It’s a foregone conclusion that there will be weather events that throw even the best supply chain plans a curveball.
When disruptions occur and major metro areas or shipping routes are impacted by flooding, power outages, fires, or deep freezes, what can you do to lessen the impact to your business, or increase your ability to help your customers in need?
There are a few ways to use DAT Tools to lend a hand:
- Market Conditions Index (MCI) – Checking to see what the MCI is showing for the impacted region is a great tactic. When a storm, fire, or other adverse weather event is hitting an area you regularly do business, knowing if there is a significant change in posting or searching activity will help determine how you should adjust pricing.
- RateView & Ratecast – Look for irregular movement on the RateView average for the lanes you normally run in impacted regions. While RateView and Ratecastwon’t predict weather events, it shows the impact in reported rates as they happen. Being informed of pricing shift helps you adjust quickly.
- RFP Tool – You can use the RFP tool to quickly price multiple unfamiliar lanes for relief shipments, or excess volume from secondary markets during a weather event. Being able to input a set of lanes and adjust your pricing strategy to both current and forecasted rates with speed and ease is critical to winning freight when shippers need urgency.
- LaneMakers – An incredibly helpful tool to be able to find carriers that are looking for the lanes you are trying to price and cover. If you are not familiar with the weather-affected region, and you are unsure which carriers will be there, checking who is most active gives you a leg up.
Combining these various pricing, analytics, and capacity tools will help keep you informed and equipped to deal with markets that are thrown in disarray during a weather event. Using these tools to maintain an understanding of market pricing, along with building a resilient carrier base, will set you up for success ahead of any market disruption.
When you are operating from an informed position with both your carriers and your customers, weather disruptions are opportunities to come through for your network and turn a bad situation into a win.
