A net profit of $62 per load is the highest result achieved by mid-sized freight brokers for at least two years. That bottom line number was the product of above-average load volume and gross revenues per load. Costs were up in October, too, but a boost to load volume more than made up for the extra expenses. The gross profit margin was stable at 14.5%.
The graph below reveals that October was a record month for brokers’ financial performance per load, among other metrics. They moved an average of 1,357 loads (dark blue bar) during the month, to bring in an average revenue of $1,578 (green bar) and a profit of $61.65 (orange line) per load.
In October 2016, by comparison, the average profit per load was only $21.71. The same group suffered a net loss per average load in December 2016 and January of this year, repeating a pattern from the previous winter.
Revenue Per Employee Achieves a Two-Year High
Even though the number of employees increased, the average revenue per employee rose to a new high of just under $79,000 for the month, and profits per employee hit $3,085. That’s a stunning 183% higher than the results of October 2016.
The core group of benchmark data contributors averaged over $2.1 million in total revenues in October, up 64% from the same month last year. Costs were up, too, but the 57% increase in labor expense and 9% rise in non-labor expense, year over year, were more than offset by the additional revenue.
More than 100 freight brokers contributed data to this report. The information is shared by a select group of DAT Keypoint customers who compare their own monthly and quarterly results against those of the entire group, for benchmarking purposes.
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