Enrica Centorame is Managing Director of Global Forwarding, a Melbourne-based domestic and international freight business.

We have faced challenging times since December, when bushfires affected some of our clients. Then coronavirus travel restrictions and lockdowns made moving freight more difficult and expensive. Border closures and no international flights have severely impacted our core services, with job numbers nosediving 47% in April. That was terrifying, though things are picking up now.

Eighty percent of our clients are small-to-medium enterprises and their ability to pay us on time was a concern, so we extended credit terms from 30 to 60 days.

Predicting how our industry will recover as the world reopens is almost impossible. All forecasting has gone out the window, and it will depend on how many businesses are still standing. We have a fairly solid client base so we really hope some domestic flights will resume in July and some international travel will start in October-November, allowing us to optimise the pre-Christmas bounce-back.

We’ve kept in close contact with clients and I’ve become more active on social media like LinkedIn building new networks and engaging in business advocacy. The benefit of pandemic pandemonium is that I’ve rediscovered how much I really love what I do – and that’s exactly why I do it.

My team has responded so well to the challenges of working from home. COVID-19 has taken a toll on us all. I’ve made an effort to read a book weekly, start personal training sessions and practise neuroplasticity by doing something completely new every day to keep the brain super active!

Enrica Centorame
Managing Director
Global Forwarding