One consistency in the trucking industry that seems to be as common as the sun rising in the east is that February is the month of the year with the lowest national average spot rates. In a way, it is refreshing to see the average rates in mid-February be only a slight drop, with just enough of a drop to be expected but not so much as to send a jolt to fleets’ bottom lines.
DAT Rates, February 2020
Recently we wrote an article about the freight rates for dry van, flatbed, and reefer shipments. Because searching through the DAT for rates to compare historically can be a pain, we at TruckinNews have decided to make posting it a monthly blog post. Here are some changes to keep in mind:
- Color coding will now follow the DAT’s color code: red for dry van, green for flatbed, blue for reefer.
- Graphs will trail 37 months. This time frame allows you to see three years of trucking rates and the three previous years of the current month to see how it stacks to today.
- For data that is hard to find or not posted to DAT altogether, we use linear averaging to approximate the monthly rate. For example, July 2018 for reefer was determined by averaging the June and August 2018 rates.
- The DAT revises and corrects its previous monthly rates as it gets new information. These rates will be updated accordingly each month.
