Reefer Loads
Temperature-Controlled Freight

The trailer is not a refrigerator

The most common and most expensive misunderstanding in reefer work: a refrigerated trailer maintains temperature, it does not remove it. A unit set to 34 °F loaded with produce that arrived at the dock at 60 °F will not bring it down in time, and the load will be rejected at delivery for pulp temperature even though the trailer ran perfectly the whole way.

What follows from that is the discipline of the segment. Pre-cool the trailer before loading. Check pulp temperatures as the freight goes on and note them. Confirm the set point and whether the unit runs continuous or start-stop, continuous for most produce and protein, start-stop only where the shipper has specified it. Get all of it on the bill of lading, because the bill of lading is what the claim will be argued from.

Food safety is a legal obligation, not a courtesy

The Sanitary Transportation of Human and Animal Food rule under FSMA places obligations directly on carriers moving food. In practice that means the trailer has to be suitable and clean, the temperature has to be maintained as the shipper specified, drivers have to be trained where the carrier is responsible for sanitary conditions, and records have to exist. A shipper is entitled to ask for evidence of all four, and increasingly does.

What reefer freight looks like through the year

Reefer is the most seasonal of the major segments, and the seasonality is geographic. Produce moves out of Florida and the Southeast in the spring, out of California through the summer, out of the Pacific Northwest in the autumn, and Texas and the Southwest fill gaps at both ends. Protein runs steadily from the Midwest and the Plains year-round. The last quarter is dominated by holiday retail and frozen goods.

• Fresh produce, the most time-critical and the most rejection-prone freight on the road.
• Meat, poultry and seafood, frequently on hanging or specific loading requirements.
• Dairy and eggs, on short shelf lives and tight windows.
• Frozen foods and ice cream, at deep set points where unit performance matters most.
• Pharmaceuticals and biologics, on narrow ranges with continuous monitoring.
• Flowers, plants and other cold-chain non-food freight.

Reefer trailers can also legally haul dry freight, and many operators do it on backhauls. It is worth knowing that this cuts both ways: a dry load in a reefer means the unit is off and earning nothing, but it also means an empty leg becomes a paid one.

The costs a dry van operator does not have

A refrigeration unit burns its own fuel, runs its own hours, and needs its own servicing. Add the higher purchase price of the trailer, the washouts between commodities, and the claims exposure on perishable freight, and reefer's higher rate per mile starts to look less like a premium and more like a price. It is a genuinely better business than dry van for operators who run it carefully, and a worse one for operators who do not.

The full comparison against flatbed and dry van is in flatbed vs dry van vs reefer: what actually pays best.

Every reefer load on this board shows its rate before you call, and posting is free for brokers and shippers, which is why the freight is here. See how it works for carriers.