CSCMP EDGE session highlights benefits of transportation partnerships amid COVID-19 pandemic

Given the challenges and complexities that the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has brought about in freight transportation and supply chain sectors, it goes without saying that things are different these days, to be sure. One thing that is clear—and has been highlighted by the myriad logistical challenges over the course of the pandemic—is the need for increased partnership among industry stakeholders.

That was made clear in a session at this week’s Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP) EDGE 2020 virtual conference this week, entitled “Transportation Partner of Choice.” The session, which was moderated by Logistics Management, featured representatives from: a carrier, Heather Dohrn Vice President, Sales & Marketing, Dohrn Transfer Company; a 3PL, Mark Redini, SVP of LTL Pricing & Solutions, Echo Global Logistics; and a shipper, Susan Vidovic Director of Traffic & Transportation, Sherwin Williams.

The session, which was replete with various takeaways and findings, took a wide-ranging approach to how these three segments collaborate in order to work together and focus on fostering strategic relationships geared towards long-term success.

The topic of supply chain resiliency, as it relates to partnerships, especially in the age of COVID-19, was a key theme of the session.

“I think what this has shown us is that both the domestic and international supply chains are quite resilient,” explained Redini. “In mid-March, it was ground zero for everyone, and the world stopped being what we were all brought up in, and immediate changes started happening that would have taken us quarters, if not years, to talk through and plan through.”

As an example, he pointed to things like how international PPE (personal protective equipment) goods being put on aircraft whose seats were removed, domestic drivers making deliveries and not getting delivery receipts signed, a decades-long practice.

“You saw a lot of things happening quickly, because we were forced to do it,” he said.     

From a shipper’s perspective, Vidovic said the challenges being faced this year completely exemplify the need of having strong partners and also serve as great testaments to being very resilient in their respective operations.

“We were fortunate during the COVID-19 lockdown, in that we saw a spike in our DIY (do it yourself) business,” she said. “And typically whenever you are dealing with a spike in your business, that is a challenge all of its own. Now, compound that with the challenges that the pandemic has caused. We had carriers that had facilities shutting down on a regular basis, because there was a positive case, and those facilities had to be shuttered and cleaned, freight had to be re-routed, and new solutions kind of had to be created on the fly. Nobody expected any of this. The carriers, shippers, and our own sites were confronted with sudden staffing changes, and rightfully so. There were no solid protection plans, and employees were hesitant to come in to work so we had to manage through that, and there were also sporadic site closures. Production and shipping had to be shifted to alternative locations, which created additional spikes for wherever [freight] was routed to, as they were already at full throttle and now taking over another plant or distribution center’s responsibilities.”  

What’s more Vidovic noted that carriers needed to avoid picking up freight in locations with shelter-in-place orders that were closed, in order to keep their systems and docks clear of undeliverable freight.

“During this time we relied even more on our carriers’ EDI feeds during this time,” she said. “That tracking information became critical. We looked at statuses that we never looked at before. If something was out for delivery, we thought that one was OK, and were looking for things stuck in a carriers’ system somewhere. We used this data to work with our LTL carriers to rescue shipments and expedite them based on where we had some demand issues and supplies were low…and also worked with a number of our carriers to arrange Saturday delivery. That is usually a day that the LTL sector does not work, but we needed a lot of Saturday deliveries through this. This EDI information and connectivity really became something we needed to manage and became a critical component for us, to manage where our focus needed to be. I think we will continue to use a lot of these processes that were developed, in the pandemic, long-term, as normal standard operating procedures.”

Dohrn, the session’s carrier representative, said that partnerships and resiliency has become critical over the course of the pandemic.

“Carriers and customers had gotten used to making predictions based on historical data,” she said. “We position our equipment based on where the freight is going to move, what we know, and customer projections. Everything was disrupted so where one customer was predicting a spike, based on historical data, it may have had to shut down at another location. Carriers don’t run with a lot of extra space on those trucks; they make money when trucks are full, so getting the capacity in the right place became a [constant] challenge for where we needed to ship to and allocate our equipment. We got really good at working with customers and listening to them shift their business patterns and even the product they are shipping out and going to new locations. Communication became key in this, as well as understanding where our customers were shifting to and being able to react to them both externally and internally with our own team. Our operations team had to be ready to go and to communicate daily to understand what needed to change for the next day.”  

When asked if some of the practices, or methods, that have been implemented over the course of the pandemic are here to stay, Redini said things have, in many ways, happened on the fly and could serve as a template for the future.

These things include electronically-delivered receipts, no touch signatures, working from home, and drivers picking up their trailer and having all of the bills in the cab and not having to go inside.

“Many things have really been fast-tracked, due to the situation we are all in,” he added.

Vidovic pointed to internal company partnerships, in the form of communications, noting how over the early days of the pandemic Sherwin Williams had some key raw materials that could have possibly been in danger, with supply patterns disrupted, due to how imports were arriving.

“We had cross-functional teams that were at the table, and transportation was included on those calls to talk about how do we react and what do we do when a material gets to the port and the quickest way to get it to where it is most needed,” she said. “A lot of these cross-functional teams do continue today and will continue, because I think the company sees the value in them.”

And she also observed how her company is exploring more of a control tower approach, in which EDI, or carrier information, is shared cross-functionally with the Sherwin Williams product planning team, for inventory levels, something it was doing prior to the pandemic but has since “hit home” may have sped up that process while also highlighting the importance of having something like this on a system-wide basis. This is coupled with her company’s need to actively communicate with its carriers and giving them more supply chain visibility earlier on through APIs and other processes, carriers have time to prepare for and react to spikes and changes in demand.

Dohrn agreed with Vidovic, explaining that she has never seen transparency in communications, in this environment, more so than at the present time.

“I think we have all let our guards down and realize we have to work together,” she said. “There have been so many [partner] calls where we all ask each other ‘how are you doing, how are you getting through it, and how can we help?’ We are laying the things out there that are affecting us and finding solutions together to get better. Things like virtual meetings have helped in this way, and we don’t need to spend three days of travel to have one good meeting…to come up with solutions to make all of us work better.” 

As for the “silver linings” of transportation partnerships during this unprecedented period, Echo's Redini cited the collaborative trust among shippers, carriers, and 3PLs, to communicate, which is key, as bandwidth is tight for everyone and there are not many other options. He also pointed to the myriad electronic efficiencies such as now commonplace Zoom meetings and other electronic efficiencies that have forcefully come out of this period in time. 

“I am really hoping that those two things are going to be a longstanding change,” he said.