Chattanooga, which is within a day’s drive of over half the U.S. population, is home to two of the nation’s biggest long-haul trucking companies – U.S. Xpress Enterprises and Covenant Logistics – and the country’s biggest privately owned warehousing company – Kenco Logistics.
But much of the recent logistics strength that is building Chattanooga’s so-called “freight alley” is coming from technology and freight brokerage businesses begun in the past decade to support the changing shipping industry.
A new list of America’s fastest growing businesses by Inc. magazine identifies 10 Chattanooga companies among the list of 5,000 rapidly growing companies started in recent years. Eight of the 10 local companies on the Inc. 5000 list are in the logistics and transportation industry and another, Reliance Partners, is an insurance broker that serves the trucking industry.
Craig Fuller, whose father helped start U.S. Xpress, launched one of Chattanooga’s biggest startup companies known as Freightwaves four years ago. Fuller says Chattanooga is emerging as one of the nation’s freight capitals.
“This city has more people connected to logistics per capita than any other city in America, so it was only natural that Chattanooga become the Silicon Valley of Trucking,” Fuller said in a recent podcast. “There’s a ton of industry energy around the space that’s being guided by people who have a deep understanding of how the market works.”