The latest updates on warehousing, logistics, customs, and supply chain management in Montreal and across Canada.
Container spot rates on transpacific and Asia-Europe lanes have climbed for six consecutive weeks, with the industry calling it peak season a month ahead of schedule. For Canadian importers and forwarders, that early surge is already tightening drayage windows and pushing detention costs up. What happens at the Port of Montreal dock right now, and how your inbound SLA changes this quarter.
LCL and FCL consolidation are not interchangeable operations — they run on different dock rhythms, drayage windows, and cost structures. Understanding the split between the two changes how you schedule inbound, plan your buffer stock, and negotiate your warehouse SLA.
Inventory management best practices in a warehouse come down to three things: knowing what you have before it arrives, moving it predictably once it lands, and not pretending your racking density math works when it doesn't. Everything else is process wrapping around those fundamentals.
PepsiCo just signed a multiyear deal to run autonomous trucks on fixed routes where driver availability is tight. This is US-focused for now, but drayage automation is coming to Canada's 401 corridor and Port of Montreal. What changes at the dock when the truck that shows up has no driver to sign paperwork.
Mobile automation vendors pitch goods-to-person (GTP) systems like they'll fix everything. The dock-level reality is more specific. Some of these systems genuinely cut putaway cycle time and error rates. Others are expensive toys that don't pay back in sufferance warehouse environments where dwell is already compressed.
ESG reporting isn't abstract sustainability theater for warehouses—it's a cost and a compliance signal. We track kilowatt-hours per pallet, drayage fuel per shipment, and whether our reefer containers are actually turning off when they sit idle. Here's what carbon neutral warehousing means on the dock floor.
LCL (less-than-container load) shipments cost more per cubic meter than FCL (full-container load) moves, but consolidating at the right warehouse can flip that math. The decision turns on dwell time, handling fees, and whether your next shipment actually needs to leave together. Most importers leave money on the table by consolidating too late or too early.
Inventory management best practices come down to cycle counting discipline, racking density decisions, and drayage window alignment. The difference between a warehouse that runs tight and one that hemorrhages margin sits in those three places.
Port of Savannah is opening a 4,000 sq ft temperature-controlled inspection facility on July 1 for refrigerated cargo. For Canadian produce importers moving through U.S. ports, this is a real change in how cold-chain clearance works on the U.S. side. The facility exists to keep product temperature-stable during USDA/CBP inspection, not to speed clearance.
Alterra IOS just landed $244 million to buy up industrial outdoor storage properties. That's real capital flowing into logistics infrastructure. But for Canadian importers and forwarders at the dock, more yard space somewhere else doesn't change the operational problems happening right now at Port of Montreal and the 401 corridor.