For the third consecutive year at the PARCEL Forum, Shipware,

LLC conducted a live parcel pricing and benchmarking survey

in which 77 shippers responded to survey questions about their

parcel usage, carrier preferences, pricing discounts, cost reduction

strategies and other valuable benchmarking data. Survey

respondents collectively commanded approximately $2.8 billion

in annual parcel spend.

We asked the questions, you provided responses. Contracts

were not shared, but rather, participating shippers responded

anonymously to survey questions based on ranges. Technology enabled

and totally blinded to avoid confidentiality concerns,

the survey was designed to help shippers better understand how

their pricing stacks up with other shippers. Moreover, all survey

responses were cross-tabulated by industry, company revenues,

primary carrier, and annual parcel volume/spend for more meaningful

like-volume correlations.

Why is benchmarking parcel pricing data so critical? Well, the

most common challenge I hear from volume parcel shippers is

that they don’t know how good — or bad — are the incentives,

terms and structure of their carrier pricing agreements. While

no shipper would ever negotiate a contract and knowingly leave

money on the table, the reality is that some shippers have clearly

done a better job than others when it comes to negotiating the

most favorable rates and terms.

Published for the first time to non-survey participants, this article

provides survey results on general parcel procurement, discounts/

pricing benchmarks, DIM divisors and minimum charges,

and mode/carrier optimization.

Download the PDF to see the full results!

Editor's Note: We originally included the wrong numbers on the graph relating to the mitigation of DIM charges; that has since been corrected.