W hile not all attributes that contribute to a successful organization can be measured, many can. When it comes to transportation and logistics, the volume of metrics and data available can make it challenging to identify the ones likely to provide the greatest value. “You can chase too many rabbits,” says Lynn Gravley, founder and CEO of NT Logistics. To be truly useful, data needs to be associated with a lever that can be changed to improve an operation— typically, it’s either cost or service. For example, if a manufacturer learns that its rate of on-time, in-full (OTIF) deliveries to a retail chain falls below an acceptable level, it will need metrics that can pinpoint, among other information, which carriers are arriving late and which facilities are sending shipments that are short inventory. The greatest insights aren’t necessarily gleaned from more metrics, but from deeper insight into particular ones, says David Nowicki, professor and director, Center for Logistics and Supply Chain Management, University of North Texas. For example, on-time delivery is usually reported as the percentage of shipments that are on time. However, this alone doesn’t capture the relative severity of late deliveries. An average transit time of 10 hours, with a range of three to 20 hours, represents a wildly different performance than the same 10-hour average with transit times ranging from nine to 11 hours. “Although the average is identical, the second case is far more consistent and predictable,” Nowicki says. While the most useful metrics vary across organizations, some consistently provide value across different companies. These include: 1 TOTAL LANDED TRANSPORTATION COST PER UNIT By watching this metric, shippers can stay ahead of changes that will eat into
Carriers’ digital dashboards, such as this one from NT Logistics, allow shippers to track critical metrics such as total charges per pound and average length of haul across high-volume networks.
pro ts, Gravley says. Take a company that sells its product for $10 per case, and it costs $1 per case to transport it to a retailer’s distribution center. If the landed transportation cost per case drifts up to $1.20, it eats into the company’s margins. 2 ON-TIME DELIVERY AND PICKUP Today, on-time delivery is considered table stakes. In fact, some companies mandate that suppliers consistently achieve designated OTIF delivery rates, says Kate Ren, Ph.D, assistant professor at Ohio State University. Investments in technology, whether new or classic, such as RFID, can provide greater supply chain visibility to identify bottlenecks and leakage that might cut into OTIF rates. This metric should also highlight the percentage of packages that not only are delivered on time, but on the rst attempt. “A package that takes three attempts and a customer service call isn’t on time, even if it technically beats the promised date on paper,” notes Kyle Henzel, COO of SHIP.com, a shipping intelligence platform. Along with deliveries, the rate of carrier pickups that occur on time is also key, says Marc Held, chief executive of cer of HOPTEK, an AI-native freight
monetization service. The reason? A late pickup generally is a failure the carrier owns outright, he adds. 3 EXPECTED VS. ACTUAL DELIVERY TIMES Many carriers post expected delivery times. Shippers should also track “expected versus actual” delivery times, says Kenneth Moyer, partner and chief supply chain of cer, strategic advisory, with LJM. The consistency between the two numbers is more important than delivery speed alone. 4 COMMUNICATE EXCEPTIONS If a package will be late, the carrier should consistently state this before the shipper has to ask and before a customer brings it up. “That second scenario means you’ve already lost,” Henzel says. 5 SAFETY RECORDS “Safety is simultaneously a moral obligation, a cost driver, and a leading indicator of operational discipline everywhere else in the business,” Held says. For truckers, relevant metrics include the carrier’s record across the seven categories of the FMCSA’s
September 2026 • Inbound Logistics 29
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