With around 31.7 million small businesses in the US, that means a lot of shipping. Of course, many of those businesses are sole proprietorships or businesses with only a couple of employees. For businesses in that situation, most shipping means small loads.
For light manufacturing and similar businesses, though, the total volume of shipping in a year is substantial. Yet, many shipments go out through lighter-than-truckload deliveries. While convenient and theoretically faster, it’s not always the most financially beneficial approach.
This is where freight consolidation can prove a boon for your business. Not familiar with it? Keep reading for a quick overview of freight consolidation and its benefits.
What is Freight Consolidation?
Let’s say that you make some kind of popular widget or a whole line of widgets. You sell them to businesses across the country, but with a high concentration of sales of urban centers. You can ship boxes or crates or pallets of widgets individually to every customer.
With freight consolidation, though, you condense shipments as much as possible based on location. For example, rather than sending 40 individual shipments from your warehouse to Chicago businesses, you send all of the Chicago orders in one truck. Then, the individual packages can go out through local delivery services.
Using a consolidated freight company this way provides several key advantages.
1. Cost Savings
Bundling all of those individual shipments into one truckload lets you take advantage of bulk rates on shipping. So you, or your customers, save money by avoiding retail shipping rates.
Let’s say you used some LTL shipping. Sending a half-full truck costs you exactly the same per-mile rate as a full truck. So, with consolidated freight, you lower the per-unit cost of shipping.
2. Safer
The more individual packages you send, the more likely it becomes that one or more of those packages goes missing in transit. With a freight consolidator, you send one load. The odds of that one load going missing is dramatically lower than the odds of one package going missing.
3. More Control
Sending via consolidated freight also provides you with a little more control over the shipping process. When in doubt, you can call the company and get a real-time update.
4. Better Time Management
Freight consolidation typically provides faster delivery times than the alternatives. That means you can build in a little breathing room for deliveries.
Curious about freight consolidation? You can head over here for more information.
Freight Consolidation and You
Many smaller businesses continue using their old shipping methods even when their total shipping volume makes it more expensive to ship individual packages. Freight consolidation provides a solution to that problem.
It cuts down on your overall and per-unit shipping costs. It’s generally safer than sending out dozens or hundreds of individual packages through the mail. It gives you more control and better time management.
If your shipping costs have gotten out of hand, it may be time to consider freight consolidation.
Looking for more business itps? Check out the posts in our Business Resources section.