April 29, 2025 • 17 mins
Nate Cross & Ben Kowalski answer your freight brokering questions and discuss:
- Is there a platform where brokers can bid on available freight shipments?
- What should I do if someone is fraudulently using my MC number to book loads?
- I'm getting started as a broker, but people say I can't compete with the big guys—any advice?
- Responding to claims that brokers are "parasites" and the root cause of low rates in the industry.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, welcome back for a final mile edition.
Here we're going to answer somequestions and actually give a
reaction to one of our YouTubehaters at the end here.
But if you're brand new, checkout all the other content at
Freight360.net.
You'll also find the FreightBroker Basics course.
While you're on our website,and please check out all of our
(00:21):
sponsors to help support thischannel.
They're in the description box.
All right, hopping right in.
First question here I'vewondered is there a platform to
bid on freight shipments?
So this is the age old questionof like hey, where do I go find
these customers that need me tomove their freight Right?
(00:42):
The short answer is no.
There's not like a magical,like bidding place out there.
But I'll add two things here.
Number one um, I bet I could gofind 10 customers today that
would put me on their load listand basically send me their this
you know their example or theirversion of this like I'm gonna
(01:02):
get a list of 50 loads andthey're going to say either
here's the price or, you know,bid on these, here's our
upcoming shipment.
So you can get on a load listwhich is basically jump ball
freight goes out to like a tonof people.
So that's kind of an example ofit.
Another scenario would be as ifyou have a customer and all of
(01:23):
their bidding is done through anonline portal.
So once you've gotten onboardedwith them, they're giving you a
chance to work on their freight.
Their stuff is automatedthrough a third party system
online.
I've seen that for a lot ofcustomers where everything's
done on their website or througha third party website but
there's not like a magical loadboard of just customer shipments
out there.
(01:43):
You got anything to add on thatone.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I don't.
I would just say that, like,even in this market, like I've
got brokers that I work withthat are adding one guy, like
two, three new customers a weekand I would say every six to
eight weeks, every month and ahalf to two months a larger one
we're getting an opportunity toeither bid or get on their spot
board.
So I mean there's opportunitiesno matter what market you're in
.
And the thing is about now theupside of the tariffs and all of
(02:11):
this is that, like all thesecompanies are looking at
different sources to supply,meaning they're looking at lanes
they don't normally run.
So they're open to having otherbrokers quote new lanes to see
if you might be able to servicethem better or give them
whatever it is they needdifferent from their current
brokers.
So I mean there's alwaysopportunities out there if you
(02:31):
put in the time and effort.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Next question what do I do if someone is using my MC
to book load?
So if you are the victim ofidentity theft, I still do.
Yeah, this is like the worst.
It like really hard because, nomatter what you do, you feel
like you're hurting yourselfwhen you do some of this stuff,
but, like the, because you'regonna raise red flags, right?
So, um, I think, if you're, ifsomeone's using your mc number,
(02:57):
I'm gonna alert all of my um, mygo-to carriers, right, anybody
that's on a current load of mine, any of my go-to carriers that
I use on a regular basis, like,hey, someone's trying to use RMC
and book loads.
You know, beware, right.
So, basically, like, well, Iguess, if you're a brokerage, it
(03:19):
depends if you're the brokerageor the carrier, but either way,
you want to go to like yourgo-to people that normally are
used to dealing with you and say, hey, someone's trying to spoof
me right now.
If you're not talking to me onthe phone, don't trust that
person.
Right, you could change your,change your login information on
FMCSA, which will raise redflags again.
Right there, you can post in ablast out in any public way,
(03:44):
like I've seen it on highway,I've seen it on DAT, I've seen
it on um, uh, uh, tia watchdog.
I've seen like all differentways of um people trying to get
ahead of this and the reality islike it just ends up really
sucks, like it really reallysucks that someone did that and
they're trying to scam otherpeople using your legitimate um
(04:06):
credibility are we assuming thisis a carrier or a broker?
yeah.
So I'm trying to kind of answerit both ways.
If it's a carrier, I'm gonnamake sure I'm going to my my
go-to brokers.
Um, if it's if it's a broker,I'm gonna go to my go-to
carriers.
Like, don't take any loads fromyou, know someone who claims to
be me, um.
Or if you're a carrier, um, youknow, don't uh, um, go to your
(04:29):
broker like, hey, don't book any, don't book any of my trucks
unless you talk to me.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Type, deal, right, um because the reason they do it
is you have a clean mc, alegitimate company.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
They want to impersonate you to be able to
take freight from somebody, um,and then steal it, rebroker it,
whatever the case might be.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
So so, yeah, I've had a few carriers that have put
flags on themselves, like in thepast week or two.
Um, that we've seen, that we'vecaught, and then you know, work
through, work through thesituation, it carries like, hey,
look, but the thing is like,the thing I would say is, no
matter which side you're on, youwant to get as much information
as you can to put into whateverflag you're going to put out,
(05:09):
right?
So it's like you want to knowhow are they booking loads on
your MC?
Did they somehow get an emailcreated under your legitimate
domain?
That is very different andsomething you need to work on
and fix.
Are they creating Gmails thatlook like your domain before
Gmail?
And you want to be very specificwhen you put this information
out there, because I've seenthese flags.
(05:30):
They're so general, you don'treally know what the crime or
how it was happening, so youjust kind of don't use them.
The more specific you are, thebetter.
And the same thing from, like,the brokerage side, right?
Like if someone's booking loadson your MC and I've worked
through that with a client a fewtimes last year it's like
you're calling, we're going tocarry going.
Hey, send me the Raycon, I wantto see the name and number on
(05:53):
it.
I want to see exactly how theysent it to you, what it looks
like and look for those specificdetails to put that information
out there as like a publicservice announcement.
And the thing I want to pointout too for the carriers out
there because I talked to acouple of attorneys in the past
month or two about this is Iforget the term they use but,
like carriers are deemedsophisticated, sophisticated
(06:15):
buyers I forget what the actuallegal term is meaning.
Like you know you own a businessand with that becomes the
responsibility of knowing whoyou're doing business with.
And a lot of the times thecarrier will be like, hey, I
took this load from a broker andthat broker doesn't exist, so
I'm going to call the shipperand demand my money from them
because the broker didn't pay me.
If I'm a carrier and you knowthis much fraud's going on, you
(06:38):
should be doing the same thingswe talked about in that
full-length episode of look atthe brokerage MC, call the phone
number on the FMCSA, look for aname change.
You want to verify who you'regetting loads from and make sure
that is the legitimate companyand not somebody impersonating
them.
Right, because it's a two-waystreet.
Both of us are in this businesstogether carriers and brokers
(06:59):
and both of us haveresponsibilities to make sure
the person we think we're doingbusiness with is the person we
think we're doing business with.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Yep, absolutely Our next one.
I'm about to start up and Ihave some questions.
People are telling me it's notworth it and that I can't
compete with the huge brokerages, but I really want to start.
Can you give me some guidance?
I want to say one thing andthen I'll let you kind of run
with this.
One is that can't compete withhuge brokerages.
That's one of the great thingsabout our industry is that, like
(07:28):
you, don't have to doesn'tmatter big or small.
Like you have the same, you havethe same ability as everybody
else, no matter what your sizeis.
But what are your thoughts?
Speaker 2 (07:37):
and take on this one I think there are advantages and
disadvantages to each One isnot better than the other.
Right, a big brokerage has morefinancial backing and more
notoriety.
But if you work at a bigbrokerage it is really hard to
even get a shipper's name,basically to allow you to even
prospect them, because you'recompeting with five or six
(07:59):
thousand other brokers that allhave a lead list of one hundred
and fifty companies.
That's a lot of companies thatyou can't call because someone
else is working them.
That is the biggestdisadvantage in a small company.
It is wide open.
What do they call it?
Blue Ocean the whole market.
You can pick up the phone andcall any shipper you want to do
business with.
And what do they call it BlueOcean the whole market.
You can pick up the phone andcall any shipper you want to do
business with.
And then the other big advantage, I think which is the more
important one of a small companyover a large one, is as a small
(08:23):
brokerage I can offer twodifferent types of service.
We'll just keep it simple.
If I worked at a big brokeragelike TQL, I don't get paid
unless I am able to chargeupwards of 25% margins, because
that's the way the company isstructured Like.
You've got to be able to sellservice and you've got to be
able to sell stellar service andget your customer to appreciate
(08:44):
it to be able to succeed there.
As a small company I can doboth.
I can sell service when theyneed it and get better trucks
with better communication andstaff it differently.
If I've got a price sensitivecustomer that wants to give me
volume, I can run that at lowermargins, staff it differently
because that's what the customeris asking for.
I don't need a lot ofcommunication.
(09:04):
I need confirmation when itgets picked up and delivered.
I don't have many standards oninsurance above making sure they
have cargo.
I don't necessarily have apreference to who's picking it
up and when.
Pick up the load today ortomorrow, okay.
Well, hey, you're going to giveme that much flexibility.
I can operate on a lower marginbecause at the end of the day,
both make sense to me as afreight brokerage.
(09:25):
At a big company I'm at CH, I'mon the cheap end.
Typically that was the oldadage.
If I was at TQL, I got to be onthe service end and you really
couldn't do both as a smallcompany.
You can offer shippers so muchmore than the large companies
because you have flexibility inhow you structure your business,
how you staff it and how mucheffort you're going to put into
(09:45):
it.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Yep, absolutely right .
All right, now, this one Ipicked.
I liked it.
This was a react.
I want to give a reaction here.
Someone we did video and Iforget what video was something
on YouTube, and this is acomment we got.
Brokers are an unnecessary leechof the industry.
They are the single most reasonfor bad rates in the industry.
(10:07):
They market themselves tomanufacturers and shippers as
the means to cut costs, when inreality all they do is cut rates
to trucks and then slowly raiserates on the shipper, but yet
they never increase rates thatthey pay.
Really just a parasite on theindustry.
This is just absolutely wrongon so many levels.
So I'll go through like a kindof I'm going to go through a
(10:30):
couple of pieces here and thenI'll see what your take is.
But I understand First of all.
I understand Right.
Whenever someone thinks likebroker, they think, well,
they're getting a cut of what Ishould be getting paid, right?
Or they're they're skimming offof whatever.
It's going to cost me moremoney to use them, whether it's
a real estate broker or ainsurance broker or a freight
(10:54):
broker, getting the access tothe vast amount of options out
there in the market.
They do get you what you needand at a rate that's reasonable.
So that's just the reality ofhow it works.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Now it means the cost , because that point is really
important.
Just to sit on that one rightLike.
Here's the thing a largeshipper is not going to onboard
50,000 carriers that have lessthan five or 10 trucks.
Why?
Because they don't have thestaff to do it, which means none
of those loads from those largecompanies are ever going to be
(11:33):
available to a small company.
Why?
Because that big company isn'tgoing to hire enough people to
do it.
So those loads are just goingto go to big carriers, mega
carriers, and they're nevergoing to get to smaller carriers
, and there would be no spotmarket, to your point, on the
market that gets created 100%.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
Now they market themselves as a means to cut
costs.
Some brokers do that and thereality is sometimes they can,
because again we can source themarket and find potential
backhauls or lower deadheadmiles, a carrier that's a better
fit, which could return, youknow.
In turn, reduce costs Slowly,raise rates on the shipper, but
(12:09):
don't pay the carrier more.
I don't know where this data iscoming from.
If you look at the data of whatrates we're paying,
historically it fluctuates basedon where the freight market is.
We're looking at things likehow much freight is being
shipped?
That's your demand.
How many carriers are out therethat can haul that freight?
(12:30):
That's your supply.
When there's an imbalance oneway or the other, prices will go
up or down.
In the peak of COVID there wasnot nearly enough capacity of
trucks to haul freight, so wewere paying premiums to get a
truck.
On the flip side, in a freightrecession, if you want to call
it that, when there's just notenough freight to fill all these
(12:51):
trucks, the rates go down.
Carriers are willing to take aload for a lesser rate because
they'd rather do that than justsit there and not drive at all.
So we as brokers don't controlthe market.
I'm sure there's bad brokers.
It's like there's bad carriersout there, but on the whole,
here's what we're talking about.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
There's bad shippers.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Yeah, exactly brokers , it's like there's bad carriers
out there.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
But on the whole, here's what we're talking about
bad shippers.
Yeah, exactly.
Um, here's the thing.
Right, if every carrier todayjust decided to not turn their
wheels unless they got twodollars and fifty cents a mile,
guess what?
Maybe not today, maybe nottomorrow, but within a few days
all of the rates would come up.
The truth is, why this carrieris saying rates are falling has
(13:35):
nothing to do with a broker.
It has to do with the fact thatanother carrier is willing to
run it for less money than whatyou want to run it for.
So they are going to take thatload.
The broker isn't saying youcan't get paid this.
They're saying I've got twooptions.
Both of you have the sameinsurance, both of you have the
same ratings, the same equipment.
(13:55):
This guy's willing to run itfor less.
You want it more.
You say that's a fair rate.
They say this is a fair rate.
At the end of the day, in freemarket economics, the value of a
price, of what something'sworth, is what somebody's
willing to pay for it or providethe service for it.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
So at the end of the day, if somebody is going to go
perform that work for a buck 80a mile and another guy wants 220
, the price on that load ends upgoing to the lowest until,
literally in the last couple ofweeks, we set up a new insurance
policy and we use an insurancebroker to shop the rates and he
came back to us with five youknow five carriers that were
willing to underwrite thispolicy for us, with various
(14:33):
different uh terms and whatnot,and ultimately, like one of them
came in like really competitiveand we ended up going with it
and it's like that's how.
that's how this works, like it'sa little like, the freight
market has more intricacies toit because there is a finite
amount of assets to haul freightand like a physical amount of
(14:56):
goods, whereas like insurance,like anyone can buy, buy an
underwriter policy for anybodyright.
Whereas, like, we're literallydealing with supply and demand,
like at its finest in freightbrokerage.
And it's not because that othercarrier just wants to haul it
for less, it's that they knowthat if they don't do it,
somebody else will, becausethere's just a lot of capacity
out there.
That is just your economics 101, right there.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
I'll tie this into tariffs.
So 50% of our farms soybeansare being purchased by another
country and that country isgetting a tariff of 140% and
they stop buying it.
The price of soybeans does notgo up.
That means there's 50% of themarket that is now available.
With nobody to buy it, theprice will plummet.
(15:41):
Right?
That's what happens.
Like it doesn't make adifference what it is.
Whether you sell apples or aservice, if there's a finite
amount of need, whether it'ssupply and demand, right,
they're going to meet in themiddle, and as one goes up or
down, so does the other.
Right?
Like it doesn't make adifference what it is, whether
(16:03):
it's the housing market, whetherwhatever it is, if somebody's
willing to pay for it, that'swhat it ends up costing, not
what somebody wants for it.
I can list my house for $5million.
It doesn't mean it's worth $5million, it's what somebody is
willing to trade their cash for.
That determines the value of myhouse.
Yep, precisely.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Good comments, good feedback.
Keep the hate mail and the hatecomments coming.
It's good, it's juicy and we'llreact to it.
But final thoughts, ben.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Whether you believe you can or believe you can't,
you're right.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
And until next time go Bills.
All right, welcome back for a final mile edition.
Here we're going to answer somequestions and actually give a
reaction to one of our YouTubehaters at the end here.
But if you're brand new, checkout all the other content at
Freight360.net.
You'll also find the FreightBroker Basics course.
While you're on our website,and please check out all of our
(00:21):
sponsors to help support thischannel.
They're in the description box.
All right, hopping right in.
First question here I'vewondered is there a platform to
bid on freight shipments?
So this is the age old questionof like hey, where do I go find
these customers that need me tomove their freight Right?
(00:42):
The short answer is no.
There's not like a magical,like bidding place out there.
But I'll add two things here.
Number one um, I bet I could gofind 10 customers today that
would put me on their load listand basically send me their this
you know their example or theirversion of this like I'm gonna
(01:02):
get a list of 50 loads andthey're going to say either
here's the price or, you know,bid on these, here's our
upcoming shipment.
So you can get on a load listwhich is basically jump ball
freight goes out to like a tonof people.
So that's kind of an example ofit.
Another scenario would be as ifyou have a customer and all of
(01:23):
their bidding is done through anonline portal.
So once you've gotten onboardedwith them, they're giving you a
chance to work on their freight.
Their stuff is automatedthrough a third party system
online.
I've seen that for a lot ofcustomers where everything's
done on their website or througha third party website but
there's not like a magical loadboard of just customer shipments
out there.
(01:43):
You got anything to add on thatone.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I don't.
I would just say that, like,even in this market, like I've
got brokers that I work withthat are adding one guy, like
two, three new customers a weekand I would say every six to
eight weeks, every month and ahalf to two months a larger one
we're getting an opportunity toeither bid or get on their spot
board.
So I mean there's opportunitiesno matter what market you're in
.
And the thing is about now theupside of the tariffs and all of
(02:11):
this is that, like all thesecompanies are looking at
different sources to supply,meaning they're looking at lanes
they don't normally run.
So they're open to having otherbrokers quote new lanes to see
if you might be able to servicethem better or give them
whatever it is they needdifferent from their current
brokers.
So I mean there's alwaysopportunities out there if you
(02:31):
put in the time and effort.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Next question what do I do if someone is using my MC
to book load?
So if you are the victim ofidentity theft, I still do.
Yeah, this is like the worst.
It like really hard because, nomatter what you do, you feel
like you're hurting yourselfwhen you do some of this stuff,
but, like the, because you'regonna raise red flags, right?
So, um, I think, if you're, ifsomeone's using your mc number,
(02:57):
I'm gonna alert all of my um, mygo-to carriers, right, anybody
that's on a current load of mine, any of my go-to carriers that
I use on a regular basis, like,hey, someone's trying to use RMC
and book loads.
You know, beware, right.
So, basically, like, well, Iguess, if you're a brokerage, it
(03:19):
depends if you're the brokerageor the carrier, but either way,
you want to go to like yourgo-to people that normally are
used to dealing with you and say, hey, someone's trying to spoof
me right now.
If you're not talking to me onthe phone, don't trust that
person.
Right, you could change your,change your login information on
FMCSA, which will raise redflags again.
Right there, you can post in ablast out in any public way,
(03:44):
like I've seen it on highway,I've seen it on DAT, I've seen
it on um, uh, uh, tia watchdog.
I've seen like all differentways of um people trying to get
ahead of this and the reality islike it just ends up really
sucks, like it really reallysucks that someone did that and
they're trying to scam otherpeople using your legitimate um
(04:06):
credibility are we assuming thisis a carrier or a broker?
yeah.
So I'm trying to kind of answerit both ways.
If it's a carrier, I'm gonnamake sure I'm going to my my
go-to brokers.
Um, if it's if it's a broker,I'm gonna go to my go-to
carriers.
Like, don't take any loads fromyou, know someone who claims to
be me, um.
Or if you're a carrier, um, youknow, don't uh, um, go to your
(04:29):
broker like, hey, don't book any, don't book any of my trucks
unless you talk to me.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Type, deal, right, um because the reason they do it
is you have a clean mc, alegitimate company.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
They want to impersonate you to be able to
take freight from somebody, um,and then steal it, rebroker it,
whatever the case might be.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
So so, yeah, I've had a few carriers that have put
flags on themselves, like in thepast week or two.
Um, that we've seen, that we'vecaught, and then you know, work
through, work through thesituation, it carries like, hey,
look, but the thing is like,the thing I would say is, no
matter which side you're on, youwant to get as much information
as you can to put into whateverflag you're going to put out,
(05:09):
right?
So it's like you want to knowhow are they booking loads on
your MC?
Did they somehow get an emailcreated under your legitimate
domain?
That is very different andsomething you need to work on
and fix.
Are they creating Gmails thatlook like your domain before
Gmail?
And you want to be very specificwhen you put this information
out there, because I've seenthese flags.
(05:30):
They're so general, you don'treally know what the crime or
how it was happening, so youjust kind of don't use them.
The more specific you are, thebetter.
And the same thing from, like,the brokerage side, right?
Like if someone's booking loadson your MC and I've worked
through that with a client a fewtimes last year it's like
you're calling, we're going tocarry going.
Hey, send me the Raycon, I wantto see the name and number on
(05:53):
it.
I want to see exactly how theysent it to you, what it looks
like and look for those specificdetails to put that information
out there as like a publicservice announcement.
And the thing I want to pointout too for the carriers out
there because I talked to acouple of attorneys in the past
month or two about this is Iforget the term they use but,
like carriers are deemedsophisticated, sophisticated
(06:15):
buyers I forget what the actuallegal term is meaning.
Like you know you own a businessand with that becomes the
responsibility of knowing whoyou're doing business with.
And a lot of the times thecarrier will be like, hey, I
took this load from a broker andthat broker doesn't exist, so
I'm going to call the shipperand demand my money from them
because the broker didn't pay me.
If I'm a carrier and you knowthis much fraud's going on, you
(06:38):
should be doing the same thingswe talked about in that
full-length episode of look atthe brokerage MC, call the phone
number on the FMCSA, look for aname change.
You want to verify who you'regetting loads from and make sure
that is the legitimate companyand not somebody impersonating
them.
Right, because it's a two-waystreet.
Both of us are in this businesstogether carriers and brokers
(06:59):
and both of us haveresponsibilities to make sure
the person we think we're doingbusiness with is the person we
think we're doing business with.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
Yep, absolutely Our next one.
I'm about to start up and Ihave some questions.
People are telling me it's notworth it and that I can't
compete with the huge brokerages, but I really want to start.
Can you give me some guidance?
I want to say one thing andthen I'll let you kind of run
with this.
One is that can't compete withhuge brokerages.
That's one of the great thingsabout our industry is that, like
(07:28):
you, don't have to doesn'tmatter big or small.
Like you have the same, you havethe same ability as everybody
else, no matter what your sizeis.
But what are your thoughts?
Speaker 2 (07:37):
and take on this one I think there are advantages and
disadvantages to each One isnot better than the other.
Right, a big brokerage has morefinancial backing and more
notoriety.
But if you work at a bigbrokerage it is really hard to
even get a shipper's name,basically to allow you to even
prospect them, because you'recompeting with five or six
(07:59):
thousand other brokers that allhave a lead list of one hundred
and fifty companies.
That's a lot of companies thatyou can't call because someone
else is working them.
That is the biggestdisadvantage in a small company.
It is wide open.
What do they call it?
Blue Ocean the whole market.
You can pick up the phone andcall any shipper you want to do
business with.
And what do they call it BlueOcean the whole market.
You can pick up the phone andcall any shipper you want to do
business with.
And then the other big advantage, I think which is the more
important one of a small companyover a large one, is as a small
(08:23):
brokerage I can offer twodifferent types of service.
We'll just keep it simple.
If I worked at a big brokeragelike TQL, I don't get paid
unless I am able to chargeupwards of 25% margins, because
that's the way the company isstructured Like.
You've got to be able to sellservice and you've got to be
able to sell stellar service andget your customer to appreciate
(08:44):
it to be able to succeed there.
As a small company I can doboth.
I can sell service when theyneed it and get better trucks
with better communication andstaff it differently.
If I've got a price sensitivecustomer that wants to give me
volume, I can run that at lowermargins, staff it differently
because that's what the customeris asking for.
I don't need a lot ofcommunication.
(09:04):
I need confirmation when itgets picked up and delivered.
I don't have many standards oninsurance above making sure they
have cargo.
I don't necessarily have apreference to who's picking it
up and when.
Pick up the load today ortomorrow, okay.
Well, hey, you're going to giveme that much flexibility.
I can operate on a lower marginbecause at the end of the day,
both make sense to me as afreight brokerage.
(09:25):
At a big company I'm at CH, I'mon the cheap end.
Typically that was the oldadage.
If I was at TQL, I got to be onthe service end and you really
couldn't do both as a smallcompany.
You can offer shippers so muchmore than the large companies
because you have flexibility inhow you structure your business,
how you staff it and how mucheffort you're going to put into
(09:45):
it.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Yep, absolutely right .
All right, now, this one Ipicked.
I liked it.
This was a react.
I want to give a reaction here.
Someone we did video and Iforget what video was something
on YouTube, and this is acomment we got.
Brokers are an unnecessary leechof the industry.
They are the single most reasonfor bad rates in the industry.
(10:07):
They market themselves tomanufacturers and shippers as
the means to cut costs, when inreality all they do is cut rates
to trucks and then slowly raiserates on the shipper, but yet
they never increase rates thatthey pay.
Really just a parasite on theindustry.
This is just absolutely wrongon so many levels.
So I'll go through like a kindof I'm going to go through a
(10:30):
couple of pieces here and thenI'll see what your take is.
But I understand First of all.
I understand Right.
Whenever someone thinks likebroker, they think, well,
they're getting a cut of what Ishould be getting paid, right?
Or they're they're skimming offof whatever.
It's going to cost me moremoney to use them, whether it's
a real estate broker or ainsurance broker or a freight
(10:54):
broker, getting the access tothe vast amount of options out
there in the market.
They do get you what you needand at a rate that's reasonable.
So that's just the reality ofhow it works.
Speaker 2 (11:13):
Now it means the cost , because that point is really
important.
Just to sit on that one rightLike.
Here's the thing a largeshipper is not going to onboard
50,000 carriers that have lessthan five or 10 trucks.
Why?
Because they don't have thestaff to do it, which means none
of those loads from those largecompanies are ever going to be
(11:33):
available to a small company.
Why?
Because that big company isn'tgoing to hire enough people to
do it.
So those loads are just goingto go to big carriers, mega
carriers, and they're nevergoing to get to smaller carriers
, and there would be no spotmarket, to your point, on the
market that gets created 100%.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
Now they market themselves as a means to cut
costs.
Some brokers do that and thereality is sometimes they can,
because again we can source themarket and find potential
backhauls or lower deadheadmiles, a carrier that's a better
fit, which could return, youknow.
In turn, reduce costs Slowly,raise rates on the shipper, but
(12:09):
don't pay the carrier more.
I don't know where this data iscoming from.
If you look at the data of whatrates we're paying,
historically it fluctuates basedon where the freight market is.
We're looking at things likehow much freight is being
shipped?
That's your demand.
How many carriers are out therethat can haul that freight?
(12:30):
That's your supply.
When there's an imbalance oneway or the other, prices will go
up or down.
In the peak of COVID there wasnot nearly enough capacity of
trucks to haul freight, so wewere paying premiums to get a
truck.
On the flip side, in a freightrecession, if you want to call
it that, when there's just notenough freight to fill all these
(12:51):
trucks, the rates go down.
Carriers are willing to take aload for a lesser rate because
they'd rather do that than justsit there and not drive at all.
So we as brokers don't controlthe market.
I'm sure there's bad brokers.
It's like there's bad carriersout there, but on the whole,
here's what we're talking about.
Speaker 2 (13:11):
There's bad shippers.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
Yeah, exactly brokers , it's like there's bad carriers
out there.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
But on the whole, here's what we're talking about
bad shippers.
Yeah, exactly.
Um, here's the thing.
Right, if every carrier todayjust decided to not turn their
wheels unless they got twodollars and fifty cents a mile,
guess what?
Maybe not today, maybe nottomorrow, but within a few days
all of the rates would come up.
The truth is, why this carrieris saying rates are falling has
(13:35):
nothing to do with a broker.
It has to do with the fact thatanother carrier is willing to
run it for less money than whatyou want to run it for.
So they are going to take thatload.
The broker isn't saying youcan't get paid this.
They're saying I've got twooptions.
Both of you have the sameinsurance, both of you have the
same ratings, the same equipment.
(13:55):
This guy's willing to run itfor less.
You want it more.
You say that's a fair rate.
They say this is a fair rate.
At the end of the day, in freemarket economics, the value of a
price, of what something'sworth, is what somebody's
willing to pay for it or providethe service for it.
Speaker 1 (14:11):
So at the end of the day, if somebody is going to go
perform that work for a buck 80a mile and another guy wants 220
, the price on that load ends upgoing to the lowest until,
literally in the last couple ofweeks, we set up a new insurance
policy and we use an insurancebroker to shop the rates and he
came back to us with five youknow five carriers that were
willing to underwrite thispolicy for us, with various
(14:33):
different uh terms and whatnot,and ultimately, like one of them
came in like really competitiveand we ended up going with it
and it's like that's how.
that's how this works, like it'sa little like, the freight
market has more intricacies toit because there is a finite
amount of assets to haul freightand like a physical amount of
(14:56):
goods, whereas like insurance,like anyone can buy, buy an
underwriter policy for anybodyright.
Whereas, like, we're literallydealing with supply and demand,
like at its finest in freightbrokerage.
And it's not because that othercarrier just wants to haul it
for less, it's that they knowthat if they don't do it,
somebody else will, becausethere's just a lot of capacity
out there.
That is just your economics 101, right there.
Speaker 2 (15:20):
I'll tie this into tariffs.
So 50% of our farms soybeansare being purchased by another
country and that country isgetting a tariff of 140% and
they stop buying it.
The price of soybeans does notgo up.
That means there's 50% of themarket that is now available.
With nobody to buy it, theprice will plummet.
(15:41):
Right?
That's what happens.
Like it doesn't make adifference what it is.
Whether you sell apples or aservice, if there's a finite
amount of need, whether it'ssupply and demand, right,
they're going to meet in themiddle, and as one goes up or
down, so does the other.
Right?
Like it doesn't make adifference what it is, whether
(16:03):
it's the housing market, whetherwhatever it is, if somebody's
willing to pay for it, that'swhat it ends up costing, not
what somebody wants for it.
I can list my house for $5million.
It doesn't mean it's worth $5million, it's what somebody is
willing to trade their cash for.
That determines the value of myhouse.
Yep, precisely.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Good comments, good feedback.
Keep the hate mail and the hatecomments coming.
It's good, it's juicy and we'llreact to it.
But final thoughts, ben.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Whether you believe you can or believe you can't,
you're right.
Speaker 1 (16:32):
And until next time go Bills.
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