Small Fleet recap: The do’s and don’ts of partnering with brokerages

BIO: As CCO of Transportation Insight and Nolan Transportation, Herpich is responsible for fostering and developing partner relationships. He was promoted to CCO after joining Nolan Transportation as executive vice president of enterprise strategy in 2020. He previously spent more than 14 years at Coyote Logistics.

KEY QUOTES FROM HERPICH

On the do’s and don’ts: “The biggest [‘do’] I think about today is making sure you’re working with a broker that has a technology offering and capabilities. That’s more visibility to you, more automation, faster pay. [That technology should help you] run your business, your route optimization, the load matching, so it’s about you being able to go drive and not take the time to find your load on a day-to-day basis.”

“A big ‘do’ would be making sure you’re partnering with a brokerage of scale. Today, there are around 20,000-plus brokers out there. You have a lot of choices. You want to make sure you’re working with a broker that can scale, that can give you the loads you need for your day-to-day business.”

“On the ‘don’ts,’ I’d say: Don’t lean too heavily into these market cycles. These market cycles are going to come and go. We’ve seen a lot of them over the last 15, 20 years. Trucks coming into the market, trucks coming out of the market, demand [changing]. Make sure when you are investing in your operation that you’re being cognizant of this.”