The first ship now headed to our shores, with capacity for 2000 sea containers, is fully booked, indicating strong initial interest from the local market.
According to McGrath, the delays exacerbated by overseas conflicts, particularly in the Red Sea, had seen a major shift in this year’s usual peak season timeline, with businesses heeding warnings to order end-of-year stock in advance.
“Traditionally quarter four would be our peak season, but I feel that the peak season actually shifted forward to quarter three,” he said.
“We’ve seen that large increase in volume through quarter three, so people were looking to get their stock in well before Christmas, well before the Black Friday sales.
“But now, let’s say you need your cargo a week before Christmas, you can still be shipping the first week of December and have your cargo in WA for Christmas.”
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As to whether or not the service is here to stay, that will all come down to demand into the future.
“Carriers will make changes to services based on demand – if the demand is not there, then they’ll reduce services,” he said.
“But MSC introducing this Koala service to run between those four ports, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Fremantle, I believe is going to be a success story, and I’m excited to see how this service goes.”
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