Who are the good brokers?

[WALTERK]

Well, well.. When saw this posing I just could not resist to respond -Two Points wants to know what others think about them. Here it goes then...
Last loads I did for you were in Aug 2012 and I have to say you guys are up there with the best. Payment was no issue even though there was a detention charge. Over all, no problems whatsoever and the rates were solid. From the flatbed operation point of view I wish I could do more work for brokers like you that seem to be a dying breed as big US brokerage houses that have not a clue on what is involved in a flatbed work take over from smaller Canadian entities. Good luck!

 

[Neat_Lion]

Anyone have info on a broker from Fargo, ND / SMJ Freight Solutions / Heard they were very good

 

[LoadLegend]

I would highly suggest looking into Long Road Logistics. They are good, reliable and available 24/7 small company but great to work with

 

[DaveW]

I was one of those guys that hated brokers, before that, salesmen. Typical ops guy. Think I'm a little right about most salesmen lol. Brokers have become carriers new sales department. Most ops guys aren't good with customer service and a lot of them have a hard time with the language. Freight brokers were born because of lazy truck companies limiting their marketing and with the new flood of new Canadians in the business they are here to stay. Like it or not.

 

[Michael Ludwig]

Freight brokers were born because of lazy truck companies limiting their marketing and with the new flood of new Canadians in the business they are here to stay. Like it or not.

That's not exactly correct. Today's freight broker never started out that way. Remember, this used to be a highly regulated industry and there was no place for the freight broker. Originally freight brokers were produce brokers. They would hire in trucks from all over the place to move watermelons, tomatoes, oranges, apples, and just about everything else the grew out of the ground, and they followed the crops. Now everyone knows there aren't any crops in the winter time so these produce brokers found a way to keep their staff busy during the winter months ... they started a "trucking company" with one unit, and moved freight for the processors they were delivering to during the harvest seasons. Back then we had to "trip lease" with those brokers. It was the wild effing west out there back then, and TBH, I have never had so much GD fun in this industry as I did back in the day ... LOL
Fast forward to today, and yes, load brokers are, for lack of a better description, a carrier's sales arm. And, yes, they are here to stay ... at least the good ones are.

 

[DaveW]

That's not exactly correct. Today's freight broker never started out that way. Remember, this used to be a highly regulated industry and there was no place for the freight broker. Originally freight brokers were produce brokers. They would hire in trucks from all over the place to move watermelons, tomatoes, oranges, apples, and just about everything else the grew out of the ground, and they followed the crops. Now everyone knows there aren't any crops in the winter time so these produce brokers found a way to keep their staff busy during the winter months ... they started a "trucking company" with one unit, and moved freight for the processors they were delivering to during the harvest seasons. Back then we had to "trip lease" with those brokers. It was the wild effing west out there back then, and TBH, I have never had so much GD fun in this industry as I did back in the day ... LOL
Fast forward to today, and yes, load brokers are, for lack of a better description, a carrier's sales arm. And, yes, they are here to stay ... at least the good ones are.

Agreed, yes, and to take it one step further when dealing with intermodal and steamship companies in the 70s they were referred to as forwarders, then after deregulation they "branched" out into providing an extended service. Like trucking companies you pick out and deal with the good ones,

 

[theman]

Michael is right that the original brokers were referred to as 'truck brokers' mostly working on the produce end of the freight industry. It morphed over time - in the heyday of being a pure freight broker it was about the notion of 'faster, cheaper, less claims' particularly on LTL but closing empty miles on F/L.

Nowadays a freight broker can't be a pure broker if they want to scale at all. Some do it by offering the customer software solutions that manage carriers without them having to invest in the IT, some do it as a mixed asset/non-asset thing, some as a warehousing/distribution solution. In other words, freight brokerage as part of a larger solution.

For carriers, it was always a way of getting better marketing reach than using its own salespeople unless it's a carrier large enough to have the scale to work - so basically at least 100 trucks on the road to support. Below that it's very hard for a carrier to be valuable to a larger shipper unless they are carving out a specific niche.

 

[Pinktruck4]

Who are the good brokers?​

Easy answer...there aren't any

However I see this conversation chain is quite old from 2009
I was still in high school in 2009 LOL so maybe back then there were

 

[Michael Ludwig]

Just the start of it was from way back then ... LOL
It sounds like you have had multiple bad experiences with brokers. Would you be open to expanding on your comment?

 

[loaders]

Who are the good brokers?​

Easy answer...there aren't any

However I see this conversation chain is quite old from 2009
I was still in high school in 2009 LOL so maybe back then there were

Well, I started this thread back in 2009 (wow!) and yes, back then I was the only one! LOL.

 

[Freight Broker]

Who are the good brokers?​

Easy answer...there aren't any

However I see this conversation chain is quite old from 2009
I was still in high school in 2009 LOL so maybe back then there were

Lots of good brokers around.. I'd like to think I'm one of them, but you know... we all tend to be biased about our own capabilities. Apart from my own biased opinions about myself, I've met some of my competitors who are clearly good brokers. Some of them are even on this board. But don't take it from me.. ask around. I've only been involved in trucking and freight brokerage since 1979...how would I know.

 

[Pinktruck4]

Just the start of it was from way back then ... LOL
It sounds like you have had multiple bad experiences with brokers. Would you be open to expanding on your comment?

I will expand on a recent experience that I still have a bad taste in my mouth about I was debating posting on here about this company but I haven't fully committed to naming them.

LTL reefer 2 shipments out of IL
They email asking for 2 rates
2 different temps frozen and fresh but loading out of the same facility
I respond and give 2 rates
I have a multi temp reefer, I load them together
My truck sits at the shipper for 8 hours waiting to get the skids on
I talk to the shipper a couple of times and he explains today is there year end or quarter end or something like that and they are SUPER behind
Broker promises me over and over and OVER AND OVER we will get paid for the wait time
We pick up and carry along
We deliver to the brokers dock (they have trucks too but I know them to be a load broker more)
They ask "hey all the freight arrived together but its supposed to be different temps" I explain no problem its a multi
They ask did you load the shipments together in IL?
I was honest and said yes...
They come back and say "WAIT TIME DENIED we paid you more than what a truckload should pay out of IL. We didn't know you were loading on the same trailer"

I said what's that your business? You asked for 2 rates for 2 different shipments running at 2 different temperatures. We haggled back and forth and you never said these were riding exclusive or made any other kind of demands I agreed to. Who are you to say when I have made enough money on my expensive piece of equipment and what does, what you sell cheap loads out of IL have to do with multi temp LTL freight?

He came back and said oh I'll ask upper management and I haven't heard back since and its been 2 months. Am I crazy? I feel like if they had requested a multi and I lied and said I didn't have one and then they gave me 2 shipments and I loaded them together that would have been wrong, I lied. But I never lied once and was upfront and honest when asked (BIG MISTAKE?) and they turn around and are scummy like that? 8 hours is excessive. I wasn't asking for 2/3....which is still deserved but cmon. AND I know who the customer was...its kraft. I know those scummy f'ers put the wait time in anyway (they asked me for the in and out times on the bol before we delivered and I sent) and kept whatever they got for themselves as extra profit (I don't ACTUALLY know but cmon they are out to make a buck no matter what)

I was being pretty negative though on my earlier post
There are some good brokers, we deal with Right choice logistics and DID logistics and those are honest guys.

As weird as it is to say some of us actually have some passion for this industry still. Its not easy to go out and buy a couple of trucks to get started so I can understand brokerage businesses, the issue becomes the bigger they get the dirtier and scummier they TEND to get.

 

[Michael Ludwig]

Thanks for that, and for admitting there are good brokers out there, because there really are good ones.
With respect to the case you recounted, you have an opportunity. An opportunity to tell your peers about the experience, and who it was with. Why be shy about naming them? Had the shoe been on the other foot, as in you screwed up, they surely would not hesitate to banter your name all about.
From what you are saying, they surely would have paid 2 trucks for the 2 shipments. The fact that you were able to capitalize should be to your benefit, not theirs. Clearly they did not have the good sense (or knowledge) to ask for a multi-temp reefer in the area, so that's on them.
As to your comment about a broker's size as it relates to their authenticity, I have to say I cannot agree. Now having said that I am sure someone is going to say "what about TQL?", and to that I say this;
The bigger you are, the more you have to lose. I am no fan of TQL, but think about their entire operation, and not just the crap loads we hear about. Without a doubt TQL has some fantastic paying lanes. The general community never hears about them because the carriers that do them move heaven and earth so that they never become public. TQL did not become the size they are by flogging shit freight all around the continent.
I would postulate the opposite. The smaller the broker the more likely they are to screw the carrier. If you think about it, what do they have to lose? Absolutely nothing. Especially if they are domiciled in Canada. There's no regulation. There's no consequence for their thievery. If carriers stop using them, they just open up under another name, and do it all over again. No different than the internet scammers.
What really needs to happen is that freight payers, whether they be shippers, receivers, or forwarders, need to be held accountable for the vendor choices they make.

 

[theman]

Thanks for that, and for admitting there are good brokers out there, because there really are good ones.
With respect to the case you recounted, you have an opportunity. An opportunity to tell your peers about the experience, and who it was with. Why be shy about naming them? Had the shoe been on the other foot, as in you screwed up, they surely would not hesitate to banter your name all about.
From what you are saying, they surely would have paid 2 trucks for the 2 shipments. The fact that you were able to capitalize should be to your benefit, not theirs. Clearly they did not have the good sense (or knowledge) to ask for a multi-temp reefer in the area, so that's on them.
As to your comment about a broker's size as it relates to their authenticity, I have to say I cannot agree. Now having said that I am sure someone is going to say "what about TQL?", and to that I say this;
The bigger you are, the more you have to lose. I am no fan of TQL, but think about their entire operation, and not just the crap loads we hear about. Without a doubt TQL has some fantastic paying lanes. The general community never hears about them because the carriers that do them move heaven and earth so that they never become public. TQL did not become the size they are by flogging shit freight all around the continent.
I would postulate the opposite. The smaller the broker the more likely they are to screw the carrier. If you think about it, what do they have to lose? Absolutely nothing. Especially if they are domiciled in Canada. There's no regulation. There's no consequence for their thievery. If carriers stop using them, they just open up under another name, and do it all over again. No different than the internet scammers.
What really needs to happen is that freight payers, whether they be shippers, receivers, or forwarders, need to be held accountable for the vendor choices they make.

I'd say you're right. Big brokers, particularly those that are more of a complete solution are generally the best to work with. And yes, there are probably those who work at TQL that are not the bottom feeder types. The culture of who they are attracts those types of candidates though.

Once I left TORUS back in 2008, I insisted to work only with multi-faceted organizations where the solution was more than just 'find a truck'. Unfortunately after I had a falling out with one said organization in 2015, I couldn't find a good match and ended up taking a couple of roles that really I shouldn't have ... then got fed up.

A good broker will have good customers and even though sometimes one would find themselves in a bad situation, I would take it on the chin, looking at the macro instead of the micro. The issue is that a lot of brokers are undercapitalized and aren't on side with this. I still miss the business sometimes, mind you with what is going on now with the tariffs and how it will change trade I'm thinking I'm in a much better position now.

 

[Freight Broker]

Got to wonder though..if the big brokers like CH or TQL etc are so great and are more or less trustworthy as you say, how is it that a little guy like me can come in with no money and run 4 million in sales within 3 years of startup? One might think that the “big guys” would have a lock on the good freight. And CH had a 100 year head start on me. Think about it.. how can a guy with zero capital and a mortgage get into that arena and do 7 figures in sales within 3 years of GO? How? The answer, of course, must be that the incumbents aren’t all that great…in fact they must be pretty shitty..I did NOTHING special to get going. I know how to use a computer, I had one landline and a bunch of trucking contacts I had worked with over the previous 20 years. If the incumbents are so great they would have crushed me like a bug within about 1 DAY of start up. 1 DAY max…in any other business but freight.

 

[loaders]

Got to wonder though..if the big brokers like CH or TQL etc are so great and are more or less trustworthy as you say, how is it that a little guy like me can come in with no money and run 4 million in sales within 3 years of startup? One might think that the “big guys” would have a lock on the good freight. And CH had a 100 year head start on me. Think about it.. how can a guy with zero capital and a mortgage get into that arena and do 7 figures in sales within 3 years of GO? How? The answer, of course, must be that the incumbents aren’t all that great…in fact they must be pretty shitty..I did NOTHING special to get going. I know how to use a computer, I had one landline and a bunch of trucking contacts I had worked with over the previous 20 years. If the incumbents are so great they would have crushed me like a bug within about 1 DAY of start up. 1 DAY max…in any other business but freight.

We all know that certain customers like the personal touch and others are strictly price driven. Usually, the large shippers could care less about the extra services and assistance a broker can offer. Often times they already have those things in-house. A smaller shipper, on the other hand, looks at a broker as an extension of their transportation department. A successful broker in my opinion, should concentrate on solving his customers problems and eliminating their headaches, as opposed to simplying selling transportation services.

 

[theman]

Got to wonder though..if the big brokers like CH or TQL etc are so great and are more or less trustworthy as you say, how is it that a little guy like me can come in with no money and run 4 million in sales within 3 years of startup? One might think that the “big guys” would have a lock on the good freight. And CH had a 100 year head start on me. Think about it.. how can a guy with zero capital and a mortgage get into that arena and do 7 figures in sales within 3 years of GO? How? The answer, of course, must be that the incumbents aren’t all that great…in fact they must be pretty shitty..I did NOTHING special to get going. I know how to use a computer, I had one landline and a bunch of trucking contacts I had worked with over the previous 20 years. If the incumbents are so great they would have crushed me like a bug within about 1 DAY of start up. 1 DAY max…in any other business but freight.

Honestly with the average margin (like what it REALLY is) $1M in sales is actually not even enough to make a living if you work for someone and get a cut.

The agent types at a Landstar or TQL etc that essentially manage their own ops may be able to make a living at that, but really the expectation of a salesperson in logistics is $1M in year one, and the good ones carry portfolios of $5M or more. Translated to margin it's $100K margin in year 1 as a target, by year 3 somewhere in the vicinity of $400-$600K.

 

[Freight Broker]

We all know that certain customers like the personal touch and others are strictly price driven. Usually, the large shippers could care less about the extra services and assistance a broker can offer. Often times they already have those things in-house. A smaller shipper, on the other hand, looks at a broker as an extension of their transportation department. A successful broker in my opinion, should concentrate on solving his customers problems and eliminating their headaches, as opposed to simplying selling transportation services.

Lately almost everyone seems price driven. I solve my customers’ problems..it’s hard to get away from that angle even if one wanted to as even well run shippers seem to trip over their own feet these days. Yet they unrelentingly focus on price..

 

[Jim L]

Lately almost everyone seems price driven. I solve my customers’ problems..it’s hard to get away from that angle even if one wanted to as even well run shippers seem to trip over their own feet these days. Yet they unrelentingly focus on price..

A smart person once told me about 15 years ago that we cannot continue to buy at Walmart because of lower prices and then ask our bosses for raises. It won't continue to work.
Spirit lowered all their fares but then charged for bags. It became a model for many businesses including retail. Now we buy goods and then pay for the bag we put them in.
North America has become completely fixated on price. CEO's and CFO's ask their staff to get quotes, put them in Excel and sort by price descending. The bottom line has become the most important issue that they're faced with. They can't raise the top revenue line, so they hammer the expense side.
I've had this discussion with my direct customers and let them know that I can go with the Spirit model and bill you a linehaul rate plus accessorial fees but remember that we will charge for absolutely everything that you didn't prebook. Just remember that Spirit bag fees sometimes cost more than the flight itself. It will look good on a spreadsheet for your CFO but when there is waiting time, bond fees (because you use Livingston), demurrage, customs inspection ect, you'll pay a lot more and your expenses may be more. I then go to some of their loads and show how their receiver made us wait 3 hours to get unloaded, the shipper needed to load on a Saturday morning, and two times Livingston couldn't clear the load and that additional fee will be much higher when added to the base price. We are willing to overlook some of these irregular issues because we have a business relationship - not a transactional relationship. We look at the year long revenue/expenses with our business relationship and we hope you continue to do so. In the end, I promise that you'll save money in our current model where we work together on issues than a transactional model.

Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, but it gets them thinking. We are not retail and not a one-time purchase to fill a gap.

 

[Freight Broker]

I try to keep my pricing as simple as possible. Back a few years ago I did what most people do.. base price plus a bunch of accessorials and what ifs. I found that whenever I invoked an accessorial it caught my customer by surprise, even when I told them it was coming. It never seemed to end well even when they understood the charges.

As a broker I try to sidestep the cheap pricing by being more strategic in my marketing. I try to avoid freight that works best when tendered to carriers directly. Like a weekly load from Dallas to Toronto, for example. I would be competing with brokers AND carriers for that, and consequently the rate on it would be lower. I prefer more textured work involving diverse lanes..where preferably lanes vary from one week to the next. My only competitors on that stuff are other brokers and the odd mega carrier who has trucks everywhere.. consequently more complex shipping matrix and less competition as all the small carriers are effectively cut out from competing directly, resulting in better pricing opportunities for me as a broker.