Moving FCL or LCL

What’s the difference between a groupage and a full container?

When moving overseas, there are different types of shipping containers you may use to ship your household goods. Depending on the volume of your move, you may require either a 20-foot container or a 40-foot container.

Besides choosing your container size, you also have to consider whether you’ll be shipping in a shared container or one that’s completely yours. When your household goods can’t completely fill a container for your move, you may choose to ship them in a shared container, also known as LCL shipping, or groupage.

LCL shipping

In LCL shipping, you pay only for the space your household good occupies in the container. Your belongings will be stacked alongside goods of others. That said, every single step such as packaging and wrapping needs to be handled with care to avoid any damages or losses. The minimum volume required to send household goods via groupage is 2m3.

FCL shipping

If you have enough household goods to fill an entire container, you then have the option of shipping them via FCL shipping. In FCL shipping, you will have the entire container space exclusively for yourself. This is the more popular option when it comes to movings. If you’re also moving your vehicle, you will most likely need a full container.

What’s the difference between a 20-foot and 40-foot container?

The difference between these two commonly-used containers lies in their size and space. In general, a 20-foot container can fit all furnitures and personal effects of a 80m2 apartment.

Whereas a 40-foot container can fit all furnitures and personal effects of a 100m2 apartment, including a car and two motorcycles.

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