The trucking, logistics, and shipping sector has battled the Great Freight Recession for about three years with no end in sight.
Most companies have blamed reduced shipping demand, lower freight rates, and rising costs of labor, fuel, and insurance as reasons for declining revenues and profits.
In the most desperate situations, shipping companies have filed for bankruptcy protection or even shut down operations.
Experts have expressed conflicting opinions on the state of the trucking industry. Some believe the sector is still facing dire conditions, while others believe recovery is on the horizon.
“The U.S. trucking industry continues to face a harsh economic reality: spot rates have failed to keep pace with inflation, squeezing carrier margins and contributing to significant financial pressure on truckers nationwide,” wrote Freightwaves CEO Craig Fuller, as reported by TheStreet’s Daniel Kline.
Doug Waggoner, CEO of Echo Global Logistics, however, is predicting improvement in the trucking industry, likely after the first quarter of 2026, he told Logistics Management.
“I think we’re at least in the late stages and maybe starting to come up,” Waggoner said. “But traditionally, January and February are the slowest months of the year.”
Regardless of those conflicting views, shipping companies are implementing restructuring plans to turn around their financial difficulties.
UPS plans to close 22 facilities in 18 states that employ union workers.Shutterstock ·Shutterstock
UPS Chief Financial Officer Brian Dykes, on a Jan. 27 earnings call, said the company would close 24 facilities in the first half of the year and slash 30,000 jobs.
UPS is decoupling 50% of its business with its largest customer, Amazon, by June because the deliveries are not profitable. It also recently agreed to outsource last-mile delivery to the U.S. Postal Service for certain economy shipments, Freightwaves reported.
Daniel Bordoni, the company’s president of global labor relations and deputy general counsel of labor, sent a letter to the Teamsters union on Jan. 30, revealing the 22 facilities using union labor that will close.
The company has not named the locations of the two other facilities among the 24 closings, at last check.
UPS included the letter in a filing with the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, which is part of a lawsuit filed by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters against a UPS-proposed $150,000 per driver buyout plan.
The Teamsters filed a motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction against UPS, demanding that the company halt its plan to roll out its “Driver Choice Program,” which it calls an “illegal buyout,” according to a Feb. 9 Teamsters statement.
“UPS must dismantle its illegal buyout program and resolve its contract violations in the courts, or the Teamsters will see this greedy corporation in the streets,” Teamsters General President Sean M. O’Brien said in the statement.
UPS in January 2026 revealed plans to offer a separation package for full-time U.S. drivers represented by the Teamsters, which the union says violates its contract with UPS.
The Driver Choice Program would give drivers a one-time lump sum payment of $150,000 in exchange for Teamsters legally committing to never work for UPS again, to waive their rights to union representation, union wages, employer-paid health care, and guaranteed retirement benefits, the statement said.
“The letter of separation that workers would be forced to sign by management to complete enrollment in the program would be irrevocable, further damaging the union or any individual worker’s ability to grieve or arbitrate the terms of separation,” the Teamsters said in its statement.
More closings:
UPS in the summer of 2025 offered another program to tenured drivers nearing retirement under its Driver Voluntary Separation Program, which the union said was widely rejected by Teamsters drivers nationwide and claimed was also allegedly a contract violation.
The company offered full-time U.S. drivers payments of $1,800 per year of service, with a minimum $10,000 offer under the Driver Voluntary Separation Program, Supply Chain Dive reported.
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