Ways to move goods

Logistics is the part of the supply chain that moves and stores goods. The first choice is how to move them, and each mode trades speed against cost.

Road is the most flexible: trucks go door to door, almost anywhere, and most goods spend at least part of their trip on one. A full truckload (FTL) books a whole truck for one shipper and goes straight there. Less than truckload (LTL) shares a truck with other shippers' freight, which is cheaper for small loads but slower, because the truck stops at depots to sort and swap freight.

Rail is cheaper than road for heavy goods over long distances, and uses less fuel per tonne, but it only goes where the track goes, so it usually needs a truck at each end. Pipelines move liquids and gas very cheaply once built, but only one product along one route.

Sea carries most of the world's trade by volume. It's slow (four to six weeks from Asia to Europe is common) but very cheap per unit. Most manufactured goods travel in standard steel containers, 20 or 40 feet long. Capacity is counted in TEU (twenty-foot equivalent units): a 20-foot container is 1 TEU, a 40-foot one is 2. The biggest ships carry over 20,000 TEU.

Air is the fastest (days, not weeks) and by far the most expensive per kilo, so it's used for things that are light, valuable or urgent: phones, medicines, fresh flowers, a part that's stopping a factory. Using two or more modes for one trip, like truck to port, ship across the ocean, then rail inland, all in the same container, is called intermodal transport.