Quest for Quality 2024: Less than Truckload (LTL)

As our trucking correspondent John Schulz recently reported, the cessation of Yellow continues to have repercussions throughout the $60+ billion less-than-truckload (LTL) market.

According to Schulz, as we roll through 2024, the market is going to see a shuffling of the capacity equation continue to cause strategic changes, and shippers will need to adapt to the new alignment of resources to find operational success as volumes tick back up in 2025.

“We’re seeing LTLs who purchased terminals after Yellow went bankrupt last August start to open up those sites,” reports Schulz. “And many more locations that were converted from Yellow will open shortly. It remains to be seen how all that extra capacity coming on line will make an impact in the short term; however, our analysts believe that the purchase of those sites will bode well for those carriers in the long term.”

According to the readers of Logistics Management, the 21 LTL carriers taking home Quest for Quality gold have managed to maintain exceptional service, even during a period of time when the market realized a seismic shift in capacity redistribution, consolidation and operational adjustments.

In this year’s National category, Old Dominion Freight Line put up the top weight score (51.65), and led all five attribute categories this year. In Northeast/Mid-Atlantic, we found two carriers, A. Duie Pyle (50.02) and Pitt Ohio (49.15) posting above average weighted scores this year.

We also have two winners in the South/South Central this year. Southeastern Freight Lines (52.23) and Averitt (47.58) both scored above the weighted average. In the Midwest/North Central region this year, Dayton Freight Lines put up top marks with a weighted score of 45.10.

Lynden Transport put up a 14.28 in On-Time Performance attribute score and went on to post a stunning 57.50 total weighted score in the Western region, the highest total average in this year’s LTL category—and one of highest of this year’s survey.

As is tradition, Surface Package Carriers rounds out this year’s category. And, as always, we find UPS and FedEx Ground both taking home Quest for Quality gold. For the third year in a row, UPS pulls in with a top weighted score (49.84), posting top scores in all five attribute categories.

National LTL Carriers

(Bold indicates leader in attribute category)

Source: Logistics Management, Peerless Research Group (PRG)

Surface Package Carriers

(Bold indicates leader in attribute category)

Source: Logistics Management, Peerless Research Group (PRG)

Northeast/Mid-Atlantic Regional LTL Carriers

(Bold indicates leader in attribute category)

Source: Logistics Management, Peerless Research Group (PRG)

South/South Central Regional LTL Carriers

(Bold indicates leader in attribute category)

Source: Logistics Management, Peerless Research Group (PRG)

Midwest/North Central Regional LTL Carriers

(Bold indicates leader in attribute category)

Source: Logistics Management, Peerless Research Group (PRG)

Western Regional LTL Carriers

(Bold indicates leader in attribute category)

Source: Logistics Management, Peerless Research Group (PRG)