What a load planner does

Every day a shipper has a list of orders to send: so many pallets of this to one store, so many cases of that to a warehouse two states away. A load planner turns that list into loads. A load is one trailer's worth of freight, with a pickup, one or more deliveries, a truck, a driver and a time for each stop.

A good load is four things at once. It's legal: under the weight and size limits wherever it drives. It's safe: the freight is stacked and held so it can't shift, crush or fall. It's full: as little empty space or unused weight as the orders allow, because a half-empty trailer costs almost as much to run as a full one. And it's on time: every stop can be reached inside its appointment by a driver who stays within the hours rules.

Load planners work at shippers and warehouses (building outbound loads from customer orders), at carriers (fitting freight onto their trucks and trailers), at third-party logistics companies, and at LTL carriers, where linehaul planners decide which trailers leave each terminal and what goes on them. Airlines and shipping lines have load planners too, but this course is about trucks.

Freight comes in a few shapes. Truckload (TL or FTL) is one shipper filling a trailer. Less-than-truckload (LTL) is a small shipment, usually one to six pallets, that an LTL carrier mixes with other people's freight. In between are partials or volume loads, and multi-stop truckloads that pick up or drop off at more than one place.

The paperwork travels with the freight. The bill of lading (BOL) is the shipping document and receipt: who ships, who receives, what and how much. A purchase order (PO) number ties the freight to the customer's order. A SKU is one product line. A handling unit is anything moved as one piece, usually a pallet. The shipper is where it's picked up, the consignee is where it's delivered.

The equipment sets the limits. Most US freight moves in a 53-foot dry van (an enclosed box) pulled by a tractor. A reefer is a refrigerated van with its own cooling unit. A flatbed has no sides or roof, for steel, lumber and machinery. Every plan starts with what the trailer can hold: floor, height, weight and temperature.