US Trailer Market Nears End of Subdued Year
November Orders Fall to 13,00, Down 37% Year over Year, 24% From October
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U.S. trailer orders fell below prior-year results in November with freight market pressures continuing to weigh on activity, reported. Preliminary net orders decreased 37% year over year to 13,000 units.
The year has been a mixed bag that has mostly trended above the previous year, with seven months showing an increase. November’s results also were down 24% from October. The seasonally adjusted figure at this point in the annual order cycle lowers the monthly tally to 10,500 units.
“Not only do net orders continue to underwhelm, cancellations remain elevated,” said , director of commercial vehicle market research at ACT. “Concerns about moderating economic activity, ongoing weak for-hire carrier profitability and ambiguous government policies remain as challenges to stronger trailer demand.”
McNealy added that demand is building, and fleets eventually will need to divert capital expenditure to deferred trailer purchases, but she also warned that stronger revenue is needed before the purchase spigot is opened wider.
“Not only do net orders continue to underwhelm, cancellations remain elevated,” says Jennifer McNealy, director of commercial vehicle market research. (ACT Research)
“This year, I think, I would just define as weird, and November was more of the same,” said Brandon Lairsen, vice president of trailer leasing at . “We put out a record number of trailers this year. We also took in a record number of trailers this year and, I think, that pretty well sums up how this year went.”
Lairsen views this pattern as reflecting much of the trailer market. He noted that largely is replacement equipment, as well as trailers being moved around to different providers because they were signed with long-term leases, and high rates, during the post-coronavirus period.
“It’s just like this shell game of moving trailers around between leasing companies,” Lairsen said. “November was really pretty weak for us on the trailer front. We don’t participate in the peak season spike in trailer demand because we don’t do anything from a short-term rental perspective.
“All of ours is a long-term lease. So most of the companies that had moves that they needed to make before the end of the year, they took care of that in September and October.”
Lairsen has heard more about replacement cycles when meeting with customers, which included traveling to the major border trade hub of Laredo, Texas. He’s seen more companies reach the point where the maintenance costs don’t outweigh a replacement.
“I’ll tell you, December is even less volume than what November was,” Lairsen said. “So, overall, I would say it’s very lackluster. We have a lot of companies that have already reached out and said that they’re looking at making a change in our favor after the first of the year. But they’re not going to make any moves now until late first quarter next year.”
reported that demand remained subdued primarily due to cautious ordering patterns. Its dealer network has reduced excess inventory across North America, but new orders for the 2027 model year refrigerated trailers, dry vans and flatbeds are being placed at notably lower levels compared with previous years. This proceed-with-caution approach is particularly evident among for-hire fleets.
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“They’re not only hesitant to make decisions, they really don’t have the need for the growth,” said Steve Bennett, president and chief operating officer at Utility Trailer. “It’s a pretty lackluster freight market. And at the end of the year, this is the time when we typically do receive a lot of orders, and my management team is very positive of the fact that we have closed quite a bit of orders heading towards the end of the year. But at the same time, our order level, year to date, is still 50% below our 10-year average.”
Bennett noted that private fleet customers have only been seeking replacement trailers, and big refrigerated customers on the for-hire side are either not buying anything new or just enough to get by.
“We’ve definitely got an issue with too much capacity,” Bennett said. “And so, as capacity exits, and that equipment gets absorbed, it probably needs another six months of capacity coming out of the industry — and that capacity getting absorbed by others — to get to the point where we can get to equilibrium and start to see trailer demand getting healthy again.”
Johan Land of Samsara explores how fleets are adopting AI to revolutionize their safety programs.Tune in above or by going to .
President Donald Trump has made tariffs a central focus of his trade agenda as he works to renegotiate trade deals across the board. This has included aluminum and steel imports, especially under Section 232 of the U.S. Trade Expansion Act, which allows the imposition of trade restrictions on imports that threaten national security.
“You have a massive inflationary factor,” Bennett said. “Aluminum today is trading at $2.20 a pound, which is 70 cents higher than it was a year ago, and that’s all because of a 232 tariff. That’s just for the base metal, so it has a huge inflationary impact.”
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