The future of logistics, transport, and warehousing in Australia looks promising. According to the data from the Australian Industry and Skills Committee, road freight transport alone required 197,000 workers. By 2023, this number will increase to 224,000.
The need for warehousing workers, meanwhile, declined in 2018 to 47,900. But by 2023, it will go up again to more than 55,000. Ken Research pegged the value of the industry to over $170 billion by 2021. The question is, are you ready to ride the wave to growth? Is your warehouse capable of handling bulks of boxes, tools, and other types of equipment?
The Demand for Efficiency and the High Cost of Warehousing
There are at least two good reasons why your company should invest in organizational systems such as tool storage cabinets: the need for efficiency and high warehousing costs. There’s no better time for any logistics or transport business to be more efficient than today. Customers are becoming more demanding when it comes to the speed of delivery. In fact, shipping options such as same-day or next-day deliveries are popular.
Not only that, customers are willing to pay a higher price if it means they will receive the goods on time or as early as possible. Your shipping choices, therefore, help you earn more money.
There’s also the issue with the labor shortage. With fewer skilled workers, the costs of wages will increase to help retain existing employees and attract new talents. At the same time, your business isn’t able to maximize productivity. Organizational systems can help in this area by helping reduce the time it needs to look for inventory.
Another challenge warehousing might face is the cost of renting or buying equipment like forklift, or maintaining the space. To be fair, Australia is a huge continent, and many of its lands remain empty. According to Colliers International, there’s still plenty of space in rural areas.
On the downside, the strategic location to open a warehouse is in the urban areas. These are places that are near roadworks, ports, airports, and target market. In cities like Sydney, land then becomes a premium commodity.
Those who want to set up warehousing facilities would have to deal with two choices: make do with a small warehouse or pay a high amount for space. Organizational systems can help bring down the costs of warehousing by giving you more available space. Storage cabinets, for example, can contain many different items even if they themselves don’t have a lot of space available. You can free workbenches, add mezzanines, or invest in pallet and flexible shelving systems as well.
E-commerce and better infrastructure are two of the reasons for the growth of warehousing, transport, and logistics. According to Statista, the revenue for e-commerce will achieve an annual growth rate of more than 6% from 2019 to 2023. Within the same period, the market volume will be worth $26 billion.
Meanwhile, the country’s investment to the improvement of the transport network will achieve an annual rate of 4.9% within the next 10 years or until 2025. That’s higher than the global average. Don’t miss out on these opportunities by ensuring you can have a warehouse and overcome the challenges that come with it.
