The first stage of survey was conducted using open-ended questions to obtain information
about the transportation outsour
cing practices and to determine common important service
features in shippers' mind. The questionna
ire was mailed with an enclosed post-paid
envelope to 400 manufacturers of automotiv
e parts and 300 manufacturers of consumer
goods sampled from the published 1998-1999 Direct
ory of Manufacturing Firms in Industrial
Estates in Thailand. The target
shippers of our survey were
those firms located in Bangkok
Metropolitan Area and the Eastern Seaboard
because these two areas have the highest
concentration of producti
on activities in Thailand.
The first stage survey utilized
a one-page questionnaire consisti
ng of two parts of questions.
The first part requested brief information about
the business profiles of
target companies and
their experience with transportation outs
ourcing. The second part was an open-ended
question asking respondents to indi
cate what they felt to be
the most relevant service
attributes when selecting motor carriers.
It was quite unfortunate that
despite a series of solicitati
on and follow-up efforts, only 25
questionnaires were returned
by manufacturers of automotive parts, and 15 by those of
consumer goods, resulting in a disappoin
tedly low response rate of 8.3% and 5.0%
respectively. Given the respons
es obtained from this survey together with the information
acquired during the literature review, a total of
48 service features were identified to be