TGL APAC and Fr8wise: Freight Operations Meet Supply Chain Strategy

Most logistics problems that look like freight problems are not. A rate that keeps rising, a warehouse that keeps filling, a lead time nobody can hold: those are usually the symptoms of a supply chain that was designed for a business of a different size. Fixing the booking does not fix them.

That is the reasoning behind our partnership with Fr8wise, a Sydney based supply chain consultancy. TGL APAC moves the freight. Fr8wise works on the design that decides how much freight there is, where it starts, and how often it has to move.

What TGL APAC brings

We have been forwarding freight since 2014, and the service list is the operational half of the partnership:

• Air freight, as an IATA accredited cargo agent
• Sea freight, FCL and LCL from all international ports
• Domestic freight by road, rail, air, sea or intermodal
• Customs clearance, in compliance with international trade policy
• Warehouse and 3PL, including e-commerce pick and pack
• Project and oversized cargo, where the shipment needs planning before it needs a booking

What Fr8wise brings

Fr8wise works further back, on the decisions that are made before anything is booked:

• Supply chain optimisation. Finding the bottlenecks, reducing the cost of them, and measuring the difference.
• Warehouse and distribution planning. Layout, inventory control and the shape of the distribution network.
• Transportation strategy. Which mode, which carrier, which route, and what each one is actually worth.
• Risk and compliance. Regulatory exposure, resilience and what happens when a lane closes.

What it looks like in practice

A client comes to us with a freight cost that has grown faster than their revenue. The operational answer is to consolidate, renegotiate and tighten the booking cycle, and that is worth doing. The strategic answer might be that they are holding stock in the wrong country, ordering on the wrong cycle, or paying air freight to cover a forecasting problem. Both answers are usually right, and neither is complete on its own.

On this site the consultancy sits in the services list as Consultancy (FR8WISE). It is available on its own, and it is available alongside the freight. The point of putting them together is that the advice is given by people who then have to live with it.