Holy Rollers, GM Test-Drives Cars at Detroit Church

The auto showroom is the place most people see new cars up close and personal, but GM is taking a unique approach to moving cars to where the potential customers are. The eye-catching headline out of the Detroit News was of a “ride-and-drive” mobile GM showroom that was set up outside a Baptist church in Detroit on Sunday with the pastor’s blessing, aiming to expose people to GM cars that might not make their way into a conventional showroom. Less theologically-questionable ride-and-drives have been done in California outside of coffee-houses and Korean restaurants, as GM experiments with alternative marketing methods.

Alternative marketing might become more of an issue as GM dealers close up shop; GM is looking at online marketing tools and other non-traditional ways of marketing cars. One alternative that is rather old-school comes from Japan, where cars are sold door-to-door much as life insurance or cosmetics are sold in the US. Busy people might not want to spend time going to a car dealership, but if the cars are at church or at their favorite watering hole, they might stop by to take a look.

This brings some possible extra work for car haulers; unless the cars are individually driven out to the locations, there might be work opportunity for car carriers to get the cars out to the remote locations. Unloading the hauler could be problematic in some settings, but it could also be a conversation piece that would draw attention to the event-“What the *$&#* is that car hauler doing in front of the church?”

http://www.detnews.com/article/20100418/AU...f-new-customers

Battery-Power for RORO Ships While Docked, Anti-Idling System Saves 6.5% of Fuel

Sanyo is finding something interesting to do with laptop computer batteries; power a car carrier while it’s at port. It’s working with a Japanese shipping company to develop an auxiliary power source for a roll-on, roll-off ship so that it doesn’t have to run its regular engines to power internal ship systems while at port; the batteries are expected to save 6.5% of fuel used on a normal RORO vessel.

That level of savings would most likely apply to shorter-haul ferry-type operations, which would be common going between the islands of Japan; it wouldn’t be as much of a factor for intercontinental shipping of cars for the export market. However, such ships would be good sellers for island-hopping ferries in Japan, the Philippines and Indonesia, not to mention the Dover-Calais run across the English Channel; Hawaiian and Alaskan car transport ferries could be customers in the US.

The battery system is slated to be made up of 644,000 small laptop-style batteries charged from a solar grid; since Sanyo is an battery maker, this would give them a great market to sell into, where they can make the equivalent of supplying a half-million laptops in one sale.

People are trying to keep vehicles from having to keep the engines running while parked; many products have been introduced to provide heat and air conditioning to trucks while parked and this allows ships to have power while moored as well. This, or something similar, might be put on RORO ships in the not too distant future.

http://www.tradingmarkets.com/news/stock-a...sel-705492.html

Shortage of RORO Facilites on West Coast, Ships are Plentiful, Parking Space Isn't, car shipping, shipping cars

An interesting aspect of the international car shipping industry is that there is a lack of available space on the West Coast of the US for roll-on-roll-off shipping. The larger ports like to major on container shipping and there is a shortage of space at those ports for RORO facilities. That might explain why Chrysler opted to use the secondary port of Grays Harbor, WA for exporting to the Pacific.

Mahindra, the newest member of the Association of International Automobile Manufacturers; the US importers trade group, may have some problems offloading their new trucks and SUVs into the West Coast and may wind up looking at East Coast ports as an alternative. Charleston, who lost a BMW contract to Baltimore recently, might be a viable alternative for the new kid on the block to be shipping cars and trucks into.

Even if there is a shortage of places to store cars on-site at major ports, there isn’t a shortage of RORO vessels; a number of new ships will be added to the fleet in the next few years. Long-tern contracts that are the norm in the car-shipping business has shielded the ROROs from the lousy shipping market of 2008 and 2009; new contracts might not be as lucrative if there is an excess of ships available.

In the future, firms might also look at container-shipping cars rather than the traditional RORO approach. There is an increasing numbers of container autoracks that can go from train to ship, and if the lion-share of port space is becoming devoted to containerized shipping, the auto industry might want to join the container party.

Sources: http://www.joc.com/node/416467
http://www.canadiandriver.com/2010/02/03/i...association.htm

International Car Transport, What to expect

It’s not every day that the average person needs to ship a car from the United States to Europe, Asia, or South America. And it’s not any auto transport service that can handle the complexities of the job. After all, there’s more to it than just loading the vehicle onto a flatbed trailer and driving it down the road.

There are language barriers to deal with and different customs regulations depending upon the country to which the car is being shipped. There is a lot of paperwork to prepare before the car leaves the United States, including bills of lading and dock receipts. There will be taxes and/or tariffs to pay in addition to the actual shipping charges. There may be import duties at the destination country.

There is proof of ownership and possibly inspection documents that must be provided. Some countries don’t allow used cars to be imported—cars must be used. There may be specific emissions requirements at the destination country.

It’s important to find an auto transport service that knows its way around the world of international shipping. The most reliable service will do more than pick up a car and deliver it to a shipping port. It will make sure the car is prepped for sea travel, ensure all the appropriate paperwork is complete, see the vehicle safely loaded aboard ship, and have someone at the destination port to see it through the customs and final delivery process.

With today’s shrinking world, many people find themselves vacationing or living and working overseas…and needing or wanting their own cars to get around the foreign locale. An international auto transport service is the only reliable way to make that possible.