Following a pilot program in 2022, freight coordination platform Leaf Logistics has found a way to eliminate 76% of empty miles from unloaded trucks driving on the road by coordinating multi-shipper moves across the transportation grid at scale.
Leaf has expanded its product offerings to include Flex Fleets, a multi-shipper dedicated trucking fleet, to solve for wasted truck capacity, which in turn has reduced environmental impact and driver turnover.
Today’s shipper-carrier game involves companies sending out requests for proposal to a multitude of carriers and brokers with the received rates ranked and executed in order. But Leaf Logistics CEO Anshu Prasad said that results in everyone managing just their lanes on a transactional basis instead of via contract, making it difficult for carriers and brokers to coordinate loads because there’s no commitment of capacity.
“We don't see the same carrier in use between Johnson & Johnson and its packaging vendor, so the chances they are using the same truck to deliver empty packaging in and then take Listerine out of J&J and get it to Walmart, it just doesn't happen,” Prasad said. “That coordination, or lack of, leads to a third to half of the truck capacity in the U.S. being wasted every day, and that's just a huge problem for all of us.”
Shippers J&J, BASF and Party City have already joined Flex Fleets, which leverages Leaf Adapt technology to analyze data from more than 450 big shippers in the U.S. to coordinate multi-shipper moves. Leaf applies machine learning to compare a shipper’s demand profile against its transportation network to establish patterns and club together volume to reduce rate volatility and save on shipping costs.
With that data, Flex Fleets connects loads to reduce empty miles.
“If we know that there's three trucks a day in April going from L.A. to Phoenix on a schedule because it's contracted, that allows us to connect that load with other loads,” Prasad said. “Leaf sees other demand with other shippers that syncs up perfectly and allows that truck not just to get back but to get back loaded … These network moves were set up at a macro industry level – we like to call it the grid level – to see and orchestrate. There are a thousand times more opportunities like this with other shippers than any shipper has internally, so this becomes a sort of air traffic control role for Leaf to play, which leads directly into the Flex Fleets where in multiple areas of the country we see pockets of demand across multiple shippers that can keep fleets of trucks and drivers busy over a period of time.”
