Supply-chain bottlenecks caused by a crush of imports heading into U.S. seaports are pinching retailers’ efforts to stock up as consumers pick up their spending, the Wall Street Journal reported. Executives at Steve Madden Ltd. and Crocs Inc., merchants known for their footwear, both said in their third-quarter reports this week that they were hit by logistics delays in getting goods to distribution centers and stores heading into a critical selling season. “There was sort of a limited supply or a challenge getting containers and vessels, which slowed things down overseas,” Steve Madden Chief Executive and Chairman Ed Rosenfeld said on the company’s earnings call on Tuesday. He said operations at the company’s warehouses and those of its wholesale customers also “have been slower just due to some labor shortages and other disruption due to Covid.” Container shipping lines canceled hundreds of sailings this spring and summer as coronavirus-driven lockdowns sent national economies reeling and global trade withered. But demand snapped back strongly over the summer after businesses reopened and retailers rushed to restock inventories to get goods in place for a hoped-for rebound in the fall.
