Struggling with Costs? Here are Six Ways to Reduce Your Shipping Costs

Shipping is an important and costly function for many companies. At the same time, it’s often not a priority until something goes wrong such as you can’t find a truck for a shipment or your costs increase unexpectedly.

Fortunately, there are several quick ways to address these types of problems. Here are six ideas to get you started.

1. Establish Benchmarks 

Of course, a company needs to know its costs (a.k.a. your baseline shipping expense) to know if they’re going up or down. KPIs like calculating your average cost per pound or cost per mile are easy to measure and simple places to start.

2. Embrace Technology

Time is money, so don’t waste it on unnecessary manual processes. You can use various low-cost, easy-to-implement technologies to accomplish things like finding lower rates and more reliable carriers. Technology also makes it easier to measure costs against your benchmarks.

3. Negotiate Better Rates

When was the last time you looked for new or better rates? Using technology to benchmark what current rates are so you can negotiate with your current carriers, or to find new carrier partners at a better rate, is a way to find lower-cost options and ensure your current rates are market-appropriate. Worst case, technology proves your current providers offer good rates and your costs are appropriate for your business.

4. Explore Different Modes

LTL (less-than-load) is a necessary option for many companies that ship just a few pallets at a time, but it can cost much more than truckload on a per-pound basis. Companies in this situation should look for opportunities with carriers who also offer load consolidation—or can create multi-stop loads to fill up full trailer loads.

5. Reconsider Delivery Speeds

Opportunities for load consolidation, as we just mentioned, are more plentiful when companies put more consideration into actual required delivery dates. Many shipments are sent based on assumptions about when the delivery is needed, not by knowing when it’s needed. A lot of money can be saved by delaying shipping a day or two because delivery speed is a big factor in delivery costs.

6. Lastly, Plan Better To Avoid Extra Fees

Every shipment comes with the potential for extra costs that are not obvious when it is scheduled with the carrier. A big one is detention occurring if the driver waits too long for pick up or delivery. Another is if the driver is required to provide additional handling. 

Like having good benchmarks, technology, and the best way to route each shipment, ensuring expectations are clearly known before pickup is important to avoid unplanned costs later.

Bonus #7: Loadsmart Helps Reduce Costs through Technology

ShipperGuide, a multimodal freight management platform, that provides shippers with end-to-end visibility can help optimize your business, resulting in a reduction in costs & time spent on shipping operations. In order for shippers to optimize their strategy and make informed budget decisions, ShipperGuide gathers valuable insights and data on your executed shipments and allows shippers to gain a competitive edge to achieve greater efficiency in your logistics operations. 

In addition to ShipperGuide, Loadsmart’s warehousing solution, Opendock is a critical tool to increasing your supply chain visibility. Opendock is dock scheduling software that improves appointment booking, and operations at any facility receiving inbound shipments or sending outbound shipments. With Opendock, shippers can reduce freight costs by decreasing detention fees with booked appointments, and reduce the number of inbound calls and emails for your warehouse staff due to carriers booking online. 

To learn more about ShipperGuide, visit ShipperGuide.com or to learn more about Opendock, visit opendock.com.