FCL means full container load: you buy the whole container or the whole trailer, it loads at one place and unloads at one place, and nobody else’s cargo shares it. LTL means less than truckload: you buy pallet spaces on a vehicle that carries other consignments. For frozen food the difference is not only price per pallet, it is the number of times a door opens on the way.
Practical comparison
| Full load | Part load or LTL | Groupage | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unit of pricing | Per trailer or container | Per pallet space | Per pallet or per 100 kg |
| Cheaper at | High volume | Mid volume | Low volume |
| Handling events | Two | Two to four | Four or more |
| Temperature exposure | Lowest | Moderate | Highest |
| Schedule control | Highest | Moderate | Network driven |
Finding your own break-even
Divide the full-trailer rate on the corridor by the per-pallet groupage rate. The result is the pallet count at which a whole trailer becomes cheaper. On Ukraine to western Europe lanes it usually lands somewhere in the high teens to low twenties of pallets, but it moves with the season and with backhaul availability, so ask for both quotes in the same week.
What the arithmetic misses
Add an expected quality cost. If groupage historically loses you one pallet in forty to clumping or damage and a full load loses one in four hundred, that difference belongs in the comparison. Compare landed cost per kilogram of saleable product, not freight cost per shipment.
Full analysis: FCL, LTL and groupage for frozen food.