Where does an intermodal container usually go from a sea port?

The customer.

 

There is (at least was) a Walmart DC in Williamsburg Virginia where I picked up a lot of freight that was shipped into the US that came from a Hampton Roads port. These shipping containers go all over the country.

 

None.

Walmart has a purchasing system just like meijers, Kroger, fryies, Best Buy, abc, and any other big box store.

There are vendors but they get their products directly from the ports.

 

I dont think it's always that cut and dry... A lot of times stuff can arrive in California by boat, then get taken by truck to rail yard where it goes by train to say Chicago and then once again after arriving in Chicago gets taken by truck to its destination...

 

I have sat watching I 64 many times near Williamsburg Va. I would be willing to bet at least half of the truck traffic is containers going and coming back empty. I have seen the same thing around the freeways in places where there are ports. You drive long enough you will start to notice you are picking up freight that came from overseas. I have also hauled freight from American Businesses into ports. There are also a lot of crossdocks esp up in New Jersey where they deal with either incoming or outgoing freight. To be honest this discovery you are undertaking will take a while to find. I used to go into ports in Florida and pick up bananas for grocery warehouses. I have also picked up big vats of juice for a place out on I 30 northeast of Dallas.

 

Containers have a limited amount of 'free time' to be emptied. Most go from port or railhead directly to a distribution center.

Wayfair has 3 warehouses within a mile of here, Amazon had 4 between here and Robbinsville, LG electronics has 2; 500,00 square foot places...

We pull around 30,000 containers a year and never take them more than 40 miles form the port...but that's our thing.

Other's run long. My last company ran longer trips [10 years ago] paying the operator $1.00 a mile loaded, $0.80 empty but had contacts inland where they terminated the container and came back loaded with a different can.

Hopefully it pays more today.