Your company has decided it wants to set up a global logistics partnership, you've found what you think will be the perfect carrier and - guess what? - the shipping line doesn't think your company is a good match for its business.
There are, indeed, some vessel operators that are quite picky, as well as some that will welcome any cargo you want to send their way.
"We're not the size of carrier where we want business from anyone who comes along. We're not in business just to fill slots,"said James Galligan, vice president of marketing and pricing administration at Mitsui O.S.K. Lines'North American headquarters in Concord, California. "If we get a new bid from a customer that we're not doing business with, chances are that there is a reason: they don't fit our business model."
Similarly, Nippon Yusen Kaisha Line looks "to do business with people who think in terms of a long-term, quality-based partnership,"said Peter Keller, chief operating officer at NYK's North American headquarters in Secaucus, New Jersey.
But while MOL's fleet capacity is relatively small, NYK's is huge and thus much hungrier. "There is no bad freight,"Keller said.
Most of the major carriers offer a complete range of logistics services, a trend driven by the market and by changes in U.S. shipping regulations.
"Twenty or 30 years ago, traffic management was routing and paper management. There's so much required today to properly manage inventory. The amount of sophistication required today is phenomenal,"Keller said.
Japanese vessel operators "got our first lessons"in global logistics from dealing with home-country shippers, Galligan said, "and they were very good at it. They marketed their products well and became very demanding on the service side."
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