A Freight Village (GVZ) is a freight transport center that is understood to be the model concept of a central freight distribution system in which logistics and transport companies cooperate at a convenient location with connections to as many modes of transport as possible. The goal of these freight centers was to act as hubs to mediate the intermodal transfer of freight from roads to rails and inland waterways. A decade after these hubs were established, they have slowly disappeared. Experts argue that the transport of freight by rail has become more attractive, as no attention was paid here to efficient bundling and the willingness of the participants within the supply chain to cooperate was not particularly great, as they had to use their own vehicles for this purpose.
Do any of you have some more background knowledge on the reasons for the disappearance of freight villages?
The German GVZs were one of the first in Europe. It is one of the logistic model which is different than others which were developed in Europe: Interporti (Italy), Transport Centres (Denmark) or Zonas de Actividaedes Logisticas (Spain). I assume that German GVZ model is undergoing a period of transformation all the time playing an important role in the economic system. Rebranding is part of this process.
Interesting, Steffen. Maybe one thing to keep in mind is "just in time delivery," where the need for such intermediate storage facilities is very deliberately reduced.
We've seen this already in large retail stores (and it actually worked against them during the initial COVID pandemic lockdowns!). The product is all on the store shelves, or it is in transit from source to the store. The idea is that having large inventories stored along the supply chain is wasteful. At least, under normal conditions.
I can see where the different suppliers of product would prefer a more decentralized approach, to minimize inventory costs, making their own decisions about when to ship, and what storage costs they have to bear.
During the early days of the pandemic, the stores which relied most on their "just in time delivery" model often had totally bare shelves! Those chains which had more ample warehouses locally, they were better off. At least, initially. But that warehouse space costs money. I'm pretty sure the same calculus applies to any centralized distribution centers.
From my experience the freight village concept does neglect two important insights: a) transshipment and handling costs are tantamount and usually underestimated ex ante; b) competition between LSPs is constantly prohibiting them from cooperating like required in the GVZ approach. So therefore usually they (GVZ) emerge due to political pressure and management "lip service", but the real growth and business value is produced somewhere else.
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