Carrier concentration

The share of loads on a lane, or premium in a line, held by the largest carrier. Assessed against a threshold set per volume band and paired with the carrier's acceptance trend, because concentration is a fact and falling acceptance is the warning.

DefinitionThe share of loads on a lane, or premium in a line, held by the largest carrier. Assessed against a threshold set per volume band and paired with the carrier's acceptance trend, because concentration is a fact and falling acceptance is the warning.

Band the threshold

A four-load lane is always concentrated. A two-hundred-load lane at 80 percent is exposure.

Group the carriers

Three subsidiaries of one carrier are one carrier.

How it is computed

The largest carrier's share of loads on a lane, or of premium in an insurance line, and the top three combined, against a stated threshold.

Example

On one lane a broker moved 400 loads with nine carriers, but one carrier hauled 290 of them: 73 percent. When that carrier took a dedicated contract elsewhere, the lane's service failed for a month.

Where it goes wrong

Counting carriers used. Nine carriers sounds diversified; the share of the largest is what matters.

Articles that use this term

Board and management reporting · Freight brokers and 3PLs

Carrier concentration per lane: when one carrier is the lane

How a freight broker or 3PL measures the share of loads on each lane carried by its top carrier from the load ledger, sets a stated threshold per lane volume band, finds the lanes where one carrier's exit would leave shippers uncovered, and pairs the concentration with the carrier's acceptance trend so the risk is seen before the tender is refused.

16 Sept 20262 min read Board and management reporting · Insurance brokers

Carrier concentration per line: how much of the book sits with one market

How a commercial insurance broker measures the share of premium placed with each carrier per line of business from the placement ledger, why a concentrated line is both a leverage point and a risk, the trend that shows a market quietly taking over a line, and the clients whose whole programme sits with one carrier.

16 Sept 20262 min read Board and management reporting

Concentration by industry: where a large top-ten share is normal, and where it is risk

Concentration is measured the same way everywhere, top-n share, count to half, the index, and what a high figure means depends on the desk: normal in a category with a few large buyers, a dependency in one with many. This hub gives, for twelve industries, what is concentrated, on which axis, what a typical top-ten share looks like, when it is a strength and when it is a risk, and the guide for each.

16 Sept 20263 min read Board and management reporting · Freight brokers and 3PLs

Margin per load by shipper and lane: the freight that moves and earns nothing

How a freight broker measures gross margin per load from the load ledger's customer rate and carrier cost, rolls it up by shipper and by lane, finds the shipper-lane pairs at or below zero margin that volume was hiding, separates contracted lanes priced wrong from spot lanes bought badly, and ranks the pairs by the margin that a repricing or a carrier change would recover.

16 Sept 20262 min read Board and management reporting · Shipping and logistics

Ten questions a forwarding managing director asks, and the table that answers each

The ten questions the managing director of a freight forwarder puts to the branch and trade lane managers, what is lane share per customer and per mode, are TEU and kilograms ever added, which customer lanes lost reliability before the tender, what detention and demurrage did we absorb and for whom, how long does delivered freight wait for an invoice, which customs holds are the customer's own data, which customers are concentrated on one carrier, what is margin per file by branch, which customers went quiet by lane, and what changed, each with the table from the bookings, milestones and billing exports, and the answer to send back.

16 Sept 20262 min read Board and management reporting · Freight brokers and 3PLs

Ten questions a freight brokerage president asks, and the table that answers each

The ten questions the president of a freight brokerage puts to the shipper sales and carrier teams, which shipper-lane pairs lose money, where is one carrier the lane, which lanes are rejecting before the market does, where are we primary and where are we the backup, which shippers give us a fraction of their lanes, what does a rejection cost us, which shipper reps' books depend on one shipper, which carrier reps keep their carriers, what is the spot share of the book, and what changed, each with the table from the load ledger and the tender log, and the answer to send back.

16 Sept 20263 min read