The freight market just split in two

The market split in two this week and stopped pretending otherwise. Consumer staples and import-frontloaded freight are running strong while discretionary and industrial lanes sit in the mud, and an early peak surge out of LA means the August capacity crunch could land in July. If you're still pricing your whole book like one market, you're leaving margin on the table in your strong accounts and bleeding it in your weak ones.

Say this

Call your import-driven shippers and lead with this: "Peak is showing up early this year, and LA is already moving 900,000 boxes a month. I want to lock your outbound capacity before the surge prices it for you." For shippers running transload out of the Inland Empire into the Midwest, point out that the carriers are firming on those headhaul lanes right now and committed freight is the only thing that protects them. Frame it as you doing their forecasting for them. The shipper who hears "I'm pre-positioning trucks for your July volume today" hears a partner, not a vendor.

Say this

This is a shipper conversation, not just an internal fix. Call your accounts and say: "There's a Florida case right now testing whether brokers are on the hook for carrier safety, and the verdicts are getting ugly. Here's how I vet every carrier that touches your freight." Walk them through your packet, your CDL and authority checks, your payment-change protocol. Shippers are terrified of fraud and liability bleeding back onto them, so the broker who shows up with a documented vetting process wins on trust before rate ever comes up. Position yourself as the broker who can't get spoofed.

Say this

If you run reefer, call your produce shippers in the PNW and California now, before Monday. Lead with: "Florida's done, capacity is flooding back, and I'm already repositioning carriers toward your fresh resets out west." For California shippers, the reset means a new baseline and you want to be the one setting the rate conversation, not reacting to it. Tell your Southeast accounts honestly that capacity is loosening so they trust you when it tightens. The reefer map redrew itself this week, and the broker who calls first owns the new lanes.

DRY VAN SPOT

$2.37/mi

REEFER SPOT

$2.68/mi

FLATBED SPOT

$2.94/mi

DIESEL

$3.64/gal

This week's cold email line

With LA forecasting over 900,000 boxes a month and peak landing early, I'm locking my shippers' July outbound capacity now instead of paying the spot premium later.

Aim this at import-driven shippers running outbound dry van and reefer out of Southern California or transloading into the Midwest. It lands now because the frontloading surge is real this week and the August crunch they're used to planning around is arriving in July.