Industry News

Recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics re-confirmed the important role that companies in the truck transportation and inventory warehousing industry provide between manufacturers and consumers. Businesses contract with trucking and warehousing companies like Komar Distribution Services to pick up, transport, store, and deliver a variety of goods.

KDS provides third party logistics services to US and foreign businesses including freight trucking, specialized freight trucking, FTZ warehousing, cross docking, pick and pack, storage and back office solutions.

Transportation Service Categories

General freight trucking uses motor vehicles, such as trucks and tractor-trailers, to provide over-the-road transportation of general commodities. This industry segment is further subdivided based on distance traveled. Local trucking establishments carry goods primarily within a single metropolitan area and its adjacent non-urban areas. Long-distance trucking establishments carry goods between distant areas.

Local trucking comprised 29,400 trucking establishments in 2008. The work of local trucking firms varies with the products transported. Produce truckers usually pick up loaded trucks early in the morning and spend the rest of the day delivering produce to many different grocery stores. Lumber truck drivers, on the other hand, make several trips from the lumberyard to one or more construction sites. Some local truck transportation firms may also take on sales and customer relations responsibilities for a client, in addition to delivering the firm’s products.

Long-distance trucking comprises establishments engaged primarily in providing trucking between distant areas and sometimes between the United States and Canada or Mexico. Numbering 40,900 establishments, these firms handle every kind of commodity.

Specialized freight trucking provides over-the-road transportation of freight, which, because of size, weight, shape, or other inherent characteristics, requires specialized equipment, such as flatbeds, tankers, or refrigerated trailers. This industry sector also includes the moving industry—that is, the transportation of household, institutional, and commercial furniture for individuals or companies that are relocating. Like general freight trucking, specialized freight trucking is subdivided into local and long-distance components. The specialized freight trucking sector contained 47,600 establishments in 2008.

Intermodal transportation encompasses any combination of transportation by truck, train, plane, or ship. Typically, trucks perform at least one leg of the trip, since they are the most flexible mode of transport. For example, a shipment of cars from an assembly plant begins its journey when they are loaded onto rail cars. Next, trains haul the cars across country to a depot, where the shipments are broken into smaller lots and loaded onto tractor-trailers, which drive them to dealerships. Each of these steps is carefully orchestrated and timed so that the cars arrive just in time to be shipped on their next leg of their journey. Though some perishable and time-sensitive goods may be transported by air, they are usually picked up and delivered by trucks.

Warehousing and storage facilities comprised 15,200 establishments in 2008.  Komar Distribution Services (KDS) operates warehousing and storage facilities for general merchandise and retail apparel.  KDS takes responsibility for keeping general merchandise and apparel secure and in good condition. In addition to inventory warehousing services, we offer logistical services, such as labeling, inventory control management, repackaging, and transportation arrangement.

The Impact of NAFTA

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) has resulted in increased trade with Mexico and Canada which, unlike other trading partners, can be reached by truck. Specifically, the U.S. and Canada have had longstanding agreements that allow drivers to deliver goods between the two Nations somewhat effortlessly. On the other hand, trucks traveling between the U.S. and Mexico have faced more difficulty, and bilateral agreements have been unstable.

Trucking and warehousing firms often provide logistical services encompassing the entire transportation process. Logistical services manage all aspects of the movement of goods between producers and consumers. Among their value-added services are sorting bulk goods into customized lots, packaging and repackaging goods, controlling and managing inventory, order entering and fulfillment, labeling, performing light assembly, and marking prices.

Some full-service companies even perform warranty repair work and serve as local parts distributors for manufacturers. Some of these services, such as maintaining and retrieving computerized inventory information on the location, age, and quantity of goods available, have helped to improve the efficiency of relationships between manufacturers and customers.

KDS Technology in Action

Komar Distribution Services offers their clients new technologies and the coordination of supply chain processes to expedite the distribution of goods. KDS routinely uses computers to analyze work routines in order to optimize the use of available labor has led to increases in productivity.

KDS utilizes Radio Frequency Identification Devices (RFID) to track and manage incoming and outgoing shipments. RFID simplifies the receiving process by allowing entire shipments to be scanned without unpacking a load to manually compare it against a bill of lading.

Many companies tap Komar Distribution for just-in-time shipping, which means that goods arrive just before they are needed, saving recipients money by reducing their need to carry large inventories.

These technologies and processes reflect two major trends in warehousing: supply chain integration, whereby firms involved in production, transportation, and storage all move in concert so as to act with the greatest possible efficiency; and ongoing attempts to reduce inventory levels and increase inventory accuracy.

Komar Distribution Services, a division of New York–based Charles Komar and Sons, is on a mission to grow its business on the West Coast.

What began two years ago as a 350,000-square-foot distribution center in San Bernardino, Calif., for Charles Komar and Sons’ own brands—which include sleepwear and intimates labels—has now grown into Komar Distribution Services, a back-office and distribution-services provider.

The company, which has operated a distribution center out of McAlester, Okla., for approximately 80 years, made the move west to satisfy its own distribution needs and quickly found brands eager to use its facilities and resources.

Ron Weissbrod, Komar’s vice president of business development, said Komar currently has approximately 10 customers being serviced out of the San Bernardino location. Those customers represent 15 percent to 20 percent of Komar’s business out of the West Coast location, and Weissbrod expects that number to more than double in the next several years.

He declined to name Komar’s current clients. But Weissbrod said customers include domestic and international swimwear, sleepwear, intimates, sportswear, dress, and children’s and juniors brands that retail in major and big-box retailers through to specialty stores and independent boutiques. Client testimonials on Komar’s Web site count Liz Claiborne Sleepwear among its satisfied customers.

In Down Economy – Interest is Up

As the economy forces companies to cut spending and reduce overhead, interest in Komar’s services has never been higher, Weissbrod said. “A good example is that of a swimwear company that only uses its warehouse 50 percent of the year, when it is actually shipping goods. The rest of the year the warehouse sits empty, but it is being paid for,” he said. “With this economy, companies are looking for ways to increase their efficiency.”

With its 40-plus employees and state-of-the-art facility, Komar’s San Bernardino location offers apparel imports, warehousing, distribution, pick and pack, supply-chain management, customer service, accounting and back-office systems for bigger operations as well as boutique brands. “Everyone needs to lower their overhead,” Weissbrod said.

He declined to discuss Komar’s fee structure, but Weissbrod said most companies, whether they have their own distribution and back-office operations or outsource them, would realize savings. One way Komar could fatten a company’s bottom line is by reducing the kinds of costly mistakes that are often made when shipping to new accounts as well as big box or major retailers. “We work with so many retailers—and have for nearly 100 years—that we know their specific requirements,” he said. Meeting shipping requirements and “virtually eliminating chargebacks” make for significant client savings.

Technology—which allows Komar to track goods from overseas factories onto boats, into and out of the warehouse, and onto the sales floor—is another money-saving bonus. “If a company knows where every single piece of product is at any given time—from the moment the order is placed to when it is cut and sewn down to whether it has been invoiced and when it is paid—they have so much more to work with and can be more agile,” Weissbrod said.

Komar Technical Prowess

With the influx of interest and business, Komar is keen on staying at the forefront of technology—from developing proprietary software that enables it to keep clients informed in real time as to the status of their goods to implementing Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) mapping and compliance with “nearly every major retailer.” The facility is also Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)–enabled, something that is becoming a key factor for companies selling goods to the likes of Wal-Mart and other big-box stores.

“We are very technology-focused,” said Melinda Cook, Komar’s director of customer service. “Our array of services and clients requires us to be at the forefront of what is going on. It’s how we save our clients money and run our own business more efficiently.”

To communicate with clients, Komar has developed a software that is installed directly onto clients’ computers. The dashboard, as it is called, gives clients constant access to reports such as sales reporting and history, gross margin analysis, style master management, reserve and bulk order management, inventory forecasting, production-order status, and real-time inventory visibility and control, a release from the company states. “The software makes everything visible and transparent. And it eliminates the hundreds of e-mails from different people that would otherwise be necessary from the moment a purchase order is written until it is delivered,” Cook said.

Currently, each client’s record is updated multiple times a day so they can track the progress of their goods in real time.

“The minute a shipment passes through our dock doors, it is in our system,” Weissbrod said. “That means a client can turn stock as soon as it comes in— and that is something that is a big advantage in the current market,” he said.