The findings, drawn from a 2026 survey of more than 1,000 supply chain, transport and logistics decision-makers at UK companies with annual turnovers above £100m, form the first of three reports under the banner The Future of Transport. They paint a picture of an industry where cost pressure is intensifying, investment is rising, but meaningful transformation remains out of reach for many operators.
The proportion of respondents reporting higher costs due to transport logistics inefficiency has also grown, from 26% in 2024 to 36% this year — a ten-percentage-point jump that GXO says points to a structural problem rather than a cyclical one. Alongside the customer and cost impacts, around a quarter of respondents said they had faced penalties linked to contractual failures, just under a quarter said they had missed key sales periods such as Christmas, and more than a fifth said their market reputation had declined.
Costs expected to keep rising
Nearly nine in ten respondents (89%) expect logistics operating costs to increase over the next 12 months, including 37% who expect them to rise significantly. More than half — 52% — agreed that logistics decisions are driven purely by cost.
Cost anxiety is particularly acute in consumer-facing and highly regulated sectors. In FMCG and fashion and apparel, 96% of respondents expect transport costs to rise over the coming year. The figure is 95% in healthcare, 93% in defence and aerospace, 90% in construction, and 89% in both IT and telecoms and packaging and manufacturing.
Carl Hanson, Managing Director, Transport at GXO UK&I, said the role of a 3PL in this environment is to give customers the tools to control cost rather than simply absorb it. “The opportunity lies in identifying the true cost of inefficiency, including underutilised fleet capacity, suboptimal routing, fragmented networks and poor visibility,” he said. “Organisations that can quantify inefficiency and link it directly to financial and operational outcomes will be better positioned to unlock investment and drive transformative change.”
Investment is rising but returns are not keeping pace
Despite the pressure, businesses are spending more. Some 85% of respondents said their company had increased investment in fleet optimisation over the past year, with 35% describing the increase as significant. Looking ahead, 70% expect capital for fleet investments to become easier to obtain, and 71% expect the same for logistics technology — suggesting the investment pipeline will grow further.
Respondents who did report returns cited improved delivery performance as the main benefit, named by 42%, followed by better customer experience (37%), improved visibility of operations (36%), improved driver productivity (35%) and better data for decision-making and regulatory compliance (also 35%).
But the report’s central argument is that these returns remain inconsistent across the sector. GXO says investment is typically deployed in isolation — a routing tool here, a fleet upgrade there, a driver performance programme elsewhere — rather than as part of a co-ordinated, end-to-end strategy. The result is that organisations struggle to quantify return on investment, prioritise projects, or scale improvements across their transport networks. As the report puts it, the challenge is not whether to invest, but how to invest intelligently — with clarity, co-ordination and measurable impact.
Technology integration is the biggest barrier
The gap between investment intent and practical implementation is the report’s other major theme. The most commonly cited barrier to fleet optimisation is technology integration, flagged by 44% of respondents. Budget constraints come second at 41%, followed by internal resistance to change (40%), distrust of new technology (35%), lack of in-house expertise (33%) and unclear ROI (29%).
The barriers break down differently by sector in ways that reveal underlying structural differences. In retail, 58% cite technology integration as the primary obstacle, with nearly half also pointing to a lack of in-house expertise — reflecting the complexity of connecting legacy systems across high-volume, multi-channel operations. In packaging and manufacturing, technology integration is again the top barrier at 59%, but budget constraints are comparatively low at 34%, suggesting the problem is less about funding and more about IT infrastructure and system complexity.
In FMCG and consumer goods, margin pressure and demand volatility mean investment decisions face tighter scrutiny, with 35% citing unclear ROI and 36% cost sensitivity. In defence and aerospace, the dominant barrier is internal resistance to change, cited by 51%, a reflection of longer planning cycles and deeply embedded operating models.
Chris Hyde, Managing Director, Food & Drink at GXO UK&I, said the pattern across sectors reveals a common underlying failure. “There is a clear disconnect emerging. While the need for optimisation is widely recognised, many organisations lack the visibility, structure and confidence to translate that investment into meaningful transformation. In many cases, initiatives are implemented in isolation — without a clear understanding of how they contribute to overall transport network performance or financial outcomes.”
The cost of missing technology
The consequences of operating without effective optimisation technology are both operational and financial. According to the survey, 37% of respondents said its absence leads to higher maintenance costs. A further 32% linked it to longer delivery times and 32% to higher CO₂ emissions. Some 27% said it increases time demands on logistics managers, while 26% said it results in the need for larger planning teams.
Without integrated optimisation tools, GXO argues, organisations are left relying on manual processes, static planning and fragmented data — none of which can respond to real-time conditions or drive network-wide improvement. The emissions impact falls hardest on sectors with the highest transport intensity: travel and transport respondents were the most likely to connect the absence of optimisation technology to higher CO₂ output, at 43%, followed by consumer goods at 38%.
Fuel uncertainty compounds the pressure
Operators are also grappling with acute uncertainty over fuel costs. The proposed removal of the 5p fuel duty cut, introduced in 2022, has raised expectations of higher costs, while ongoing instability in global energy markets makes forward planning harder. More than half of respondents said they expect the end of the fuel duty relief to materially increase their operating costs.
The most common anticipated response is a sharper focus on route optimisation and fuel efficiency, cited by 38%. Passing increased costs on to customers through higher delivery charges comes in at 37%, as does pressure to reduce non-essential mileage. Accelerating fleet transition plans to alternative fuels was cited by 36%, while 31% expect reduced profit margins. GXO says the more strategically focused operators are increasingly moving away from reactive responses in favour of structural efficiency improvements — better utilisation, network collaboration and alternative-fuel planning.
Collaboration is gaining ground
One of the more striking year-on-year shifts in the data concerns attitudes to collaboration. Some 86% of respondents now say collaboration is key to the future of logistics, up sharply from 65% in 2024. GXO attributes this to growing recognition that fragmented, independently operated transport networks cannot deliver the efficiency, flexibility or resilience that current conditions demand. Shared capacity, better data sharing between partners and more flexible operating models are all cited as elements of the shift.
The report sets out a five-pillar framework — covering network optimisation, fleet efficiency, transport networks, digital transport and customer experience — as the basis for structured, data-led improvement. Its conclusion is that the question facing UK transport operators is no longer whether to act on inefficiency, but whether they have the visibility, co-ordination and investment discipline to act effectively.
