Holiday shopping season will face supply chain challenges, expert warns
Toys, clothing and electronics will be hardest to come by this year, Freightwaves CEO Craig Fuller said
Global supply chain crisis poses ‘challenging’ holiday shopping season: Expert
Freightwaves founder and CEO Craig Fuller says items like toys, electronics and sneakers will be harder to get this holiday season.
Freightwaves founder and CEO Craig Fuller warned on "Mornings with Maria" Friday that this year’s holiday shopping season will be a challenge as the global economy faces a supply chain crisis.
Fuller, whose company analyzes data on how cargo and physical products are moved through the economy, recommended shoppers to buy those "hard-to-get" items sooner rather than later.
"These delays are significant," Fuller told FOX Business’ Maria Bartiromo. "I would recommend everyone to go ahead and buy those hard-to-get items now versus waiting until the holidays."
Toys, clothing and electronics will be hardest to come by this year, according to Fuller.
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"Toys are probably going to be the hardest because they're manufactured in Vietnam and China, which has substantial risk," Fuller explained. "The risks really are on the Pacific trade plane into the West Coast ports. That's where the most substantial risks are in terms of sourcing supply."
The pressure to provide more supply as demand goes up could "substantially" add to the already rising product prices, Fuller pointed out.
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Freightwaves founder and CEO Craig Fuller on the global supply chain crisis impacting prices and inventory.
"I think the bigger risk to businesses is just not having inventory," Fuller explained, "so demand isn't a problem right now. It's really just having the inventory to provide consumers with those items that they need."
Cargo and shipping disruptions have likely been the result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the executive director of the busiest container port complex in the U.S. told Bartiromo on Monday.
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Drone shot of a massive container ship arriving in the Port of Long Beach, California. (istock / iStock)
He explained that there have been "delays from the cargo coming from China," pointing out that there are "major ports" in China and when one COVID-19 positive worker is detected, terminals are shut down.
Because of this, Fuller predicts the U.S. won’t see a normalized supply chain until 2023.
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FOX Business' Talia Kaplan contributed to this report.