Relationships don’t always take top priority in turbulent industries like logistics. Kesco has seen the market swing in every conceivable direction – sometimes in favor of carriers and other times in favor of shippers – but we have always protected the players on both sides regardless.
That’s loyalty. And everyone benefits when loyalty flows in both directions.
The past two years have changed the landscape from a seller’s market to a buyer’s market. It has also stranded both small shippers and small non-vessel operating common carriers (NVOCCs).
In many ways, both were left behind in the wreckage of COVID. This happened when larger carriers signed contracts with major shippers like Walmart and Home Depot, who could guarantee business and provide an incentive for the larger carriers to give over their capacity.
The smaller shippers were left scrambling for carrier capacity wherever they could find it. And as always, Kesco stepped in to protect our clients. Small shippers know we have secured capacity within multiple modes and are often the best option to get them space on ships, trucks, and other modes of transport.
It wasn’t always this way, though. For many years pre-COVID, shippers were in command of the market and carriers had to compete fiercely with each other for business. But we protected the carriers in those days by buying up much of their capacity and helping them match shipper clients with the best options to transport their freight.
Today, some carriers figure they don’t need to work with an NVOCC like us. But at some point, the market will turn, and shippers and brokers might come to the same conclusion. That is a classic case of short-term thinking that misses the value of relationships.
Most C-Suite executives understand the value of maintaining such relationships. It’s the same reason many businesses prefer to work with community banks instead of large banks. The community banks will be there for them but not if their loyal customers don’t stay on board.
At Kesco, we are especially grateful to our most loyal customers – the ones who value the relationship regardless of which way the market is swinging at a given moment.
Loyalty is hard to find in business, so no one gets higher priority than those who reciprocate our commitment to it.
