Spot Truckload Rates Up 41% — and Flock's CCO Says They're Not Done Climbing

Spot truckload rates are up 41% year over year through October, and the executive who called the move says they have further to run — another 10% to 15% before a cyclical peak of roughly 45% to 50% above year-ago levels, likely this quarter or next.

That's the forecast from Chris Pickett, Chief Commercial Officer at Flock Freight, who says shippers walked into 2026 braced for flat pricing and got the opposite. Contract rates have already reset 10% to 12% higher depending on the index. The inflationary leg, he notes, actually began as early as November of last year.

"I haven't talked to a shipper in this market that was in any way prepared for the contract and spot truckload rate conditions that we've seen," Pickett said. Shippers had built forecasts around subdued consumer demand and saw no credible catalyst for material rate inflation. The market disagreed.

Is demand actually driving this?

Partly, and the signals are quietly turning. Consumption has returned to pre-COVID levels with slight acceleration in preliminary third-quarter numbers. Industrial production is rising off a floor. After three straight years of year-over-year deflationary reads, both the ATA Truckload Volume Index and cash shipments are near equilibrium.

"After 3 years of year-over-year deflationary reads, both the ATA Truckload Volume Index and cash shipments are basically knocking on equilibrium, about to, I think, break inflationary going into Q4," Pickett said.

In plain terms: volumes aren't booming, but they've stopped shrinking. For carriers that's the first genuinely constructive backdrop since 2022. For shippers, it removes the last argument for waiting out the market.

What does this change for shippers?

Mode strategies left on autopilot during the multi-year freight recession are getting a fresh look. Two shifts stand out, according to Pickett:

• Migration from truckload to intermodal rail, the classic recession-exit hedge.
• Growing interest in shared truckload — Flock's core product — which puts multiple shippers' freight on a single truck with no terminal consolidation and charges only for the trailer space a shipment actually occupies.

The economics are straightforward. Shared truckload rates run 5% to 30% below full truckload for shippers moving partially filled trailers. It also attracts a second cohort: shippers willing to pay a premium over traditional LTL for faster, lower-touch service on high-value freight. A truck that's half empty is a discount waiting to be arbitrated.

Diesel is the squeeze nobody budgeted for

Fuel is compounding the pressure, especially for small and mid-size carriers skewed toward the spot market. Pickett noted that fuel costs have been rising faster than all-in spot rates for roughly the past six months — a very different dynamic from the structured fuel surcharges of the contract market.

Shared truckload gives asset-based carriers one answer: high-utilization two-pick, two-drop loads that maximize revenue yield per trailer and can generate more revenue per mile than a conventional single-stop truckload move. Full trailer, better math.

How long does this last?

Pickett's trajectory: spot rates peak at 45% to 50% above year-ago levels this quarter or next, while contract rates keep resetting higher — potentially reaching plus 15% to 20% by mid-2027. Sequential declines? He doesn't expect them until early 2028.

The biggest wildcard is diesel. A resolution to geopolitical conflicts in Iran or Ukraine could pull WTI crude back to the $70–$80 per barrel range. That sounds like relief, but it cuts both ways: if fuel surcharge assumptions embedded in current bids become misaligned with a falling fuel price line, shippers could face another round of contract repricing anyway.

So the practical question for freight buyers isn't whether rates stay high — on Pickett's numbers, they do, deep into 2027. It's whether the mode mix and contract structures signed this quarter can survive both a diesel spike and a diesel collapse. Plan for both, because this cycle seems intent on punishing everyone's forecast.