SAN PEDRO, Calif. — In 2020, Anthony Coombs' underwear subscription brand, Splendies, saw a boom in business when a surge of customers signed up, but Coombs was also among hundreds of businesses left waiting for shipments from China.
“Things that used to take four days to unload, maybe a week, are now taking if you’re lucky, three weeks,” Coombs said.
In the eight years he has been in business, Coombs’ company had never experienced shipping delays until this recent global supply chain crunch.
“The delays happening in China are a confluence of problems. What we are seeing is port stoppages in China. We are seeing that there are unemployment issues at the Port of LA, along with COVID outbreaks,” he said.
The problem has sent the cost of shipping goods to the U.S. skyrocketing.
Coombs said containers that once cost $3,000 are now between $20,000 to $25,000, and he has been eating the cost to not pass it on to his loyal customers. He looked into airfreight but that was quoted at more than $100,000, which was not possible for his scaling business.
“We’re doing our best,” Coombs said. “Our Halloween stuff is on a boat and it’s actually here in LA but we’re not sure when it’s going to be unloaded,” he said.
Those goods are on one of the more than 70 container ships that are anchored or drifting off the coast of LA. Each one waiting its turn to come into the port for unloading.
The ship movements are overseen by Captain Kip Louttit’s team at the Marine Exchange of Southern California and are effectively like airport radio control but for ships.
“We are much more nervous than we used to be because we’ve got more than double the number of ships in our area,” Louttit said.
Captain Louttit said the exchange has kept the transportation system safe, secure and reliable, but the back up at the ports has significant ripple effects with ships waiting weeks before they can unload.
“From docks to trucks to the trains to the warehouses to the forklift drivers, everybody involved in goods movement. The system choked before Christmas and it hasn’t been able to clear,” he said.
Port officials said disruptions exist in every node of the supply chain and the public and private sectors as well as stakeholders are addressing the issues in LA.
As for Coombs, he said he is planning early ahead of this Christmas because he expects the final quarter of 2021 to be the busiest, potentially running into the most issues with the containers.
Officials are urging people to do their holiday shopping early to avoid delays.
“There are things that are bigger than us and we just hope they can be patient and know we’re getting things out as soon as we can,” Coombs said.
He hopes as the pandemic eases, some of the underlying pressure on the supply chain will, too.