As you are all too aware, holiday periods always pose the biggest challenges in the logistics industry calendar. Spring this year is no exception, with a long Easter weekend with two national bank holidays, and this year there’s only a short gap between Easter and the first May bank holiday.
The two four day consecutive weeks at Easter have a tendency to cause major issues for the ports and shipping lines as they endeavour to deliver ten working days of deliveries in an eight day window. This year has been no different. The significantly high volumes currently arriving into the UK are adding further strain on supply.
The current position is that most carriers are offering earliest delivery schedules for next week for Wednesday afternoon, with some as far out as Friday morning. PFE however does not rely on shipping line haulage, but a mixture of our own traction and rail allocation with onward local delivery by our own hauliers. Therefore we are pleased to say that we will still be delivering to most areas of the UK for Monday afternoon/Tuesday morning next week.
As always, rather than dealing with seasonality challenges as they occur, we develop effective, long-term strategies that focus on inbound logistics practices. While the very nature of seasonality means the peak shipping season will always come with its fair share of headaches, we work closely with our supply chain partners to maintain high performance during the most demanding times of the year. Because of our close working relationships with our partners, we do not expect any surprises during this Spring holiday period.