A pricing model failure masquerading as a capacity shortage
The companies moving the most cross-border freight right now have one thing in common: a truck in hand.
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Shippers with confirmed capacity are closing spot freight at rates that would have been unremarkable two years ago. Brokers have turned down loads this year because the rate committed to six months ago no longer covers the cost of moving them. US immigration enforcement has reduced the pool of Mexican drivers willing to cross northbound, while fuel costs spiked well after most contracted rates were locked in. Brokers holding those contracts are absorbing the gap between what they committed to and what the market now costs. The result is a pricing model failure dressed up as a capacity shortage. Most deal rejections in this environment come from price-capacity mismatches.
Why trade growth is outpacing our current logistics infrastructure
These disruptions are symptoms of a logistics infrastructure that has failed to scale alongside the growth in cross-border trade.
Mexico absorbed nearly $41 billion in foreign direct investment in the first three quarters of 2025 alone, a 15% year-over-year increase. New greenfield manufacturing investments tripled to $6.56 billion. Manufacturing exports from Mexico to the United States have grown by approximately $150 billion since 2021. The cross-border freight market supporting those flows is a $73 billion industry growing at roughly 4% annually.
Yet the logistics infrastructure handling that volume has not kept pace. Most providers still concentrate upward of 90% of their operations on over-the-road trucking. Cross-border intermodal remains barely used. Rail for non-urgent bulk freight is an underutilized option across the board. Warehousing, domestic Mexico drayage, and temperature-controlled logistics are treated as add-ons rather than core parts of the network. When any single piece fails, there is no backup, and the entire chain stops.
Why the window for network redesign is open right now, and what to do with it
Mexico is projected to attract $40 to $45 billion in FDI in 2026, and the nearshoring projects that stalled during USMCA uncertainty are starting to move again. When that volume picks up, shippers with multimodal options will absorb it without competing for scarce OTR capacity at peak rates. Shippers still on a single-mode approach will face the same problems visible today, at higher volume and higher cost.
Moving now means three things.
First, audit which lanes are entirely OTR-dependent and find intermodal alternatives for freight that is not time-sensitive. Intermodal options exist today at rates that will not be available once demand normalizes. Waiting means paying a premium to build something your competitors already have.
Second, establish bonded warehouse capacity on both sides of the border before the next demand surge. Bonded warehousing gives you the flexibility to stage freight, defer duties, and keep product moving when a single crossing point gets congested. At volume, that flexibility is the difference between an on-time delivery and a difficult customer conversation.
Third, secure at least one direct Mexico-Canada routing option that does not require US transit. The carrier relationships and regulatory groundwork required to build that lane take time. The shippers who have them when the next disruption hits will not be scrambling for alternatives.
None of these require a full network overhaul. All of them are harder to build at volume than they are right now.
The past two years were a preview of what comes next. The shippers who treated the disruption as a reason to rebuild rather than wait it out are already in a better position than the ones who did not.
