Neil Horner from Laltex Promo would like to draw the industry’s attention to the new hurdles that Laltex and other importers are having to overcome in their attempts to import products into the country.

UK haulage problems have meant that the movement of goods from the port to warehouses is taking, in some instances, over two weeks, greatly increasing leadtimes when getting new product in.

Following new legislation from the European Union, there is now a national shortage of drivers due to the cost for drivers to train and retrain for their HGV licences. Many firms have found that a large number of drivers have simply retired or taken new jobs driving smaller vehicles, rather than training for this new EU legislation. This is creating severe backlogs at port which are impacting on the speed at which all suppliers can get goods into production and delivered to customers.

At Laltex they are personalising goods quicker than ever before, with a leadtime of 5 days from approval of artwork as standard for our orders, however the above problem is making their job much harder. They will be working with distributors to make sure orders are fulfilled on time, however this emphasizes how important it is for customers to order their merchandise and Christmas gifts as soon as possible. Below is a link to the story on Sky News.

http://news.sky.com/story/1351478