VoltusFreight AI
The Forwarders Who Will Win the Next Decade
I've met hundreds of freight forwarding business owners over the past few years. I've seen companies that are thriving and companies that are struggling. Companies that are excited about the future and companies that are terrified of it.
After all those conversations, I've started to see patterns. The winners don't look the same—they're big and small, old and new, from different countries and different niches. But they think the same way.
Here's what separates the forwarders who will win the next decade from the ones who won't.
They See Technology as Leverage, Not Threat
The first thing I notice about winning forwarders: they're not afraid of technology. They're curious about it.
I met a forwarder in Delhi who's been in the business for 35 years. You'd think he'd be skeptical of AI and automation. Instead, he's one of our most enthusiastic adopters.
"I've seen this industry change many times," he told me. "Containerization. EDI. The internet. Every time, some people fought the change and some people used it. The ones who used it are still here."
He doesn't see AI as something that will replace him. He sees it as something that will make his company stronger—letting his team do more, respond faster, and compete with players much bigger than him.
The losers talk about technology as if it's something happening to them. The winners talk about it as something they're using.
They're Obsessed With Customer Experience
Ask a struggling forwarder what they sell, and they'll say "freight services" or "logistics solutions."
Ask a winning forwarder the same question, and they'll talk about their customers.
"We sell peace of mind," one told me. "Our customers have enough to worry about. When they give us a shipment, they don't want to think about it again until it arrives."
These forwarders measure everything from the customer's perspective:
How long does it take to get a quote? (Not "how long does our process take"—how long does the customer wait?)
How many times does the customer have to follow up for information?
When something goes wrong, does the customer hear about it from us or do they have to discover it?
At the end of the shipment, would the customer recommend us?
They're not just processing shipments. They're designing experiences. And they use technology specifically to make those experiences better—faster responses, proactive updates, fewer surprises.
They Invest in Their People Differently
Losing forwarders see labor as a cost to minimize. Winning forwarders see people as their actual competitive advantage.
But here's the difference: winning forwarders invest in developing their people for the future, not the past.
They're not training people to be faster at manual data entry. They're training people to understand technology, to manage exceptions, to build customer relationships, to solve complex problems.
One forwarder I know has completely restructured his operations team. Instead of having everyone do a bit of everything—quotes, bookings, documentation, tracking—he's created specialized roles:
Customer Success Specialists who own relationships
Exception Handlers who manage only the shipments with problems
System Trainers who teach AI how to handle new scenarios
"The routine work is automated," he explained. "So I need people who can do what machines can't—think creatively, build trust, and solve problems that don't have standard solutions."
His team is smaller than it was five years ago, but they're paid better, more skilled, and happier. Turnover dropped by 60%.
They Have Clean Data
This sounds boring, but it might be the most important one.
Every winning forwarder I've met has made a deliberate effort to organize their data. Their rates are structured. Their customer information is centralized. Their shipment records are consistent.
They didn't do this because they're naturally organized. They did it because they realized that data is the foundation everything else is built on.
Want to automate quoting? You need clean rate data.
Want to analyze profitability? You need consistent shipment records.
Want AI to learn your business? It needs structured information to learn from.
The forwarders who are still running on spreadsheets scattered across email inboxes will struggle to adopt any new technology. Their data is a mess, and cleaning it up is a project they keep postponing.
The winners invested in data organization years ago. That investment is now paying compound returns.
They Think in Systems, Not Tasks
When a losing forwarder has a problem, they fix the problem.
When a winning forwarder has a problem, they fix the system that allowed the problem to happen.
I watched this play out recently. Two forwarders had the same issue: a customer was quoted an outdated rate, and the company lost money on the shipment.
Forwarder A blamed the ops person who used the wrong rate, gave them a warning, and moved on.
Forwarder B asked: "Why was it possible to use an outdated rate? What system allowed that to happen?" They discovered their rate update process was broken—carrier updates weren't being entered consistently. They fixed the process and implemented automated alerts for expiring rates.
Six months later, Forwarder A had the same problem again with a different person. Forwarder B hasn't had that problem since.
Systems thinkers build businesses that improve over time. Task thinkers stay stuck solving the same problems forever.
They Move Fast
The final pattern I've noticed: winning forwarders make decisions quickly.
Not recklessly. They gather information, consider options, assess risks. But they don't spend six months studying a decision that could be tested in six weeks.
I've seen forwarders take a year to decide whether to implement a new system. In that year, their competitors moved ahead, customer expectations evolved, and the opportunity cost compounded.
I've seen other forwarders pilot a new technology in 30 days, learn what works, and scale it in 90. They made mistakes along the way. But they also got results while others were still in committee meetings.
The freight industry is changing faster than it ever has. The forwarders who wait for certainty before acting will always be behind. The ones who embrace uncertainty and learn as they go will lead.
I don't know your business. I don't know your challenges. I don't know your customers or your team or your financial situation.
But I know this: the next decade will be won by forwarders who embrace technology as leverage, obsess over customer experience, invest in the right people, organize their data, think in systems, and move fast.
None of these require you to be big. None require massive capital. None require an army of IT staff.
They require a mindset. A willingness to change how you think about your business.
The best time to start was five years ago. The second-best time is today.
Which forwarder do you want to be?
