Freight Opinions
 

What's the best way to move 10-12 pallets of computers across the country? Only about half of it is palletized for shipping, the other half is loose inventory, so either I'd have to fly out and palletize the rest or pay the freight company to palletize it. What would you recommend? Any good freight bid search engines? The other issue in the back of my mind, is the residential delivery aspect. Going to need to find a very flexible shipper.

www.Uship.com www.freight.com

I've used freightquote.com a dozen or so times over the past few years for LTL shipments outside our standard carriers' territory and have been pleased with it. You will pay more for a residential and non-loading dock delivery but it is available. Is there any way you could arrange for delivery to a location with a loading dock? Liftgate and/or driver assist charges can be considerable.

I would think shipping container but that's just a guess.

That reminded me, ABF offers a self-pack container option. Check out upack.com. I'm not sure how it compares but if palletizing the entire shipment isn't feasible it might be a good option. The folks that just bought the house across the street from me used the service (and that was the first I saw it) so they will bring it to a residence. Is there someone to load it on the other end?

Yeah, I just saw an ABF truck on the road with an ad for this on the back doors. I don't think they bring a whole container though.

Check out Pack-N-Ship, if you have them in your area. I had good luck with them.

Actually, ABF does bring a whole container. You tell them ahead of time how many feet of it you think you'll need, they route an appropriate box your way. If your load is smaller, you'll get the back end of a trailer somebody else has partially filled.

The couple times I've used them, I was going to use well over half, so I got an empty container. When my stuff was packed, we put in the dividing wall (which was then locked in place with my padlock) and off it went to the next stop. Great service, everything went as advertised, would use them again.