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It's a daily challenge to provide timely, consistent and reliable transport. Marcel Bos, logistics operator at Royal Ingredients Group, is well know with the challenge. He is responsible for all European transport flows.
On time delivery
Royal Ingredients Group distributes raw ingredients like starches, proteins and fibers around the world. The global supplier uses all types of transport for that. ''On average we have four bulk transports per week. Although months with 30 bulk transports are also common. Recently we had a month were we organized about 40 bulk transports. In bulk it fluctuates a lot, because there is a higher need for on-time delivery.''
On time delivery is of the essence because storage of bulk materials is expensive. The supply chain of bulk is much shorter with no intermediate storage in warehouses within the chain. Marcel: ''This changes the dynamic completely. The bulk materials you transport need to go straight into the silo of a factory. You can't store 25 tons of product just anywhere so you have to coordinate the transport very well. It requires a lot of communication and planning.''
Organizing transport
After the planning is carefully put together it can be turned upside down in no-time. One of the causes being a late cancellation by a carrier. ''It's very stressful when this happens. I have to drop everything and inform the customer about the situation. I need to see if I can quickly fix it, but in silo transport this is difficult. The domino effect of a late cancellation is almost unstoppable. When a factory doesn't get their products on time they have to switch gears. They can't just stop production for a few days.''
In order to organize the transport planning, Royal Ingredients Group works with regular carriers but also with Bulkio's platform. ''Last year we started collaborating with Bulkio. We offered a few lanes on their platform. I'm very satisfied about it. The price is fair, the communication is good and the portal is very easy to work with. We will continue offering transports via Bulkio.''