Guide to Trucking
Special Report manufacturing activity. US manufacturing purchasing managers’ indexes from S & P Global and the Institute for Supply Management have both been positive for months, signaling expansion.
But reports of higher manufacturing activity and US imports don’ t jive with consumer concerns over inflation and higher food and energy prices, Schaffer said.
Consumer prices rose 4.2 % year over year in May, the largest increase since April 2023, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics( BLS) said June 17. Housing starts, considered a harbinger of freight demand, dropped 15.4 % month over month in May, with single-family housing starts falling 1.9 %, according to the US Census Bureau.
“ There are all these mixed signals across the board,” Schaffer said.“ Who’ s buying this stuff?”
Capacity collapse
Perhaps the question should be,“ Who will be buying this stuff, and when?”
The surge in US imports from Asia is attributed to frontloading of fall and holiday merchandise ahead of new tariffs, higher fuel prices and disruptions caused by the war in Iran. The trans-Pacific peak shipping season has arrived early.“ My customers say frontloading works,” said Scott
Weiss, vice president of technical sales-warehouse and distribution service for North America at Maersk.
Retail goods and manufacturing inputs arriving in the US are being moved inland somewhat ahead of what used to be the normal schedule. Those goods are moving to US warehouses and factories now and will create more freight traffic this fall.
Weiss said communication among supply chain partners and timely cargo forecasting is keeping many US warehouses fluid.“ I feel that the warehouses are in good shape and are managing their inventories well,” he said.
“ Demand has been relatively flat across the whole ecosystem.”
Once cargoes arrive in the US, however, they immediately hit tighter land-side capacity, starting with drayage. Tightness is more acute in the final-mile drayage move than at ports, sources tell the Journal of Commerce.
In the over-the-road truckload segment,“ we haven’ t seen this kind of change in capacity since deregulation” in the 1980s, said Josh Allen, chief commercial officer of ITS Logistics.
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www. joc. com July 6, 2026 | Journal of Commerce 29