Anyone here directly dealing with trucking, logistics, etc. in their job? (Domestic)

I work in sales for a distributor, so rising freight costs are a pretty big deal to me and my customers.

Costs have been creeping up slowly over the past year or so and I don't know the historical trends (I've only been in this job for 1 yr). Are transportation costs expected to continue to rise and probably never come back to reasonable levels?

How soon do we expect to see adoption of automation/"driver-assisted" type technology?

Is trucking a dying industry?

Thoughts?

TIA.

No way trucking is dying. Truckers - maybe. There is a massive shortage of drivers, and no one young wants to do it. As long as we keep buying more stuff from China shipped in containers (prediction: we will), then trucking needs will keep growing. Finding the folks to drive is the limiting factor...

The cost is only going to rise along with transport times. Electronic tracking and logs are going to force drivers to follow the rules.

Trucking definitely isn't a dying industry, but when driverless cars finally hit the road in a meaningful way the next move will be in 18 wheelers. Both of which will probably happen faster than we realize.

The reason freight rates have gone up in the last year is because of the new electronic log book regulations. It should start leveling out this year.

I hire trucks on a daily basis.

Fuel is a major driver of shipping cost and the price for diesel is close to 20% above 12 months ago and forecasted to climb.

I work at a large online retailer in the trans org. In my opinion, you are seeing truck costs increase because of demand. It's similar to when oil was hot a few years ago and the demand for sand was high. Back then we would have five jobs for every truck which meant the carriers could pick and choose and charge more to get first priority. Expect this trend to continue. We're planning for there to be a shortage in capacity this year and all our efforts are on shipping smarter and reducing waste (empty space, empty backhauls, dwell time).

Tsuag10 - I just sent you a PM, but reposting here in case it is helpful for the board.

I work for Ryder in DFW. You are correct - we are seeing freight/transportation costs increase nationwide. This is due to the current driver shortage, new DOT regulations requiring Electronic Logging Devices (ELD) and increasing maintenance costs for fleet vehicles.

The total impact the ELD systems will have on freight costs has yet to be seen, but the consensus across the industry is this will only continue to drive prices higher. This assumption is pushing many companies to find more cost effective and creative solutions to keep their transportation costs as low as possible.

I have some information on recent studies that have been completed regarding transportation cost trends. I am happy to send that to you, or anyone else who is interested. Send me a PM with your email address, and I will forward that information to you.

https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/PCU484121484121?output_view=pct_3mths

The trucking industry can be very cyclical. 2014 was one of the more profitable years for trucking companies. So trucking companies wanted to grow trucks so they could increase revenue. So they went out and bought more trucks and over saturated the market. We had too many trucks and not enough loads for them. So that drove rates down and forced companies to try and sale trucks/ take them out of service. Over the past year things have changed and there arent enough trucks to haul the loads out there. So carriers can be picky and raise rates

A good thing to look at is the new truck purchases each month. Guess what trucking companies are doing now that rates have gone up so much recently? try to buy more trucks and grow. I think I heard new truck purchases were at all time high in one of the recent months. So with more trucks it should even things out some.This time around we will have the ELD effect. Which will make things interesting. I could see some of the smaller companies go out of business that can't afford to go to ELDs.

I am curious what some of the drivers will do that use to drive for small companies and run illegal. They wont be able to go to the big companies and make the same amount of money. Will they be ok with that or search for a new career??

Any of you guys in the trucking industry in the Houston area? We have a brokerage that is heavily dependant on shipping and we're exploring adding logistics / shipping to our brokerage offering. We've started small scale, but would love to talk and network with anyone in the industry. We're looking at hosting a happy hour in the next week or two if anyone is interested.

Are there any local groups (LinkedIn, Facebook, etc) we should look to join as well in our effort to gain knowledge and network?