It’s been a month since China’s Yantian Port returned to normal operations. However, the debilitating three-week-long shutdown has done its damage. 

You’ve Got a Shipping Deadline? Get In Line.

A massive backlog of products is still on ice, sitting in storage and waiting to be exported. Warehouses full of appliances, commodities, toys, and other goods are causing panic for manufacturers and factory owners that desperately want to move their cargo out of the country, but there just isn’t enough space on freighters as ships struggle to catch up after the Yantian port congestion.

As Josh Brazil, the VP of marketing for logistics service provider Project44, said of the incident,“While we can see the cargo is moving through the port again, this event is shaping up to be one of the most disruptive of the year.” This shouldn’t be surprising, since Yantian is the third-busiest gateway in the world.

Yantian Port isn’t alone with this problem, either. Manufacturers across the entire Guangdong province — a major manufacturing zone — have been wrestling with similar supply chain choke points, extended lead times, and limited real estate aboard the precious cargo ships that get their products overseas. The effect, ultimately, will be higher prices for consumers as supply crawls along too slowly to match demand.

 It’s already realistic to imagine countless Christmas gifts showing up late this year — and this is in July.

Take Action & Save Your Shopping Season!

Disruptions in international shipping from China will impact brands worldwide. You’ll have to plan ahead to cope with these disastrous  (but inevitable) delays.  Place your orders NOW to give products the time they need to work their way through the logistics process and get to U.S. shores. Your first concern might be, “but what if they get here early? What am I going to do with all of it?”  

It’s true…storing inventory takes up space and costs money. Your best bet will be to partner with a company that has warehouses right in the U.S. that can hold your product if you don’t have spare warehouse space, perhaps for a nominal fee. Even better, find a supplier who will hold your product at those warehouses without charging you for the time or the space (we know they exist — we’re one of them).

Keep Products a Day Away and Avoid Added Costs

Failure to make your deliveries on time to retailers can cost you big. Don’t risk getting dinged for $25,000 per day due to shipping delays from China. The international supply chain is just too fragile and unpredictable right now to count on timely deliveries with the sort of schedules you’ve used in prior years. Yantian port congestion is just the beginning. More things will happen. See Typhoon In-Fa, which just closed more ports in Shanghai.

These inevitable complications are why we invested in warehouses in the midwest and Salt Lake City: to protect our clients. If you (or your buyers) have always ordered just in time, get ahead of the game this year. Bring your products into the U.S. in bulk, right now, and make sure you’ve already got it all here for the autumn rush. You won’t pay a dime for warehousing! At The Oversea Network, we’ve got a process in place to ensure your inventory is safely located within a day of its final destination, so stock stays reliable and deliveries can stay on time — no matter what’s happening at Yantian Port in Guangdong or anywhere else.