As a business owner, it is your responsibility to offer fast shipping options to your customers. Shipping small packages is not an issue, but when shipping large items, you should be ultra cautious as you can easily find yourself spending more money than you are bringing in, leading to your business making losses.
You don’t want this to happen to your business, do you?
Before proceeding, it is wise to understand heavy freight shipping. This is a shipment carrying a load that is unusually big and wide. For example, manufacturing equipment that is wider, taller, or longer than the legal limits and/or weighs more than the legal limits.
In most cases, you need special equipment and permits to move the load.
To ensure that you ship the heavy load without eating into your profits, here are valuable tips you should put into place. These tips include:
Work With The Right Trucking Company
The shipping company you use can make or break your business, so take your time hiring the company and ensure you hire the right one.
Not every shipping service company is the same. When looking for a shipping service for your heavy load, ask as many questions as possible to have peace of mind that you are working with the right provider.
You should also ask for references, pictures, and other proof that the company has previously organized and handled heavy hauls like this.
Check out the company online to see if anyone has filed a claim against them and ensure they have the right insurance.
How the company answers your questions will tell you a lot about what kind of service you can expect from them.
When you come across several potentially good companies, compare shipping costs. But don’t forget that this isn’t just about the cost of shipping—you also need to consider the quality of service.
Only you know what is important for your business, so you should choose a company that will give you the best service.
Nudge Your Customers To Choose A Cheaper Shipping Option
Only some customers need to get their package right away. In fact, many people would save money and get an express package that costs more.
This means that they can choose to ship using a standard courier service instead of choosing to have the package delivered within a few hours.
When shipping large items, it is a good idea to give your customers a reason to choose cheap shipping methods, especially during the busiest shipping times of the year. This will save money on shipping for both of you.
A great way to go about it is to show them that they will save a few bucks on the product when they choose the cheaper option. While at it, you can also give them the self-scheduling option where they can select the time and day when they will be at home and ready to receive the package.
Adjust Your Packaging
It might be challenging to package large objects. This is particularly true if you send delicate things or items susceptible to dents or scratches.
When comparing shipping costs for bulky products, it’s important to consider your packing and see if you can do anything to reduce the size and weight of your shipment.
Can you make the cases longer, taller, or wider? If so, you can put more products in each case and still fit the same product in one container. How about wooden crates? If you make them a few inches shorter, you can make more room in the box.
A classic example of how you can adjust your packaging is using the model of a company that was shipping metal castings in cases loaded onto pallets so wide that the shipping company could only fit one row of them in a container.
The supplier couldn’t make the pallets any narrower, so the company took them to a warehouse and cut a few inches off each one before sending them out.
This made it possible for the shipper to put two rows of loaded pallets in a container instead of just one. As you can tell, this cut the cost per unit by half for each shipment.
You can do the same for your shipment. Can you alter the packaging to cut your shipping cost? Go ahead and do it.
While there is nothing wrong with adjusting your packaging, you should ensure that you leave all required packing in place since a broken box might end up costing you more money in the long run, and you don’t want this, do you?
Give Your Shipping Partner The Correct Information
This might sound weird, but it’s an important tip you should put in place. Imagine this. You have told your logistics provider that the height and width of your load are 120 inches and 110 inches, respectively.
But when the trucker comes to get it, the shipping company finds that the load is 128 inches tall and 120 inches wide.
As you can tell, the truck can’t carry the load, right?
You may also have to redo your permits, which will delay the delivery and cost you more money.
To ensure this doesn’t happen, measure your load carefully and give your shipping or trucking company photos or technical drawings of the load to ensure everything is correct.
Choose A Cheaper Container
If you are using containers to ship your products, the container size does matter a lot sometimes. For example, moving a 40-ft. container is a lot more expensive than moving a 20-ft. container.
In some cases, if you ship a load in a light 40-ft box, you would save money by sending it in a heavy 20-ft box.
Before you send your package, confirm with the shipping company whether you can use a smaller container.
Parting Shot
There you have it shippers. At first, it may seem hard to ship large items and packages while saving money, but it is possible. You only need to make a few changes to your freight shipping process and partner with the correct shipping company. It is time to ship off!
