Moving air freight swiftly and carefully The express logistics business differs in some ways from that of the regular air freight industry. Speed is of the essence, while huge volumes must be moved O
liver Evans, chief cargo officer at Swiss International Air Lines and head of the carrier’s Swiss
WorldCargo air freight division, notes that there are two types of customer using the carrier’s express product, X-presso, for different reasons. “Some prefer to use express
where supply is limited and demand is high – sort of like using first class mail, not because your shipment has to get there the next day but just so that it has priority. Demand from these customers is variable according to the fluctuations of the market so it’s not evenly spread. “On the other hand you have what I call the
three months), there has been a fall in demand for express ser- vices when used for priority rather than speed. He went on to observe that
the express products offered by the airlines do have a place alongside the world’s large inte- grators. “This is proven by the fact that the integrators are amongst our major customers. “They buy services from us
Evans: “our focus ... adds value for our customers”
because they have a huge cus- tomer base and the nature of their offering means that they have to have rigid processes and networks.” Evans went on: “The
‘genuine’ express customers with a need for speed, and demand from them is evenly spread across the whole network.” Evans maintains that there is growing
demand for “genuine” express. This continued to grow even in recent years of falling demand for cargo in general. However, with 2011 hav- ing seen some stagnation (especially in the last
strength of the forwarder/airline partnership is that the forwarder can offer any combination of carriers and the airline can offer the pas- senger bellyhold capacity on all its routes. This is useful for the end-user and also for the integrators.” He also believes that the integrator model for
express shipments and the forwarder/airline model are not mutually exclusive and that both will continue to thrive. An important part of Swiss WorldCargo’s
Qantas meets the needs of varied customers
A spokesman from Australian flag-carrier Qantas Airways notes: “For us, the biggest express market is the Trans-Tasman trade lane on which we added a B767-300 freighter aircraft earlier this year, increasing capacity by around 40 percent.” This service is now operating six nights a week, and departs late in the evening in order to
meet the needs of the airline’s express customers. Qantas offers three separate express products, each tailored to a specific market and having
different strengths, the spokesman went on. These are Fast Freight, Courier and Q-GO, which guarantees uplift for time- critical shipments. Far from being in compe-
tition, the big integrators such as DHL, FedEx, UPS and TNT as well as logistics giants like Toll are key customers who, when necessary, oper- ate their own aircraft, the Qantas spokesman said. “Util- ising our services allows them to supplement their own capacity and expand their network,” he explained.
strategy is offering a number of specialist ser- vices to cater for different markets, he pointed out.
The complexity of having parallel processes
for each segment requires that superior manage- ment is applied on each channel, Evans observed, while it is also a challenge for sup-
pliers such as handlers and truckers. “But our focus on these segments adds value for our cus- tomers,” he emphasised. “Speed is one dimension of the value we add,
but reliability for all products is key. Express will continue to grow – but not to the exclusion of other products.”
➤
3 October 2011
Page 13
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20