The Freight Forecast Nobody Wants – But Everyone Needs

Thu, Sep 11, 2025, 10:41 AM 6 min read

If you’ve been sitting at a fuel island wondering when this market’s going to flip, you’re not alone. And you’re not crazy for thinking it still feels off—because it is.

At a recent industry event, two heavy-hitters in trucking leadership said what many folks in our Playbook community have already been feeling in their gut:

“It’s going to be a bumpy next 12 to 18 months,”
—Matt Parry, SVP of Account Management, Werner Enterprises

“The market isn’t likely to improve much. Costs have risen more than 5% in each of the past three years.”
—Sam Anderson, CEO, Bay and Bay Transportation

These aren’t startup execs guessing at trends. These are leaders of legacy carriers, speaking to rooms full of shippers and brokers. If they’re saying this out loud on a microphone, then you can bet they’ve been seeing it in their balance sheets for a while.

So what do you do with that kind of info when you’re a small fleet owner? You don’t panic. You prepare.

Let’s break it down.

When Matt Parry says “a bumpy next 12 to 18 months,” he’s not just talking about the big boys. He’s indirectly talking about you—the 1-to-10 truck carrier trying to stay alive while spot rates flirt with break-even and insurance goes up again.

When Sam Anderson says costs have risen more than 5% each year for the past three years, that’s the kind of math most folks don’t even want to run. But he’s right. And if you haven’t raised your internal cost-per-mile projections by at least 15% since 2022, you’re behind.

These aren’t just soundbites. These are sirens.

“Bumpy” doesn’t mean disaster. But it does mean unpredictable.

You might see freight volumes bounce in July, then drop in August. Rates might spike in certain lanes—only to get flooded by new trucks in 3 weeks. That’s the cycle we’re in.

What’s fueling the chaos:

• Excess capacity still hasn’t left the market.
  

• Shippers are tightening budgets.
  

• Interest rates and financing costs are still high.
  

• Used equipment values are dropping, but new truck payments are still heavy.
  

In short, everything costs more—but nobody’s paying more.

Parry added that he’s optimistic about the 2025 holiday shipping season.

That’s great. But here’s the catch: holiday shipping has always been seasonal. If your business model relies on a good Christmas to survive the rest of the year, you’ve got a cash flow problem, not a freight problem.

Let that be the bonus—not the bailout.

Sam Anderson said it clearly: operating costs have risen more than 5% each of the past three years. Think about that: