How To Prepare Your Business Goods For Sea Freight

High-volume of business goods are being shipped via sea freight worldwide every day. A solid freight shipping system in place for business goods ensures continuous supplying the demands of manufacturers producing consumer goods and reordering process. 

Business goods are used in manufacturing other goods to be sold to end users or consumers. The consumer goods demand reflects business goods demand. They include equipment parts or components and raw ingredients or materials.  

Business owners should prepare business goods for sea freight properly to ensure recipients will receive them in their best condition. Check out some sea freight preparation tips below for a smoother shipping process. 

1. Use High-Quality Bulk Container Liners  

Small and large companies worldwide use bulk container liner bags for efficient freight shipping via containerized bulk. High-quality bulk container liners are manufactured in a high-end air-conditioned environment with quality assurance standards such as AIB and BRC certification.  

Make sure to only deal with a reputable container liner bags manufacturer or rent portable storage from MMPS to secure the company complies with high-quality standards for the safety and security of your business goods.

Here are the types and benefits of using bulk container liners: 

• Front Spout Or Back Fill Container Liners: You can install these liners inside the container of 20ft to 52ft size shipping containers. They can carry pellet, powder, granular or flaked industrial- or food-grade goods. 
• Wet Hide Or Open Top Container Liners: You can use these liners inside any trailer, railcar, or shipping container. Because of the high-tensile food grade material of wet container liners, they are moisture resistant, suitable for preserving your business goods.   
• Top Fill Liners: These liners are suitable for 20ft up to 52ft shipping container size, designed with top hatches via gravity fill at the container end. 
• Thermal Containers: They come in top loading, end filling, or open-ended loading spouts. Because of their aluminum barrier foil laminate material; these liners protect your business goods from deterioration caused by moisture, oxygen, light, and odor.

2. Protect Your Cargo 

Seaborne trade involving the freight shipping of cargo or goods from logistics specialist, vast oceans and across continents accounts majority of global trade. Therefore, cargo damage is inevitable and many people who don’t know how damage occurs and how to prevent them. 

Here are some tips to prevent cargo damage during sea freight shipping: 

• Stacking: One way to protect your business goods is to make good stackable. For consolidated or group cargo, other goods go with your business goods in freight shipping. Therefore, you need to ensure your goods, alongside or on top of other goods, won’t sustain any damage. 
• Proper Labeling: Stacking may not be a suitable option on the type of business goods you’re shipping. You should properly palletize cargo and keep pallets un-stackable. Let freight forwarder know about it when you reserve. In addition, you should label ‘UNSTACKABLE’ this on all sides of the boxes. For fragile business goods, make sure that the boxes or containers have the ‘FRAGILE’ sign or label. 
• Anticipate Handling Challenges: Also, it’s important to secure your business goods can withstand forklift handling because international deliveries load goods using forklift. Make your goods ready for ocean motion such as swaying, heaving, surging, rolling, yawing, and pitching ship movements in the sea.  

3. Use Wood-treated Or Plastic Pallets 

Use either properly treated wood pallets or plastic pallets to avoid rejection of your business goods at the place or country of destination due to failure in complying with customs regulations. 

4. Ensure Proper Internal Packaging  

Avoid overlooking the importance of proper internal packaging because it provides the first-line caution for your business goods. Remember that multiple couriers handle international shipments and there’s a high possibility of your goods sustaining damage with incorrect packaging. So, how do you pack your business goods for sea freight? 

Look at these helpful internal packaging tips: 

• Fill Spaces: Use air cushions or packing peanuts to fill the empty spaces in parcel boxes. Bigger goods should have enough internal packing to minimize the empty space that predisposes them from undue damage with ocean motions. 
• Box-in-box Method: You can use the box-in-box packing technique, where the boxes that contain the goods are placed inside a larger box, and fillings are added on the surrounding space. 
• H-Taping Method: Make sure that the edges are H-taped, in which the seals and edges are secured with high-quality parcel tape, which is applicable in shipping small components or parts in manufacturing consumer goods. Don’t use cheap tapes because they’ll lose adhesive overtime and decrease the support and protection of your products during transit. 
• Use Thermal Blankets: Packaging perishable goods for consumers and for businesses is far different. Thermal blankets insulate the pallets for long distance shipping to ensure no damage to perishable goods in transit, which are delivered to retail traders or wholesalers who later sell these products to end users.
• Package Good Uniformly: Stack your goods evenly without having one part shifting or sticking out too high because it causes unbalanced distribution. Remember that shipping prices are based on the merchandise volume and an uneven distribution equates to higher shipping costs. 

5. Label Boxes And Calculate Shipment Volume Properly 

If your cargo will join other cargo in less than a container load or LCL shipping, make sure that all boxes have clear labels on each side for visibility, which include the following information: 

• The shipper’s name 
• The consignee’s name 
• The country of destination 
• The name of freight forwarder 
• The booking number 

Note: Shipping cost is based on the amount of space that your cargo takes up instead of the actual weight, which is known as the dimensional weight or shipment volume. Calculate shipment volume of your cargo and book with the freight forwarder. 

Conclusion 

In long-distance shipping, fragile goods can sustain undue damage if the surrounding space lacks filling even if the boxes are very sturdy. Prepare your business goods for sea freight by using high-quality bulk container liners and packaging goods properly. Also, make sure that your business goods are clearly labeled. The success of freight shipping of business goods heavily depends on your proper planning and preparation.