U.S. freight transportation arrangement employer establishments in 2023.
U.S. Census Bureau, 2023 ↗INDUSTRY FACTSHEET
Freight forwarding facts 2026.
Freight forwarding, customs brokerage, transport arrangement, and intermodal market facts by region.
DIRECT ANSWER
What do freight forwarding statistics show?
Freight forwarders and brokers sell coordination across shippers, carriers, customs, ports, terminals, and consignees. The United States has 21,873 freight-transportation-arrangement employer establishments, and EU transportation and storage services generated €1.9 trillion of turnover in 2022, making account and exception management a substantial CRM opportunity.
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Numbers with
traceable sources.
Each statistic links directly to its primary publisher and keeps the original date, geography, and classification.
EU transportation and storage services turnover in 2022.
Eurostat, 2022 ↗UK goods lifted in 2025 using HGVs plus at least one other transport mode.
UK Department for Transport, 2025 ↗REGIONAL COMPARISON
One industry.
Six market contexts.
These measures are not a like-for-like market-size ranking. The table preserves the source definition and explains what each regional signal means operationally.
| Region | Definition | Official baseline | Operational interpretation | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| United States | All 50 states and the District of Columbia. | The SBA counted 36.2 million U.S. small businesses in its 2025 profile release. | Census counts 21,873 establishments arranging freight between shippers and carriers across modes. | SBA Office of Advocacy, 2025 ↗ |
| Southeast United States | Pipetidy's target states: Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Kentucky, and Virginia. | These seven states contain about 5.49 million small businesses and roughly 8.8 million small-business employees. | Savannah, Charleston, Hampton Roads, Mobile, inland rail, airports, and distribution hubs create a strong multimodal forwarding market. | SBA state profiles, 2025 ↗ |
| United Kingdom | England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. | The UK had about 114,000 VAT/PAYE-registered transport and storage businesses and 141,000 agriculture, forestry, and fishing businesses in 2025. | About 130 million tonnes moved in journeys combining HGVs with another transport mode in 2025. | Office for National Statistics, 2025 ↗ |
| Northern Europe | Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden for this factsheet series. | Eurostat's structural business statistics cover detailed enterprise activity across EU and EFTA markets, including transport, storage, rental, repair, and trade. | Major ports, ferries, air cargo, and export industries create multilingual, cross-border exception workflows. | Eurostat structural business statistics ↗ |
| Central Europe | Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Poland, Czechia, Slovakia, and Hungary for this factsheet series. | Central Europe contains several of the EU's largest freight and industrial markets; Germany and Poland together produced almost 35% of EU road-freight tonne-kilometres in 2024. | Dense road, rail, river, and manufacturing networks make shipment milestones and account communication highly interdependent. | Eurostat road freight, 2025 ↗ |
| Australia & New Zealand | Australia and New Zealand, reported separately where official statistics differ. | Australia had 261,109 transport, postal, and warehousing businesses in 2025-26; New Zealand transport, postal, and warehousing sales reached NZ$11.75 billion in the June 2026 quarter. | Long international routes, biosecurity, ports, domestic linehaul, and trans-Tasman trade produce document-heavy customer journeys. | ABS and Stats NZ, 2026 ↗ |
OPERATING RISKS
Where customer context
falls through.
Rate requests and quotations disappearing across inboxes
Multi-party updates losing ownership and deadlines
Customs, document, port, or carrier exceptions not tied to the account
Proof, invoice, and repeat-shipment follow-up delayed
CRM WORKFLOW
Enquiry. Work.
Invoice.
The useful CRM layer is a reliable handoff from the first enquiry through delivery, exceptions, billing, and the next opportunity.
METHOD & LIMITS
What the evidence
does—and does not—show.
Methodology
Pipetidy Research selects primary government, statistical-agency, and publisher-original sources. Each figure retains its source period, geography, and classification; unlike measures are not combined into a synthetic global total.
Limitations
Industry definitions differ by country and statistical system. Regional baselines describe the wider operating market and should not be read as a like-for-like market-size comparison or as evidence of Pipetidy customer outcomes.
Editorial disclosure
Hudson Paul is a cofounder of Pipetidy. P101 LLC publishes Pipetidy Research. The operational interpretation reflects Pipetidy's product perspective and is kept separate from source facts.
Corrections
Send newer primary evidence or corrections to hello@pipetidy.com. Material changes update the page date and downloadable files.
SUGGESTED CITATION
Paul, Hudson. “Freight forwarding and brokerage facts 2026.” Pipetidy Research, P101 LLC. Updated 2026-09-22. https://pipetidy.com/industry-facts/freight-forwarding-statistics
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Clear answers.
Qualified claims.
Each answer preserves the geography, period, and classification of its supporting evidence.
How large is the freight forwarding market?
Freight forwarders and brokers sell coordination across shippers, carriers, customs, ports, terminals, and consignees. The United States has 21,873 freight-transportation-arrangement employer establishments, and EU transportation and storage services generated €1.9 trillion of turnover in 2022, making account and exception management a substantial CRM opportunity. The figures on this page should be read with their stated geography, period, and industry classification.
Which regions does this freight forwarding factsheet cover?
The factsheet covers the United States, Pipetidy's seven-state Southeast target region, the United Kingdom, Northern Europe, Central Europe, and Australia and New Zealand.
How were the statistics selected?
Pipetidy Research uses primary government, statistical-agency, and publisher-original sources, preserves the source period and classification, and avoids combining unlike regional measures into a single global total.
SOURCES
Official data first.
Scope made clear.
Sources were last checked September 22, 2026. If a figure cannot be traced to its primary publisher, it does not belong on this page.
U.S. Census Bureau — U.S. freight transportation arrangement employer establishments in 2023. ↗Eurostat — EU transportation and storage services turnover in 2022. ↗UK Department for Transport — UK goods lifted in 2025 using HGVs plus at least one other transport mode. ↗SBA Office of Advocacy, 2025 — The SBA counted 36.2 million U.S. small businesses in its 2025 profile release. ↗SBA state profiles, 2025 — These seven states contain about 5.49 million small businesses and roughly 8.8 million small-business employees. ↗Office for National Statistics, 2025 — The UK had about 114,000 VAT/PAYE-registered transport and storage businesses and 141,000 agriculture, forestry, and fishing businesses in 2025. ↗Eurostat structural business statistics — Eurostat's structural business statistics cover detailed enterprise activity across EU and EFTA markets, including transport, storage, rental, repair, and trade. ↗Eurostat road freight, 2025 — Central Europe contains several of the EU's largest freight and industrial markets; Germany and Poland together produced almost 35% of EU road-freight tonne-kilometres in 2024. ↗ABS and Stats NZ, 2026 — Australia had 261,109 transport, postal, and warehousing businesses in 2025-26; New Zealand transport, postal, and warehousing sales reached NZ$11.75 billion in the June 2026 quarter. ↗
RELATED RESEARCH
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operating context.
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