Viewpoint: The envelope please...
Michael A. Levans, Group Editorial Director -- Logistics Management, 8/1/2009
These words have become synonymous with anticipation, even a little tension. When used in relation to our annual Quest for Quality Awards, they indicate that there’s good news about to break for a select few carriers and service providers that, in the eyes of Logistics Management (LM) readers, have delivered consistent, world-class service over the course of the past year.
For the 26th year, LM is proud to release the results of our Quest for Quality survey (Page 26), the leading benchmark of quality and service levels in the industry. This year, 115 providers of transportation and logistics services received the news that they’ve earned the ultimate vote of shipper confidence by posting the highest scores across our lists of critical service criteria.
Our Quest for Quality survey is perhaps the purest piece of research we do over the course of our publishing year. It gives our readers—shippers who are in the trenches on a daily basis—the chance to single out the service superstars in all key modes and logistics services. And considering just how tough the operating environment has been over the past year, walking the red carpet to receive a Quest for Quality Award this year just may be the highest form of praise a carrier or service provider may ever receive.
And as we’ve found over the past quarter century, when they experience superior service these shippers are eager to share that success with their peers. Despite the fact that they’ve never been busier in their careers, 6,485 logistics and supply chain professionals took the time out of their hectic schedules to cast their votes in 2009.
The annual results certainly yield a “who’s who” of current service stars, but it also reveals how service levels are perceived by shippers across the modes and service functions. In fact, this year we found that economic pressures and operational strains have pushed the 2009 weighted average scores—the baseline from which our winners are selected—down by a few tenths of a point across the board from our 2008 results.
While that may not sound like a monumental jump, our research teams reports that this overall downward tick indicates that shippers have become slightly tougher service critics. We also found that as more and more shippers went shopping for better rates, the percentage using core carriers dropped significantly over our 2008 findings. In fact, every mode saw a sizeable percentage drop with the exception of National LTL, Intermodal Marketing, and Ocean Carriers.
So, after reporting two years back that we had seen a near-record jump into the core carrier concept during late 2006 into 2007, it appears that a considerable number of shippers have started to turn their backs to that approach as they went to market to take advantage of the current rate environment.
But now it’s time for you to pore through the results and do your own analysis. As you do, keep in mind that this project represents over six months of surveying and number crunching with our Reed Business Information research team and is the single biggest research project we undertake year after year. It’s helped to set the gold standard in the industry for 26 years, and I hope it helps you better weigh your service options.
Comments? E-mail me at michael.levans@reedbusiness.com
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