Ocean freight markets have swung sharply out of balance, with spot rates rising by more than 300% in five months as blank sailings, port congestion and geopolitical tension disrupt global flows, according to GEODIS Americas chief executive Laura Ritchey.
Speaking on FreightWaves Today, Ritchey said shippers are wrestling with a backlog that has left goods stuck in transit for months, particularly for manufacturers that rely on predictable arrivals to keep assembly lines moving....
Continue Reading This Article
Enjoy this article as well as all of our content, including reports, news, tips and more.
By registering or signing into your SRM Today account, you agree to SRM Today's Terms of Use and consent to the processing of your personal information as described in our Privacy Policy.
She pointed to pressure in the Red Sea and the Strait of Hormuz, as well as congestion that has followed earlier port bottlenecks, as key reasons the market has tightened.
The surge is not occurring in isolation. GEODIS, which is owned by the French national railway SNCF, is also seeing a split economy in which some customers are posting sales growth of 30% to 40% while others remain flat. Ritchey said apparel has been one of the stronger categories, while housing improvements and new housing starts continue to soften.
That unevenness is making planning more difficult, particularly for sectors tied to electronics and infrastructure. Ritchey said big tech customers are dealing with chip shortages and import constraints at the same time, which has added pressure to both ocean and air freight networks. Air capacity is available, she said, but at a price many shippers are reluctant to pay.
GEODIS is responding by leaning more heavily on technology. Ritchey said the company is using AI to process shipment data and manage trucker oversight, while also using digital tools to train and upskill warehouse staff across a multilingual workforce. The company is piloting drones for inventory checks inside warehouses, a move Ritchey said could improve accuracy and reduce safety risks compared with traditional cycle counting.
Her comments also reflect a broader shift in how logistics buyers are thinking about outsourcing. Ritchey said companies are increasingly treating supply chain management as a partnership rather than a purely transactional service, with shippers more carefully deciding which functions they want to retain in-house and which they are prepared to hand to a third-party logistics provider.
That change, she said, is strengthening the case for integrated service models and more robust compliance. GEODIS has highlighted the stability that comes with its ownership structure, and Ritchey said that matters more as liability scrutiny and vetting requirements increase across the industry.
She has also pushed for a tighter internal focus on customer service. Earlier in the year, Ritchey created a client experience organisation by bringing together teams that had previously operated separately, including continuous improvement, data and analytics, and account management. She said the goal was to mirror the way strong consumer brands and airlines manage the customer journey, rather than letting operational silos shape the experience.
Looking ahead, Ritchey said the next phase of logistics will be about orchestration rather than visibility alone. In her view, the value of data lies not just in tracking shipments, but in helping systems respond automatically to disruption and make better decisions with less human intervention.
For now, though, the immediate problem is capacity and cost. Shippers are still waiting on freight booked months ago, and the longer the backlog persists, the more strain it places on manufacturers that cannot afford delays. In Ritchey’s view, the market is less about a temporary spike than a hard reset in how supply and demand are now interacting.
Source: Noah Wire Services
