Carriers Are Navigating a Market 'Forged in Disruption'
But the trucking industry is seeing signs of recovery
“The changes we're seeing aren't temporary disruptions,” said Korhan Acar, a partner in Kearney's Strategic Operations practice and the report's lead author. “Tariff complexity, geopolitical uncertainty, changing trade flows, AI adoption and new network designs are becoming permanent features of the logistics landscape.”
The U.S. truckload market is beginning to recover after an extended freight recession, but the improvements are being driven by capacity leaving the market rather than increases in demand. About 89,000 carriers have left the market since 2022. “We can say with a high degree of confidence that the downcycle has come to an end and we are clearly in the path to recovery,” said Andres Mendoza Pena, a co-author of the study and partner at Kearney.
The change in capacity has driven rates higher. Spot rates rose from $1.65 to $2.01 per mile between November 2025 and February 2026, while contract rates increased more modestly to $2.12. However, “carriers should avoid mistaking a supply reset for a demand boom," the report warned. "Shippers should avoid assuming that soft national freight indicators guarantee easy capacity."
Acar added that pricing, capacity and service reliability are varying sharply by region and by lane. “Truckload is no longer one national market, with pricing capacity increasingly varying by region and by lane,” he said.
The market now behaves less like a single national market and more like a collection of lane-level markets, with pricing, capacity and service reliability varying sharply by corridor. In response, major shippers are moving from annual bid cycles to continuous, dynamic procurement and creating more strategic networks.
Shippers still have leverage, but they will have to work harder to maintain it. “When the last bids went through, it was very much a shipper’s market. That is shifting back. This is about the relationship, and this is where you work together when there are ebbs and flows,” said Doug Cantriel, head of North American transportation and modernization at Ford. “When you’re in an industry where you can potentially put trucking companies out of business with network bids, you’ve got to be very, very cognizant of what you’re doing.”
As the market recovers, driver availability remains a concern and is becoming a part of network decisions and shipper conversations. “Thinking about your network and clicking together your network with the driver experience in mind is really critical,” said Stacy Schlachter, senior vice president of sales at Penske Logistics.
Schlachter added that Penske has implemented a lot of relays to help get drivers home at night. “As you design networks and as you're working with your carrier partners, talk about the driver experience, because it does matter.”
Schlachter, Cantriel, Mendoza Pena and Acar participated in a panel discussion following the release of the report, which is produced annually for CSCMP by the global consulting firm Kearney and presented by Penske Logistics. They were joined by Paul Bingham, director of transportation consulting for S&P Global Market Intelligence; and Beth Rooney, director of port operations for the Port of New York and New Jersey.
Shippers Look for Solutions Beyond Truckload
As truckload capacity becomes less predictable, shippers are considering a broader range of transportation options, including partial truckload, intermodal, private fleet and hybrid models. “The point is not to abandon truckload; in many lanes, truckload will still be crucial because the service characteristics are difficult to substitute. The point is to understand where alternative transportation models can reduce volatility or improve the total cost-to-service equation,” the report stated.
Partial truckload has grown more relevant as shippers look for options in the space between less-than-truckload (LTL) and full truckload. For the right freight, truck leasing can reduce the cost of unused trailer capacity while avoiding some of the handling complexity that comes with LTL. It works best when carriers or brokers can combine compatible freight, build efficient pickup and delivery sequences, and preserve service commitments.
Intermodal offers another option, it is “not an automatic escape valve,” according to the report. “Intermodal can become more attractive when truckload capacity tightens, yet if truckload rates rise materially, intermodal pricing often follows, especially where rail providers have pricing power or demand shifts quickly from highway to rail.”
Collaboration Between Carriers, Shippers and 3PLs Is Increasing
Changes to the market are changing how shippers are engaging with logistics partners. In the past, shippers often asked providers to solve a narrowly defined problem. Today, they are more likely to ask partners to help shape the answer.
“I think there's more openness to 3PLs, motor carriers to come back with answers that leverage their geographic coverage, their capacity, their assets, and really bring the best answer,” Schlachter said. “Then, usually, there's a lot of back and forth with the shipper and the partner to come up with what ‘best’ looks like, and so there's more openness to being agile together.”
Schlachter said that approach requires greater transparency across the supply chain. “I think transparency is apparent now. I think we are much more transparent in the supply chain industry than we've ever been, sharing with our partners things we used to hold very close to ourselves, which is allowing for that collaboration to take place and to solve bigger problems collectively,” she said.
The ongoing risk of disruptions is making agility a top priority, and logistics leaders need to design for resilience, not just efficiency. “Network architecture must now account for geopolitical disruption scenarios as a baseline condition, not an exceptional one,” according to the report.
“We're also seeing shifts on the warehousing side,” said Schlachter. Warehouse networks are becoming more distributed and regionalized — often using smaller, strategically located facilities as part of a broader footprint. “In turn, shippers are asking for more flexible arrangements as a way to prepare for the unexpected changes coming into their networks,” Schlachter said. “Shippers are definitely recognizing that they are in a structural change, and they want their agreements to represent that.”
The report also recommends leaders prioritize asset productivity. “In a higher-cost-of-capital environment, extracting greater utilization and efficiency from existing assets will become an increasingly important driver of returns,” the report stated.
Penske’s Catalyst AI™ helps fleets benchmark their performance against similar fleets and gain visibility into key metrics, including maintenance, fuel efficiency and fleet utilization. Those insights can help fleets identify where existing assets can perform better before they add capacity or expand their footprint.
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The SOL report, which is available for download, also provides detailed information on logistics and transportation costs, structural forces defining the macro environment, the growing role of artificial intelligence and other dynamics shaping the current business landscape.