📦 Shipped & imported goods — what if freight jumps?
Scenario · not a forecastIf shipping routes are disrupted, freight can rise — but freight is usually only a small part of a shelf price. Enter what you spend a month on shipped or imported goods, set your assumptions, and see a low–mid–high scenario range. Built from your own numbers, not a live freight rate and not a prediction.
Start here — your monthly spend:
Your freight assumptions
If you spend $400/month on imported goods (containerized) and freight rises 30% on a 12% freight share, this scenario shows about $403–$406/month by 1 month — roughly +$5/month at the mid assumption. A scenario, not a forecast.
Your scenario range — move any control to watch it change.
What drives the change?
How it could build over the delay (mid assumption)
Sensitivity — pass-through vs monthly spend
Freight is usually only part of a shelf price. Materials, labour, retail margin, marketing and taxes make up most of what you pay — which is why even a big freight jump moves the final price much less than the headline freight number.
Households Delivery and imported-goods costs can edge up when routes are disrupted, but the freight slice of most items is small.
Businesses Importers and retailers feel freight and delay first; many absorb part of it or reroute rather than pass it all on.
Government Sustained freight disruption feeds into goods inflation and trade balances; reserves and rerouting can cushion it.
What this does not include: measured freight rates or any live shipping index, the large non-freight share of a shelf price, substitution to other routes or suppliers, and inventory buffers that absorb a temporary spike. Treat the range as a way to reason about pressure, not a number to expect.
A scenario built on your own spend and your assumptions — not a forecast, not a live freight rate, not investment advice.
How it works & what it won't do
The shipping-cost calculator turns your own monthly spend on shipped or imported goods into a scenario range. You set how much freight might rise, how much of the final price is actually freight, how much reaches the price, and how long the delay lasts. The tool scopes the freight move to the freight share, shows a low–mid–high range with a driver cascade, a timeline and a sensitivity table, and keeps 'freight is only part of a shelf price' front and centre. It invents no freight rates and forecasts nothing.
- Your spend is the starting point; every other value is an assumption you set.
- Freight is usually a small slice of a shelf price, so even a big freight jump moves the final price much less.
- Channel weights (imported, parcels, perishable, local delivery) are illustrative modelling assumptions.
- Machine-readable at /scenario-lab/shipping-cost/data.json.
What this tool deliberately does not do
- It does not use or forecast measured freight rates or any live shipping index.
- It asserts no current freight cost; the freight rise is an assumption you set.
- It cannot see the large non-freight share of a price, substitution, or inventory buffers.
- It is not investment, procurement, or policy advice.
Machine-readable export: /scenario-lab/shipping-cost/data.json.