GGL - South Korea

Time flies, and memories lost… Sometimes, we lose memories which must be kept in our mind…

I was wondering if I could sugar-coat our history during the past decade by the name of “success”. For that reason, (well, it could be another reason that I tend to seclude myself from the crowds) I have hesitated so long to introduce our humble growth to you all, while other iCargo Alliance members are achieving more glorious goals than ours. But I made up my mind to talk about ourselves with you to do our own duty as a member and to return the favour that iCargo Alliance has given us.

It would be great pleasure for us if you happen to get any small insight from our story.

1. Being a member of iCargo Alliance

GGL was founded in 2007 and we are celebrating our 15th anniversary this year. Joining iCargo Alliance is the very turning point to define our identity as a consolidator. With iCargo Alliance, founded in 2012, we could become No.1 consolidator in Korea which have flexible transhipment system, overtaking other reputable ones.?

The reason why most consolidators in Korea are in decline is because they do not have organic overseas system.

We are moving as a team in the name of iCargo Alliance with strong support from destination agents such as MSL, Pier17, IFS group, and FPS, and from origin ones like Eurasia, CP Asia, and Marine Star.

It has helped us secure enough imports and exports through transhipment cargoes and do business without limit.

I would like to highlight that it is the most important driving force of our growth. I cannot thank everyone enough, especially Eurasia, CP group, and Marine Star who helped us join iCargo Alliance.

And it is grateful from the depth of our heart to have energetic friends – Maya, RSMs, and best partner ever, Franky.

We have recently renewed our website for our agents. You can more easily find t/s schedule and export/import schedule on it now.

2. Autonomy-based company

When it comes to operating a company, I face a dilemma between creativity of our staffs and unity of system. Autonomy boosts up creativity but it makes us build unified system very hard. On the other hand, it is the best tool to manage efficiently our creative and passionate people.

I could not give up anything between autonomy and unity but, if possible, I dare to give priority to autonomy. That’s why I have not measured performance of each salesman and each operator with digitized figures. I would like to say that I am so lucky to get a chance to have lots of self-motivated and loyal people.?

3. One stop CFS

50% of Korean major consolidators, including GGL, have one-stop CFS. We have the biggest CFS among them and its size measures 56,996㎡, 227m * 250m. So we've a huge advantage of attracting small consolidators’ cargoes that don't have CFS.

We do not consider them as our competitors. Same rates on transhipment cargoes apply to their cargoes as ours. It makes us attract their transhipment cargoes with ease. In other words, we can handle our competitors’ cargoes as well as our freehand cargo and ICA members’ nominations.

Rather than hiring more salesmen and increasing competition in Korean market, just being a friend of small consolidators is our strategy to get their cargoes into our consol boxes, which allows us to make one unitized CFS in Busan.

“I would like to say that I am so lucky to get a chance to have lots of self-motivated and loyal people.”?

4. GGL becoming a logistics platform

One of the most important points in global logistics market caused by Covid-19 is that securing space and empty containers from carriers.

It was very troublesome especially in Busan, as hub port in Northeast Asia.

3PL departments of major companies, companies specialized in CAP business, and we consolidators… Up to recently, these three parties had played their own special roles in US export market. Due to coronavirus pandemic, however, scarcity of space for US occurred and it let them expand their business scope to each other’s.?

We thought that we should get out of just focusing LCL market. Now we go into this flow by cooperation with major 3PL companies, expansion of storage service, and direct contract with shipping companies.

We think that it should be future pipeline for GGL to handle all freights – LCL and FCL – through turnkey based contact with a certain company, not struggling in red ocean in Korea that is called LCL.

It seems that loyal customers and good relationships with carriers would be our stepping stone to operate excellent CAP business. Furthermore, our CFS is in best condition to store increasing cargoes.?

Thanks to our new pipelines, we are already seeing meaningful figures this year.

Epilogue

I wish I did not have bad habit of listening only to what I want to listen to, but some people in this industry talk about our success.?

It is true that we are growing so fast now as 3PL specialist beyond consolidator.?

But being an ICA member was a starting point for all these successes. GGL have done and will do our best for iCargo Alliance and its members with much gratitude and appreciation.?

With our all heart, we sincerely hope all members’ good luck.