Maersk offers daily cut-off on new Asia-North Europe service

Maersk Line is set to challenge the container shipping industry’s 50% reliability score with the launch of its new Asia-North Europe service, which it says will dramatically change the way shipping is done and will “change liner shipping forever”. It described its Daily Maersk service, which commences on October 24, as a “giant ocean conveyor belt”. It offers a daily cut-off at the same time every day, seven days a week, with the exact same transportation time. Daily cut-offs mean that cargo can be shipped immediately after production without the need for storage. “Containerised cargo will now be delivered with unprecedented frequency and reliability,” said the company. At a press conference, Maersk Line CEO Eivind Kolding said that up until now, customers had to adjust their production schedules and supply chains to accommodate shipping lines’ unreliability as they had never been able to trust that their cargo would be on time. “Shipping is only around 2% of our customers’ total cost. And yet our unreliability has until now forced them to shape their production plans and inventory around it.”