Cargo mishandling and damage can happen anywhere and anytime. The impact is felt by carriers, shippers, manufacturers, and consumers by driving up costs, including insurance premiums, transportation expenses, and retail prices. Compounding matters is the interference of global supply chain disruptions.
Companies have to make frequent decisions about how to use finite resources. Any choice you make means diverting those resources in one direction instead of another. Typically, this results in a productivity loss and reduction of an organization’s ability to execute on its primary value proposition.
Similarly, shippers and receivers experience reduced productivity and resource drain processing claims. Claims may be due to substandard or spoiled goods. Many are the result of a considerable tilt or impact event. The resulting economic consequences of these claims can be significant and detrimental to an organizations bottom-line and reputation.
When products are loaded, in-transit, or being offloaded, it’s imperative to have detection and visual evidence of mishandling or damage to reduce claims and product recall loses. The good news is there is a cost-effective solution. By utilizing indicators in your shipments, you will have an end-to-end solution to spot damage with visual proof to proactively mitigate product losses and punitive claims.
Industries such as automotive and aerospace benefit from indicators by ensuring quality and the timely delivery of just-in-time shipments which are necessary to synchronize production schedules to orders. Indicators also help freight forwarders and logistics managers red-flag components that have experienced impacts and temperature, humidity, and tilt events that could cause damage.
Additionally, customers can use the valuable information freight forwarders provide them about their assets such as location, impact, temperature and tilt to identify the best transportation, routes, packaging, storage and delivery condition options for their supply chain.
Another challenge faced in supply chain risk mitigation is temperature fluctuations. Many factors can cause temperature damage. For products like pharmaceuticals and food, temperature control is critical to ensure the efficacy and safety of products. Some medications lose potency while perishable food items rot when subjected to heat beyond certain levels.
A product can sit unattended in severe conditions for extended hours, or the cooling system in a warehouse or truck could be broken. Temperature inconsistency can cause major losses or safety concerns in the cold chain. Whether it’s during production, storage, or moving, temperature regulation is critical.
Temperature Indicators
Today’s modern temperature tracking solutions for the cold chain logistics industry provides supply chain managers with the data and proof they need to get temperature-sensitive products from point A to point B — and everywhere in between. This data also allows managers to optimize their cold chain logistics by finding gaps and problem areas.
The WarmMark family of temperature indicators are single-use devices that provide accurate, irreversible evidence of any above temperature deviation allowing you to make smarter decisions across the cold chain. The WarmMark are ascending time-temperature indicator alerts users of exposure to unacceptably high temperature conditions and the cumulative amount of time of the exposure.
ColdMark descending temperature indicators are single-use devices that provide accurate, irreversible evidence of a below-temperature deviation allowing you to make smarter decisions across the cold chain. ColdMark is designed to help shippers identify and correct gaps in their cold chain. The ColdMark turns from clear to violet when the temperature goes below a predetermined threshold.
Tilt & Impact Indicators
The TiltWatch® XTR is single-use
tip indicator used to monitor goods that must remain upright. Once applied to the packaging, the TiltWatch XTR will provide evidence of mishandling if the shipment is tipped. However, the tilt indicator remains unaffected by movement resulting from normal handling. ShockW
atch® 2 impact indicators are single-use, go/no-go devices that determine if fragile products have been dropped during transit or in storage. The indicators are field-armable, tamperproof devices that turn bright red when an impact beyond a specific threshold has occurred. Each ShockWatch® 2 has a unique identifier to support traceability. ShockWatch® Companion Labels and Alert Tape provides an unmistakable visual alert that impact indicators are in use and reinforcement that proper handling procedures are required.
With the 
ShockWatch® RFID (radio-frequency identification) tag, it’s nearly impossible for items damaged by impacts to get past the supply chain. Simply choose the appropriate impact threshold and affix the ShockWatch RFID tag. Then, each time that a package or asset is remotely scanned by an RFID reader, its condition is entered automatically into the enterprise resource planning (ERP) software or warehouse management system.
By combining traditional RFID inventory management with impact-damage monitoring, managers can use their existing ultra-high frequency (UHF) RFID infrastructure to Deter, Detect, and Diagnose damage throughout the supply chain.
As trusted experts of all thing’s cargo security related since 1873, TydenBrooks will ensure our customers meet the demands of today’s transportation security requirements. Whether you require advanced real-time tracking and monitoring, ISO 17712 high security seals, temperature and damage indicators, plastic indicative seals or void security tapes and labels, we supply proven multi-layered security solutions tailored to all industries.
If you are interested in learning more about our latest innovations and a free no-obligation shipment consultation, get in touch with us today at [email protected] or contact us at 1-800-458-7325 (SEAL).
