Some of the nation’s biggest retailers and shippers are promising to move more goods overnight and on weekends to help fill store shelves in time for the holidays.
Shoppers frustrated by empty store shelves and rising prices might soon see some relief as the nation’s biggest ports and retailers kick into high gear.
President Joe Biden said, “Today’s announcement has the potential to be a game changer. I say potential, because all of these goods won’t move by themselves.”
President Biden announced the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, which handle 40 percent of the nation’s overseas cargo, will now operate around the clock, seven days a week.
Centerline Logistics CEO Matt Godden said, “It’s just not that same smooth operating machine that it once was.”
Not only are some things harder to find, prices are up more than five percent over last year.
Dozens of cargo ships are sitting off the coast of California waiting to be unloaded.
Warehouses in the region are packed full with not enough truck drivers available to move goods across the country.
Executive Director of the Port of Los Angeles Gene Seroka said, “50 percent of all truckers licensed to do business at the ports no longer come here. They’ve gone to other industries and other segments, so we need more drivers.”
The ports, along with some of the nation’s biggest shippers and retailers, are committing to work overtime to ease the COVID-induced supply chain backlog.
Port of Long Beach Deputy Director Noel Hacegaba said, “Everything we’re seeing today was induced by the pandemic.”
Today, there are new promises of relief which anxious holiday shoppers hope the supply chain can deliver.
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