Wholesaling a service gap: Blue Coast Intermodal wants to reinvent US West Coast supply chains

Fairplay – Logistics and Supply Chain, 10/21/2010
(download pdf)

Stephen Pepper is anxious to prove that government money can spark demand for a service that supply and demand alone has yet to achieve.
Pepper, the president of Humboldt Maritime Logistics, says that he and partner Abraham Hyatt have figured out a way to provide box capacity for international and domestic shippers along the US West Coast that complements – rather than competes – with ocean carriers and long-haul trucking companies. HML’s Blue Coast Intermodal (BCI) is an $80M container-on-ocean barge system that Pepper and Hyatt plan to market as a wholesale service to liner operators and truckers as extensions of their own services.
The scheme, known by government officials as the West Coast Hub-Feeder Project, was awarded $275,000 in September by the US Department of Transportation to help get it off the ground. It was one of several projects for which the DOT provided a total of $7M to either kick-start or expand in support of a national Marine Highway programme. [...]

The Shipping News

Washington Monthly, July 2010
(link | download pdf)

[...] But if crude oil goes up to $91 a barrel, the trucking cost jumps to $2.28 per mile. And if oil reaches $157 a barrel, the trucking cost jumps up to $3.24. By comparison, even if oil is at $157 a barrel, the cost of moving that same container one mile by barge is only twenty-eight cents, less than a tenth of the trucking cost.
One entrepreneur who is very aware of such calculations is Stephen J. Pepper, founder of Humboldt Maritime Logistics. Pepper is trying to start a service that would allow shippers to move containers by barge from the port of Oakland up and down the Pacific coast. At current fuel prices, he says, such a service is cost competitive with trucks, but only barely so. With even a modest uptick in fuel prices, though, the numbers would shift dramatically in favor of barge over truck. [...]

Thompson lauds harbor efforts, announces federal grant for shipping study

The Times-Standard, 10/06/2010
(download pdf)

During a tour of the Eureka waterfront on Tuesday, Congressman Mike Thompson and harbor officials announced a $275,000 federal grant meant to analyze the market for a marine shipping service along the West Coast.
The St. Helena Democrat said that the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Maritime Administration grant is a step toward revitalizing Humboldt Bay as a harbor, which would bring jobs and provide for more efficient and cleaner shipping. Thompson said that he was immediately sold on the idea of having a feeder barge service that moves goods from smaller ports to larger ones, and that the Secretary of Transportation understood the potential for the project.
”This first phase is an emphasis of that commitment,” Thompson said.
The West Coast Hub-Feeder Initiative proposed by Eureka-based Humboldt Maritime Logistics. [...]

Humboldt County barge project gets federal attention

The Times-Standard, 08/17/2010
(download pdf)

[...] A local entrepreneur’s efforts to establish a marine shipping service along the West Coast and a four-port initiative to build infrastructure to support it have earned recognition — and the prospect of funding — from the U.S. Department of Transportation.
The department’s finding makes the projects eligible for federal funding. Also, a designation of an “M-5 Marine Highway Corridor” by the Transportation Department recognizes how Interstate Highway 5 and a marine distribution network along the California, Oregon and Washington coasts may work together to increase efficiency, and reduce pollution and traffic congestion.
The Humboldt Bay Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District is the public partner of Eureka-based Humboldt Maritime Logistics. Its concept of shipping goods from smaller ports to larger harbors by barge and vice versa is determined to be a fit for the federal marine highway initiative. [...]

Harbor District committee weighs in on Humboldt Bay economy

The Times-Standard, 04/30/2010
(download pdf)

[...] Stephen Pepper of Humboldt Maritime Logistics, which has been developing a plan for Short Sea Shipping, said that recent actions by the federal government to complete a marine highway incentive will help spur development of the project. Pepper said he expects to be engaging additional partners for the venture, and to start a West Coast market analysis of its feasibility.
He said that upcoming requirements for large ships to upgrade fuels — and the rising cost of fuel — will make shippers more likely to use only one port to pick up goods before crossing the Pacific. That would encourage Short Sea Shipping, he said. [...]

KMUD radio news spot

Air date: 05/29/2009
(download mp3)

On May 28, HML president Steven Pepper took part in a Humboldt Bay Economic Development Forum panel. The Forum is a series of conversations between business and economic leaders who have a mutual interest in Humboldt Bay. The news story focuses on Stephen at the 2:23 mark.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Sea Change

North Coast Journal, 04/16/2009
(link | download pdf)

[...] What next? If there’s an immediate beneficiary of this dash of cold water on the Bay District’s collective face, that would be Stephen Pepper, the young tugboat captain who has been looking to institute a short-sea shipping service along the Pacific Coast for the last couple of years. Pepper’s plan — to build a bus-like barge service for cargo between Longview, Wash. and Long Beach, with stops in between at Oakland and Humboldt and possibly elsewhere — has never had any significant opposition from any quarter. It’s scaled to fit the needs of the county, and can scale up if those needs increase. Pepper’s nascent company, Humboldt Maritime Logistics, still has a long upward climb ahead of it, but the stars seem to be aligning in its favor. A federal initiative to promote such short-sea shipping routes is just coming online, and with the Bay District’s priorities now reconfigured it can devote more attention to the project. [...]

Short sea shipping being pitched by maritime group

The Times-Standard, 11/26/2008
(download pdf)

Stephen Pepper sees an opportunity for Humboldt Bay — and it doesn’t involve enormous ships, dredging, a railroad or large amounts of public money.

It’s also something that’s been quietly steaming along, a little behind the scenes, in the conversation about how the port might become a greater economic engine in the region.

Short sea shipping involves moving cargo and containers from one American port to another, where it can be shipped across the ocean to a final destination. Pepper, who has worked in the tugboat industry and formed a logistical outfit called Humboldt Maritime Logistics, sees an operation that would use tugs and barges to move goods between five different West Coast ports, including Humboldt Bay. [...]

New Wave: Short-sea shipping’s on the horizon, and Stephen Pepper wants to tug it in

North Coast Journal, 11/20/2008
(link | download pdf)

As visions of cruise ships bearing moneybags tourists danced through people’s heads at last Friday’s harbor commission meeting — delighting a few, perhaps, but apparently provoking headaches in most — one young man sat quietly in the back row of the audience with a different vision occupying his brain.

The Humboldt Bay Harbor, Recreation and Conservation District Commission was discussing the final business plan for developing the Redwood Marine Terminal, that currently dilapidated expanse on the bay side of the Samoa Peninsula whose fate has been handed to the harbor district. The plan — by consultants TranSystems — would have the district seek $40 million to build a multipurpose berth that could handle everything from commercial cargo shipping to the aforesaid cruisers, plus various non-cargo endeavors. And it would expand over time. The commissioners job this night was to vote on whether to proceed with an environmental review of the first phase. [...]

Short Sea Shipping Without The Fancy New Terminal?

Arcata Eye, 11/18/2008
(download pdf)

As Humboldt talks about and debates the prospects of railroad and port redevelopment, an Arcata resident is proposing a shipping plan that relies on what’s already here.

Stephen Pepper believes his plan to launch a local maritime transport company can improve Humboldt’s access to coastal area markets, reduce shipping costs for local businesses and create jobs. Licensed as a tugboat captain since 1999, Pepper said he’s worked for a variety of tug and barge companies but is on hiatus now to do something more personal — start his own company.

Dubbed Humboldt Maritime Logistics, Pepper’s project would use the Pacific Affiliates Marine Terminal in Eureka as a freight conduit for short sea shipping — barging goods now hauled by truck to ports up and down the west Coast. In a letter to the county’s Harbor District, he said a “preliminary agreements” with Pacific Affiliates have been secured, and in an interview, Pepper said he’s also gotten a significant show of interest from GSC Logistics, a trucking company based in the Port of Oakland.

He doesn’t claim to be testing new waters. [...]

MEDIA CONTACT: Stephen Pepper, president. Cell: (707) 616-5244. Email: info@humboldtlogistics.com.