Shipping Container

A shipping container is a container built strong enough to withstand the shipment, storage and handling of goods, a term covering forms from large reusable steel boxes down to corrugated cardboard boxes, though it is most closely associated with the standardized steel intermodal container used in international freight. Reusable steel boxes built to the size of a truck trailer first came into use around 1956, replacing the older practice of loading break-bulk cargo piece by piece into a ship's hold, a slow and labor-intensive process. Standardized shipping containers made a major contribution to the globalization of commerce in the second half of the twentieth century by sharply cutting the cost of transporting goods over long distances, and roughly seventeen million intermodal containers are in use worldwide today, carrying a large share of all internationally traded freight.