PHOTO PRESS -Piacenza-credit @CRUCIATTI Piero.jpg

08/25/2026

One Partner, Three Networks: A Simpler Way to Plan for Peak Season

Rising freight rejections signal more than a trucking problem. See why growth brands should audit transportation, warehousing, and Final Mile together before peak season hits.

Most growth brands know peak season is coming. What catches them off guard is how much leverage they have already lost by the time they try to lock things down. Staying on the spot market feels like flexibility. In a tightening freight market, that posture is exactly what gets punished first.

 

Peak season prep is not only a scheduling exercise. It is a margin and service question, and how a brand answers it now determines who gets prioritized when capacity runs short. And transportation is rarely the only place that exposure shows up. Warehouse space and Final Mile capacity tend to tighten on the same timeline, which means a brand that solves one problem in isolation is often still exposed on the other two.

Why waiting costs more this year

Tender rejection rates, the share of contracted freight that carriers decline in favor of higher-paying spot loads, have moved sharply this year. Reporting from FreightWaves and SONAR data showed the national tender rejection index reaching roughly 13.5 percent by mid-2026, a level that did not occur at any point in 2024, including that year's peak season. Earlier in the year, a SONAR and Ryder System report found rejection rates climbing to nearly 14.3 percent, a sharp move from a baseline that had hovered closer to 5 percent for much of 2023 through 2025. One trucking company executive described readings above 14 percent as comparable to the rejection spikes seen during the pandemic freight boom.

 

Spot rates have moved with them. Industry reporting citing DAT data put national spot rates at roughly $2.80 per mile, all in with fuel surcharge, in early 2026, a 23 percent jump from late 2025 lows.

 

For a growth brand without contracted capacity, that combination is not just a cost problem. When carriers can pick which freight to accept, tenders from shippers without a committed relationship are the first to get rejected. That means paying more for the freight that does move, and risking real service disruption on the freight that does not.

GEODIS heavy truck on a road.png

Talk to a GEODIS Supply Chain Expert.

Button Contact us

The other two shoes about to drop

Transportation gets the most attention because rate and rejection data are easy to point to, but it is rarely the only stress point. Warehouse space tends to tighten on the same Q4 timeline, often while a brand's attention is still on trucking. At the same time, parcel carriers have been pulling back capacity and shifting priority toward higher-margin volume, which squeezes Final Mile options right as order volume peaks.

 

The pattern across all three is the same. A brand that has not secured commitments ahead of the surge is negotiating from a weaker position exactly when it can least afford to.

A capacity audit growth brands can run this week

Before any conversation about contracts or partners, it helps to know where the exposure actually sits. This is a short internal exercise, not a sales pitch:

 

  1. Contracted versus spot mix. What share of your freight currently moves under a committed rate versus the open market.
  2. Q4 volume reforecast. Whether your current plan reflects updated demand signals or is still built on last year's numbers.
  3. Carrier diversification. How much of your volume depends on a single carrier or a small number of lanes.

 

Running this audit does not require a 3PL. It just requires an honest look at where a brand's freight, space, and delivery capacity are still unprotected heading into the fourth quarter.

Talk to a GEODIS Supply Chain Expert.

Button Contact us
Nouvelle politique diversité

Where GEODIS fits, and why it is rarely just one conversation

GEODIS works with growth brands on managed transportation and freight procurement to provide access to contracted capacity and carrier relationships that are difficult to negotiate on a smaller shipper's own volume, through centralized carrier sourcing and dedicated fleet partnerships built for regular and peak demand.

 

That conversation tends to surface the other two. GEODIS operates more than 150 U.S. warehousing locations, including more than 20 multi-client campuses designed to flex for seasonal peaks without requiring a long-term facility commitment. On the Final Mile side, GEODIS's scalable, independent contractor delivery model is built specifically to flex capacity up for peak demand periods without the fixed cost of a permanent fleet.

 

In one documented case, a large regional Final Mile delivery provider came to GEODIS for peak season capacity support and relief. Over November and December, GEODIS managed 2,000 loads between the client's hubs, achieving 100 percent tender acceptance, 96 percent on time pickups, and 98 percent on time delivery, the kind of performance that is difficult to replicate on the spot market alone.

One plan instead of three fire drills

Most brands that come in looking for transportation capacity have the same unaddressed exposure in warehousing and Final Mile. Treating the three as separate problems usually means three separate vendor conversations, each one started later and under more pressure than the last, and each one negotiated from a weaker position than it would have been a month earlier.

 

A single conversation covering transportation, warehousing, and Final Mile together lets a brand plan for peak season once, with one partner accountable for all three, instead of running three fire drills between now and December.

 

The audit above takes about an afternoon, and it is the fastest way to see where that exposure actually sits before the fourth quarter closes in. From there, the more useful conversation is not about any single service. It is about whether a brand's transportation, warehouse space, and Final Mile capacity are lined up to hold through peak, or quietly working against each other.

 

That is the conversation a GEODIS Supply Chain Expert can walk through directly: where the audit points to real exposure, what locking in contracted capacity, warehouse space, or Final Mile support would look like for your volume, and what a realistic timeline still allows given how far into the year we already are. Bring your numbers or bring the questions. Either way, one focused conversation now is a better use of time than three separate scrambles in October.

Talk to a GEODIS Supply Chain Expert.

Button Contact us

FAQ title here

It means securing commitments across transportation, warehousing, and Final Mile delivery before demand peaks, rather than relying on the open market to have space available when order volume surges. The earlier a brand locks in capacity, the more leverage it has on rate and service.

A rejected tender means a carrier declined a load at the agreed contract rate in favor of higher-paying freight elsewhere. When rejection rates climb, brands without contracted capacity are the first to feel it, both in higher costs on the spot market and in delays when carriers prioritize committed freight over theirs.

As early as possible, and ideally before Q4 demand signals are already straining the market. Warehouse space and Final Mile capacity tend to tighten on the same timeline as transportation, so waiting on one often means losing ground on the other two as well.

GEODIS supports all three. Its managed transportation and freight procurement services provide access to contracted carrier capacity, its warehousing network includes more than 150 U.S. locations with flexible, multi-client campuses for seasonal peaks, and its Final Mile delivery model is built to scale up for peak demand without the fixed cost of a permanent fleet.

Existing carrier relationships are a good starting point, but the audit in this article is designed to show whether that coverage is broad enough to hold through peak, particularly on lanes or modes outside a brand's core relationships. A conversation with a GEODIS Supply Chain Expert can help identify where gaps remain before they become a problem in the fourth quarter.

Arial Struthers