on as Big Data translates into Big Sales and Big profits (first few hits on google when I queried Big Data and logistics were from SAS and Oracle).

My lesson is this:  Take the time up front, a lot of time, to determine what you really need, what will really give you the signal you need to determine what is going on, and what you need to actually do something.  Take the rest of the data and throw it away - not only is it noise but because it is so noisy and full of static it will actually slow down your decision making rather than speed it up.  Big data may actually not only be a waste but it could actually be harmful.  So much data will drive you to be parallelized versus taking action.  The article I cited above about control towers brags about collecting "mountains of data". - I don't need mountains, I just need the vital few.

It turns out, we logisticians have a lot to learn from emergency room doctors.

More on Crude By Rail

As I said on my last post I would come back to this topic as it truly has become the most interesting transportation topic to come up in a while.  Not only are there articles being written about this but tonight on Mad Money Cramer talked about it.  He thought the Union Pacific was to become the big benefactor of this operation.  Really interesting and starts putting meat on the bone for those who are shipping retail products.  If Cramer is right, UP resources will turn to CBR and they most likely will leave your freight at the side of the track.

I am not saying this will happen. What I am saying is anyone using these rail lines should keep very close to this development and ensure you have a contingency plan if your freight is no longer seen to be competitive to the CBR freight.

Act Expo 2013

I will be using twitter a lot more than the blogging site as I will be attending the ACT EXPO 2013 this week. Please follow me at: my logisticsexpert twitter feed.  twitter/logisticsexpert.  I will follow up with at least a nightly recap.

Awakening the Sleeping Giant - Crude by Rail

I am short on time as I am heading to the Alternative Fuels Conference (ACT 2013).  I wanted to give the light of day to this article on the growth of Crude by Rail (which I mentioned as a trend back here).  This has huge impact on the movement of crude and will likely impact the movement of retail goods.  Think about things such as priority of movement on track, where capital spending will go and the locomotive resources.

More to follow.  Be ready.. whatever industry you are in you will be affected by this.

Why Benchmarking In Its Current State for Transportation is Dangerous

I hear a lot about benchmarking in my travels and it makes me think about this idea, why it is used and what it really is.  What also fascinates me about the subject is the real forward looking business leaders never really care what their competition is doing.  The reason is they are so far ahead of the competition it just does not matter.  Could you imagine Steve Jobs worrying, wondering or working on what Sony was doing?  Would the iPod ever have been invented if Steve Jobs' goal was to be incrementally better than the Walkman?  Would the iPhone have been invented if his goal was to be incrementally better than the Motorola Flip Phone?

This is the danger of benchmarking.   When you benchmark you put a lot of attention on the current state and you tend to feel good if you are incrementally better.  But, that is not where true innovation comes from!  Real innovation and real "disruption" comes from thinking critically about the future, being imaginative and creative and thinking about things no one else has thought of.  That is where energy is best spent.

What I find about benchmarking is it is often an internal exercise to justify what someone is doing to higher management.  It is very rarely about anything else - have to prove to higher management that you are doing better than the other guy.  It is also incredibly inaccurate because there are so many external factors that effect the price of transportation beside just the zip to zip and the rate.  Here are some questions:

1. Do you compare with exact size and operating characteristics?  Sometimes I will hear of giant shippers presenting they are "better than market" based on their benchmarking through external agencies.  My question always has to do with expectations.  Of course, you are better, you are huge!  The question is, from a "should cost" analysis, are you as good as you should be?
2. What about your operating characteristics were taken into account when the benchmark was done?
3. Are you comparing prices of how freight is actually moved  or how it was bid?  I have seen this before where companies will send their bid data into the agencies that do benchmarking but that may or may not be how the freight is actually moved.  And, of course, how the freight is moved is what is most important.
4. And, my final question is this:  Why is everyone better than average?  How could that be?

There are so many people out there who are being told they are doing better than market in the benchmarking I am wondering just who is doing worse?  Someone must be... who are they?  I find benchmarking and Las Vegas have a lot in common -  everyone says they win when they go to Vegas yet somehow the casinos keep getting more cash than they know what to do with.  Someone must be losing.

My opinion is there is far too much energy spent on this topic and it actual restricts innovation instead of driving it.  Think about where you want to spend your time and think about whether this really adds much value or not around the edges.

I would advocate you should spend a lot of time on innovation and by definition if you are innovating you cannot benchmark... your competitors will be too far behind you to even matter.

Applying My One Big Thing in 3PL Management to The "Capacity Crisis"

Yesterday I blogged about the "One Big thing" for managing your 3PLs.  This was essentially ensuring the incentives and goals of the 3PL perfectly align with you as the shipper.  I talked about how no one can really serve two masters and each will always act in their own best interest.  It is for this reason those interests have to be perfectly aligned.

Today I want to explain this through an example which highlights the risks of letting your 3PL buy the transportation and then charge a "mark up" over the rate to you (with no transparency this is a disaster with some transparency it is just not good).  We can see this in the "Capacity Crisis" issue. 

The 3Pl / brokerage company has an incentive to report to you the capacity crisis is bad and getting worse.  In fact, they can even blame their own poor performance in tender discipline, carrier management and routing guide compliance to this nebulous issue called the "coming capacity crisis".  They can point to a few reports and tell you if you only would pay more you would be a preferred customer of the underlying transportation companies. 

They convince you and you pony up.  All the while this is going on they are negotiating with the carriers and their story is something completely different.  Why?  Because your goals are not aligned!  The 3PL in this situation has a goal to expand the spread between what they pay for the transportation and what they resell it to you for.  While it appears they are giving "advice" to you what they are actually doing is working to improve this spread.  What are you to do about this as a shipper. A few things:

1. As I have said before, I highly recommend you do not get into this situation in the first place; keep procurement in house and let the 3PL execute.
2. If you have already outsourced procurement, work hard to insource it!
3. If those two do not work then become extremely smart in what is happening in the transportation market.  The 3PL cannot be your trusted advisor because they have another set of incentives.  You need to build that expertise in house.  For example, when they talk about "capacity shortfall" ask them:
• In what lanes is this shortfall prevalent?  Do I ship in those lanes
• What about mode conversion?
• What  are you doing to reduce my fuel costs and make my fuel costs more aligned to what you are actually paying for fuel?
• What is your carrier base?  Have you looked at regional carriers?
• What are you doing to leverage your spend to keep my rates down?  (if you are hiring this expertise you expect they will not just perform at market but below market - remember, market price is what you get without even trying)

In the end you can see this type of relationship actually causes more work rather than saves work.  You will not only pay for the outsourcing but you will also have to employ a "shadow" organization just to ensure you are getting a competitive deal. 

Again, unless you do not believe in the basic tenants of capitalism you have to see where this relationship is fraught with misalignment and conflict.  In this case, the 3PL will use a market event (or non event) not to better your business but to better theirs at the expense of yours.

When Selecting a 3PL Ensure Your Goals and Incentives are Aligned

As I travel and speak to industry leaders I am always asked about strategies for shippers to manage their 3PL relationships.  There are many theories from transactional "beat them down" relationships (which I do not advocate) to the "Vested Outsourcing" espoused by Kate Vitasek (Which I believe is a great framework for how to manage any third party relationship).  And, of course, there is everything in between. 

While a great strategy to manage these relationships is a subject too complex for a blog posting, and usually too complex for my short discussion, I do get asked "what is the one thing" they can do.  Well, here it is:

The One Thing: - Align Goals and Incentives

Let me start with my philosophy on human behavior and one which is built into the DNA of a capitalist society. People will always act in their own self interest.  Think about this as you develop your relationships and let me use an example totally outside of our industry -  Financial advising.  There are two broad categories of financial advisers:  Those who work for a fee for which you pay and those who get commissions, 12b-1 fees, rewards etc. from the products they are selling.  The latter looks like a good deal because you do not pay the up front fee.  But is it a good deal?

When we apply my general philosophy of people will always act in their self interest  to this case the answer becomes clear.  The financial planner who is considered "free" has an incentive to sell to you the product which will make them the most amount of money - and they will.  Two products, one of which if sold gives her and her family a free trip to Hawaii v. another which gives her just a few bucks commission are the selection.  Which do you think she will sell to you?  If you picked Hawaii, you are right.  

Now, the former advisor, the one who you pay a fee for has a fiduciary responsibility to work in your best interest. In fact, because you are their sole source of income, they have no incentive to provide anything to you that is not in your best interest.  The only way their income continues is if you are happy and that only comes if they work in your best interest.  In this case the goals and incentives are aligned.

Let's apply my philosophy (again, it is people will always act in their self interest) to the world of the 3PL and specifically to the outsource model of transportation management.  I see many models where both the operations and the procurement of transportation have been outsourced.  The key question here is whether the goals and incentives are aligned when you are in a relationship where the 3PL essentially acts as a broker for you. 

Imagine that the "broker" 3PL relationship comes across a way to lower your overall transportation costs knowing however that it will eat into their margin on the spread they make between what they are selling transportation to you for and what they are buying it for.  In this situation they have a choice to make:  Will they act in your best interest  or will they act in their own self interest?  Both my guiding principle philosophy and my experience is that the answer is clear: The 3PL, when confronted with a conflict between their self interest and the client's, will almost always choose their self interest first. This is especially true if they have shareholders (whether public or private) to report to.  Why would they do anything different.

However, if their goals and incentives are aligned - such as the my recommended solution which is the shipper should always retain the procurement process in house and NEVER outsource this part of it - then the 3PL will never be put in this conflict situation.  You pay them for a service and they execute that service.  

The critical point here is the 3PL should not make money on both sides of the transaction.  As soon as that is the case, they will be in conflict. The only way the 3PL should be able to make money is by acting in the client's best interest.  In other words, they have a sole and singular fiduciary responsibility and that is to you the shipper. 

This is "The one thing".  If you are a shipper who has outsourced your procurement to a 3PL you should think again and ask yourselves what is driving the 3PL thought process (By the way this also applies to "dedicated" fleets who make money leasing equipment to you - are they working in your best interest or in the best interest of the profitability of their leasing operation).

I am not one to quote the Bible much in public but, if you do not believe me about this then listen to what Matthew has to say:

"No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money."

In my case change the last sentence to: You cannot serve both sides of the transaction.  

The Business of Supplying The Transportation Business - Tires and Trucks

The Wall Street Journal reported on two major industry suppliers today - Navistar and Michelin.  For Navistar, the story continues to be bleak.  Due a major, almost existential mistake with how they dealt with emissions control. (went against DEF initially) they have been struggling since 2010.  In fact, they essentially pay fines for the trucks they sell because until recently, when they teamed up with Cummins, their trucks violated EPA standards.

The WSJ reports the following statistics for Navistar:

• 34% drop in truck sales
• "higher" warranty costs - an increase of $164M
• Ending the quarter with 15% market share which is down from 25% at the end of 2009 (A direct cause of this is the miss on emissions)
• Loss of $109M in the quarter v. last year a loss of $45M (Truck Business)
• Overall, Navistar lost $374M in the quarter ($4.65 per share) v. $172M ($2.50 per share) last year for this quarter. 

The basic story for Navistar is they went all in on their own emissions system while the rest of the industry went the route of using Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF).  It was a "bet the farm" move and it appears they may have lost the farm. 

The second report was on Michelin.  Michelin of course is a French company and they are highly exposed to Europe.  This is causing a problem for them and the numbers in Europe are staggering.  Think of this:

• Demand for truck tires in Europe is down 25% since 2007.  This is a key indicator for how bad the economy is on the Continent.  This decrease is due to lower miles which is due to just less product being moved. 
• Middle East and Africa - down 12% and 18% respectively.
• While South America appears to be booming, sales globally are down 5.6%
• Volvo truck sales are down 7% in April in Europe.

These two companies are not in the same situation.  Michelin is all about being in a bad market - Europe.  Navistar is a self inflicted wound which may not be a foot shot as much as a head shot.  

If the state of transportation is one considered fairly bland - not huge growth and not huge deficit - the work of supplying the transportation industry is downright tough. 

Macroeconomic Monday® - A tale of Two Economies

There are two economies developing and it is very important you do not confuse the two.  The first economy is the financial  economy.  This is Wall Street, investing, arbitrage and commodities.  When bundled together this economy is on a tear.  It is booming and if your business is just to make money with money the Fed has become your friend and your company is most likely doing very well.

The drawback to the financial economy  for my readers is just this: There is no freight.  There is no freight in the booming of Wall Street.  Nothing is produced, shipped and delivered beyond bits and bytes of data which magically turns into money in your bank account.

There is the second economy which is the physical economy.  This is the area where my readers and I have participated for most of our lives and this area is operating in a murky, up and down environment and is not nearly as "booming" as the financial economy.  While the financial economy, in a lot of cases, is at a pre-recession level, the physical economy is not.

Here is why it matters for us logisticians.  If the physical economy does not improve we will continue to mired in a low freight environment while at the same time believing the economy is booming.  This is why shippers need to keep a real eye on the actual physical economy and not let the financial economy sway their opinion.  Will capacity continue to decrease?  Yes.  However, and unfortunately, demand for goods seem to be decreasing as well.

You need look no further than the unemployment rate to know why.

 The graph to the left shows us in a stubborn range of unemployment.  As many economists have discussed this also does not reflect the underemployed, those who have stopped looking and those who are employed but are too scared to spend due to a fear of losing their job.

The simple fact is when unemployment is this high people will hold onto money and not spend it.  When they do not spend, their is nothing to move.  And, this translates into lower freight volumes.

This can be reflected in my infamous love affair with the inventory to sales ratio.

 This ratio has stayed flat for a while and recently had a small uptick.  We will be getting a new reading this Thursday but the trend line is clear:  Businesses thought sales would increase, inventory went up and the sales did not come.

Again, more indication of a lack of freight demand.  This also means that when demand picks up there will be a lag in freight demand as inventories will need to clear out.

The summary is simple:  While last week may have ended with a bang on Wall Street, it was a thud on main street - inventories up, unemployment up, construction spending did not keep pace with expectations and manufacturing actually contracted.

In a real perverse way, you know the physical economy is doing poorly when the market is up because the market is being driven by the expectations for the FED to keep rates low and keep the quantitative easing program going.  When physical economy results come in below expectations, the traders believe this will keep the Fed going, which will then boost the market.  If you see the market collapse then, perhaps, we will see a signal in the growth of the physical economy as the market collapsing will be an indicator the traders believe the Fed will be backing away.

What is down is up!

More Signs of a Financial Economy; Not a Production Economy

On June 3 the Institute for Supply Management issued their May ISM index and it came in at 49.  Unfortunately, this means the manufacturing component of our economy actually contracted in May (despite all the talk of a manufacturing renaissance).  This is the lowest since November of 2012 and the lowest level since June of 2009.

Both the price index and employment index showed decreases as well.  This is aligned with the CASS readings of a relatively soft economy resulting in balanced, or slightly in shipper favor, rate environment.

My opinion is this is one reason why you are seeing the markets swoon back and forth as the economy is teetering between growth and contraction.  Every little bit of data could tip it in one direction or another. Expect continued contraction and caution in any type of growth which will continue to keep transportation capacity and shipments in balance.  We have evidence that rates are flat at best and could be falling and clearly intermodal / rail is taking business from trucking.

 One area where this is very noticeable is in the cross border moves where trucking is losing to rail.  This, of course, releases capacity to other areas for movement.  (see chart to the left)

Bottom line:  Economy is slow, shipments are down, and capacity is balanced.

CASS Freight Index for May - Volumes and Expenditures Roughly Steady

The May Cass Freight Index is out and it is clear that rates are staying flat and volumes are a bit behind where they were last year.  Despite never missing an opportunity to say "Hours of Service (HOS) in July will cause rates to go up" the industry is starting to see the interesting phenomenon that the economy can have positive GDP rates yet freight volumes do not increase enough to put pressure on rates.

I have discussed this a lot and will not rehash it but you can read my theories on why this is occurring.  The Cass report also commented on the large increase in Crude by Rail which I had commented on here earlier. 

At the end of the day the story is remaining the same:  Yes, truck capacity is leaving the market AND yes demand has decreased due to other situations with size of product, product being shipped, lean inventories and other types of actions. 

Impact for Shippers:  My advice remains the same:  Do not succumb to the industry fear of a doomsday coming in capacity.  Take a look at your individual  situation with type of freight, volumes and lanes and make a decision on your strategy based on that.  The data is suggesting a balanced industry with rates staying flat and unfortunately a slowing economy.

Amazon Fresh - Amazon Groceries to a Door Near You

A fascinating discovery occurred the other day on my way to Chicago from Michigan.  As I was driving down I-94 I saw a delivery truck coming the other direction.  It looked a lot like the size / model of a UPS truck except it was somewhat lime green.  On the side of the delivery truck was a logo that said "Amazon Fresh".  It had the distinctive Amazon "arrow" logo and I thought to myself - OK, here it comes.

When I arrived at my location I immediately googled Amazon Fresh and was taken to their website and found it fascinating that it said " They offered limited delivery to Seattle neighborhoods" yet I had just seen an Amazon Fresh delivery truck in Southwestern Michigan! I had heard of this even as far back as 2007 and 2008 however I was shocked to see the truck in my area.

Then today Twitter and other news services lit up with the news Amazon is going to dramatically expand its grocery delivery service.  Those of us who were around in the late '90s remember webvan, Peapod and an entire host of these that ended really badly.  However, Amazon has been able to execute extremely well those things others could never figure out.  I would not count Amazon out at all and I would never discount their ability to make this work.

Along with a massive expansion of DCs, a push into same day delivery and now Amazonfresh going nationwide (or at least expanding) I would be very careful if I were a bricks and mortar retailer.  These guys are for real and it looks like they will be a force to be reckoned with in grocery delivery. 

Note:  I have written fairly extensively about the "delivery wars" including the idea of crowd sourcing for home delivery.  It is worth reading through all of this as you will see a pattern developing and a true "war" about to take place. 

Crude By Rail is The New Hot Thing

Many have always said crude by rail was just a "stop gap" until new pipelines are built out to support the new finds of oil all over North America.  However, as this article in the WSJ points out (subscription required) Kinder Morgan is canceling a $2Bl pipeline project because West Coast refiners want the crude delivered by rail.  Pipelines lock contracts for a long time where rail is far more "variable".

For a while manufacturers and retailers were the beneficiaries of low utilization in rail due to the coal drop off and the switch to natural gas.  Then, an odd thing occurred which is crude by rail started and most people thought this was a stop gap to new pipelines which would eventually depress the crude by rail market.  However, this new development, and other information I have received, says that the refiners such as Valero and Tesoro value the flexibility that crude by rail brings to them very highly.  High enough that they would not meet Kinder Morgan's requests and lead the cancellation of this pipeline.

What does this mean for the average shipper?

1. Don't expect the lack of coal argument to go far in negotiations - they have found alternatives and it looks to be a very good alternative
2. Don't expect the "glut" of North American crude to depress prices very far.   One reason why the refiners like this is they can "shut off" the flow much more quickly when prices depress too far.
3. Expect a lot of capital investment to go into this segment of rail - and since there is not an infinite pot of money this will mean less investment in other areas of rail.

The Boom Box Replaced By The iPod

The anchoring continues by many transportation executives where they publish all sorts of comments that say "if" this happens and "if" that happens then prices will go up.  As you know I have been arguing for a while that while capacity has decreased what has been missed in almost all the analysis is the miniaturization of product resulting in, of course, far less truckloads needed.  

Well, it appears there is some enlightenment... albeit a bit late.  I read a comment from an industry executive who said that the ipod replacing the boom box is causing the demand for loads to decrease at about the same clip as the capacity decrease. 

The ipod was rolled out in October 2001 - it is now May 2013 -  better late than never. 

Vacation Got the Best of Me - Maersk Looks into A Dim Future for Containers

Ok, just for my regular readers, I am back.  Took a bit of a vacation and toured around Europe for a while.  Sorry for the lack of posts and I will begin getting back to my normal cadence.  Now on to business and the first one will be the state of ocean freight.

A recent article in the Wall Street Journal cited Maersk warning of subdued demand in ocean container traffic.  And, of course, I have been warning and talking about this and about the lousy economics of this industry since I published "The Sick State of Ocean Freight" back in March. An industry which is far over capacity is now launching new Mega ships and increasing the overall fleet size - not a formula for success.. unless.....

Maersk says they are overcoming the excess capacity by increasing rates.  Huh?  This is one of the few industries which, dare I say, colludes, and everyone knows it.  In fact, it is quasi legal so when you are negotiating don't necessarily expect the laws of economics to work.  We have all learned when supply exceeds demand prices go down.  According to the Wall Street Journal:

"Excess tonnage, estimated at 10% above current demand, has kept rates under pressure and all but seven of the biggest 30 players lost money in 2012. Cumulative losses over the past four years have run to about $7 billion."

It goes on to say that Maersk has said:

"Still, Maersk posted a better-than-expected first-quarter net profit as it pushed through higher prices to customers. It expects container transport demand to remain subdued this year amid challenging conditions.

Essentially Maersk is saying the customer will pay for empty ships through higher prices.  I am sure if they were under capacity and over demand they would say you will pay higher prices to "reserve a spot" on an already oversold ship.  Apparently the story goes not matter what is happening in the market place you will pay higher prices.

If you remember my multiple discussions on "Anchoring" you will see this activity in action.  They are, through these public statements trying to anchor the buyers thoughts.  Essentially start all conversations with the premise that rates are going up in some fashion and now it is just a question of how much.

Don't fall for it.  As i have said over and over again use the laws of economics, understand your lanes and understand the economics of your lanes and then use that as the starting position.  You will have a much better outcome.