The second annual Shipper Conference, co-hosted by Canadian Transportation & Logistics and Dan Goodwill & Associates, is scheduled for June 16 at the Airport Marriott Hotel in Toronto. The theme of this year’s conference is “Managing your Freight Program during a Resetting Economy.” This year’s event will address a broad range of topics of interest to many Canadian shippers.
The conference will again be kicked off my Carlos Gomes, Senior Economist at Scotiabank. Carlos will outline a number of the variables his company is tracking in today’s resetting economy. He will also specifically highlight a number of transportation sector key indicators and draw out their significance to shippers. In addition, he will provide his forecast as to where his company sees the economy going over the balance of the year.
Lou Smyrlis, editor of Canadian Transportation & Logistics, will provide a summary of the results of his magazine’s annual shipper survey. Lou will specifically highlight shipper expectations as they pertain to mode utilization, mode shifting and shipper freight rate expectations.
The conference will then feature a series of speakers who address both domestic and international freight issues. Laurie Turnbull, Supply Chain Consultant, Cole Group, will provide his insights into the state of ocean and air freight shipping. Laurie will be followed by Gary Breininger, of Breininger & Associates. Gary will share with the audience his thoughts on the state of the small parcel market. I will follow Gary and provide some observations on the current state of the LTL and truckload freight markets. Specifically I will look at such issues as capacity and freight rates and provide some strategies for managing a freight program in 2010.
The morning session will conclude with one of the most eagerly awaited segments of the day, a shipper panel that will be moderated by Lou Smyrlis. Lou will engage a group of leading shippers in a dialogue on their companies’ strategies with respect to freight transportation. Immediately after lunch, Lou will lead a discussion with a panel of carrier executives on what they are planning to do to respond to the needs of shippers in 2010. Immediately after the two panels, Carol West, the President of the Canadian Society of Customs Brokers, will provide everyone with an overview of current issues in the field of customs clearance.
As a result of the economic downturn in late 2008 and 2009, many manufacturers and distributors had a mandate to reduce supply chain costs. There are a number of companies that are still in this mode. Toby Brzoznowski, Executive Vice President, Sales and Marketing, LLamasoft, Inc., will look at ways of reducing freight costs through network optimization. The formal presentations will conclude with a presentation from Jim Papineau, Director of Supply Chain Systems & Automation, Dan Goodwill & Associates Inc., who will provide the attendees with an overview of the results of a recently completed survey looking at transportation management software systems.
The final segment of the day will include some small roundtable discussions on four of the major topics discussed during the day, freight management and procurement, network optimization, ocean and air freight shipping and TMS systems. Each group will be facilitated by one of the speakers who made a presentation earlier in the day. At the end of the day, there will be opportunities for everyone to network and engage in one-on-one discussions with the attendees and speakers. There is still time to register for the event. To do so, go to www.dantranscon.com. I hope to see you there.