Opinion

Taking a Toll

taking a toll

There are a lot of aspects and meanings to the term, taking a toll, but the last two years must have definitely taken a toll on just about everyone in the trucking industry.

It wasn’t as if working in the trucking industry wasn’t stressful enough already, with all of the time pressures on freight, driven by the just in time delivery philosophy which has kept our trucks full and our warehouses carrying minimum stock.

That sort of pressure becomes multiplied as it cascades down through the supply chain. A major supermarket says it wants so many tonnes of baked beans to arrive at a distribution centre every day. It’s easy, done with a few strokes of the keyboard. No pressure there.

However, the knock on effect back along the supply chain introduces extra issues at every stage. Bad weather at the farmers paddock might mean a shortfall in supply. The buyer then has to source more from elsewhere, and ensure the right quality.

When the right number of beans arrive at the processing plant, the number of things which could go wrong starts to escalate. Machinery breaks down, there is a can shortage, the printer can’t print the labels, or the suppliers can’t get to the plant on time. Quality control have got to sign off at every stage.

Once the beans are in the can, there needs to be enough cardboard boxes, pallets and cling wrap to get the product to the point where a truck can come and get a load of these beans from the factory. This is not the first point at which transport has been involved. Every input into the cannery had to be delivered there by a truck. 

If we are lucky the one load of beans can be picked up at the cannery and delivered directly into the supermarket’s system, but is most likely to be loaded on and off a truck several times before it arrives at the supermarket DC. 

Where, of course, it goes through several different stages getting loaded and unloaded, stored and checked several times before the final journey from the back of the supermarket to the canned vegetables aisle in your local store.

That’s just the normal supply chain, but to make it more realistic, simply add in a pandemic, massive flooding, a few bush fires and steeply rising fuel prices and the stress levels continue to mount all of the way through the chain. 

The fact of the matter is the road transport industry has managed to evolve to the point it is at now, despite all of these issues. We have fully functioning and extremely efficient national supply chain which makes all of the economy work and help to build prosperity.

However, it does come at a cost, and that cost is in the stress levels experienced by all of those involved in that chain, who have to go the extra mile to ensure that what goes wrong, as it invariably does, does not effect the final outcome. That there are some beans on the shelf when the customer comes into the store.

This is a stressful industry to work in, but it does have its rewards. Our aim now must be to make sure all of that stress is not taking a toll on the overall health, both mental and physical, of those involved.

taking a toll

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