Additional random thoughts
Apr. 5th, 2022 12:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitoutI ran across a weird statement about how Amazon could do 2 day delivery for the US out of 8 fulfillment centers (!!!) and tracked it to its lair.
https://jindel.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/More-LTL-carriers-may-follow-AAA-Cooper-to-the-altar-consultant-says-FreightWaves_july-19_2021.pdf
Makes way more sense in context. Also goes a long way to explaining some of the things I found months ago when I was looking at Amazon Freight and how increasingly irrelevant the previously elite (but kinda bonkers) long haul trucking segment is.
“However, e-commerce has profoundly transformed supply chains and, by extension, the trucking industry. Truckload networks designed to efficiently handle heavier volumes are not well suited to move the lighter-weighted shipments — 1,000 to 1,500 pounds in total — that are the bulwarks of e- commerce. That’s especially true for the middle-mile portion of the delivery chain, where freight moves from a supplier’s warehouse to a retail store or a distribution center before the final delivery to a residence or business. In a changing distribution landscape, truckload executives have come to value the LTL network design, and they are voting with their dollars.”
The 8 vs 160 remark makes way more sense in this context.
ETA: I do understand that when I was looking at Amazon Freight, I was struck by how oriented it was to line haul which _often_ but _not always_ is also LTL. It is entertaining to observe that a bunch of the websites in this general area confuse the two in several of the same ways I often do.
ETAYA: OK, I gotta make this quick because I’m walking in 10.
Logistics pros really hate that Amazon lit their entire area of expertise on fire by offering free shipping. They’re like, come on, it costs something. I am reminded of Matt Levine’s coverage of Berkshire Hathaway / Warren Buffet’s recent acquisition of Alleghany. Normally, acquisitions result in a nice even number, but in this case, Buffet wanted to call out the part of the nice even number that was going to the lawyers or whatever.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-03-22/the-sec-will-regulate-climate
Levine characterizes it as a Nothing that is also Weird, and that strikes me as right.
You can go into some stores, and they will sell you things, and the price is the price — it is the total amount that you will owe them to walk out with The Thing(s). Other stores, you see a price, but you have to do mental math, because The Price is NOT The Price. The Price will have things added to it before you walk out the door, usually starting with Sales or VAT but who knows, other things wind up there, too.
If I buy something that is going to have to be delivered to me (I cannot just run over to Amazon and pick it up “for free”, which of course would NOT be free, because wear and tear on the shoes, or my car, or bike, or paying for the bus or the light rail or cadging a ride from a friend or or or or ), then sure, duh, shipping is part of The Price to Get the Thing. (I do understand that when I run to the store to buy the thing, I still probably have to get home with it, which is also going to wear and tear on something.)
Anyway. Retailer discretion, whether to tell you up front the All In, or surprise you later. I, personally prefer to compare two all-in numbers; don’t fucking make me do all that math, and I am willing to supply lots of info up front while you figure it out. But apparently, no one agrees with me. Or, more likely, lots of people think it _is_ the All In, but then pay the extra anyway and feel Shame and don’t want to talk about it.
I don’t feel Shame. When someone adds extra as an Unpleasant Surprise, I know it’s not _my_ fault that happened. That was someone else’s Choice.
Whatever one might think or feel about shipping rolled in or paid separately, the fact that rolling it in changed a whole lot of people’s behavior should definitely clue people into the fact that, you know, _IT MATTERS_. If you are in logistics, and people want a lot more of what you do for a living if what you do for a living is rolled into the overall price, I would sort of expect you to like that. However, these are all a bunch of zombie conservatives preserved unnaturally from the 1990s so what do I know.
https://jindel.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/More-LTL-carriers-may-follow-AAA-Cooper-to-the-altar-consultant-says-FreightWaves_july-19_2021.pdf
Makes way more sense in context. Also goes a long way to explaining some of the things I found months ago when I was looking at Amazon Freight and how increasingly irrelevant the previously elite (but kinda bonkers) long haul trucking segment is.
“However, e-commerce has profoundly transformed supply chains and, by extension, the trucking industry. Truckload networks designed to efficiently handle heavier volumes are not well suited to move the lighter-weighted shipments — 1,000 to 1,500 pounds in total — that are the bulwarks of e- commerce. That’s especially true for the middle-mile portion of the delivery chain, where freight moves from a supplier’s warehouse to a retail store or a distribution center before the final delivery to a residence or business. In a changing distribution landscape, truckload executives have come to value the LTL network design, and they are voting with their dollars.”
The 8 vs 160 remark makes way more sense in this context.
ETA: I do understand that when I was looking at Amazon Freight, I was struck by how oriented it was to line haul which _often_ but _not always_ is also LTL. It is entertaining to observe that a bunch of the websites in this general area confuse the two in several of the same ways I often do.
ETAYA: OK, I gotta make this quick because I’m walking in 10.
Logistics pros really hate that Amazon lit their entire area of expertise on fire by offering free shipping. They’re like, come on, it costs something. I am reminded of Matt Levine’s coverage of Berkshire Hathaway / Warren Buffet’s recent acquisition of Alleghany. Normally, acquisitions result in a nice even number, but in this case, Buffet wanted to call out the part of the nice even number that was going to the lawyers or whatever.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-03-22/the-sec-will-regulate-climate
Levine characterizes it as a Nothing that is also Weird, and that strikes me as right.
You can go into some stores, and they will sell you things, and the price is the price — it is the total amount that you will owe them to walk out with The Thing(s). Other stores, you see a price, but you have to do mental math, because The Price is NOT The Price. The Price will have things added to it before you walk out the door, usually starting with Sales or VAT but who knows, other things wind up there, too.
If I buy something that is going to have to be delivered to me (I cannot just run over to Amazon and pick it up “for free”, which of course would NOT be free, because wear and tear on the shoes, or my car, or bike, or paying for the bus or the light rail or cadging a ride from a friend or or or or ), then sure, duh, shipping is part of The Price to Get the Thing. (I do understand that when I run to the store to buy the thing, I still probably have to get home with it, which is also going to wear and tear on something.)
Anyway. Retailer discretion, whether to tell you up front the All In, or surprise you later. I, personally prefer to compare two all-in numbers; don’t fucking make me do all that math, and I am willing to supply lots of info up front while you figure it out. But apparently, no one agrees with me. Or, more likely, lots of people think it _is_ the All In, but then pay the extra anyway and feel Shame and don’t want to talk about it.
I don’t feel Shame. When someone adds extra as an Unpleasant Surprise, I know it’s not _my_ fault that happened. That was someone else’s Choice.
Whatever one might think or feel about shipping rolled in or paid separately, the fact that rolling it in changed a whole lot of people’s behavior should definitely clue people into the fact that, you know, _IT MATTERS_. If you are in logistics, and people want a lot more of what you do for a living if what you do for a living is rolled into the overall price, I would sort of expect you to like that. However, these are all a bunch of zombie conservatives preserved unnaturally from the 1990s so what do I know.