Trucking companies in Jacksonville: Landstar's hometown, port car haulers and how to vet a carrier

This report is for Jacksonville shippers, importers and auto processors looking for a carrier, drivers comparing employers, and B2B sellers whose customers are trucking companies.

Jacksonville at a glance

County Business Patterns 2023, NAICS 484 (Truck Transportation), for the Jacksonville, FL Metro Area (CBSA 27260).

Duval has three-quarters of the establishments and 90.6% of the jobs. The suburban counties are mostly one- and two-person businesses: Clay averages 2.3 employees per establishment.

What gets hauled

Movers are the oddity: 69 establishments with 1,740 employees, 25.2 each, far larger than a typical moving company. One large mover is visible in the federal register: Suddath Moving & Storage, with 193 power units registered in Jacksonville.

The Census Bureau withholds the three largest classes. In broader bands, 1,025 establishments have 1 to 19 employees, 67 have 20 to 99 and 22 have 100 or more (the total less the smaller bands), so five have at least 250. Owner-operators without employees aren't counted.

Landstar, CSX and the port

Landstar System is the SEC-listed trucking company (SIC 4213) headquartered in the metro, at 13410 Sutton Park Drive South. Its 10-K for the fiscal year ended 27 December 2025 reports $4,743,760,000 of revenue and 1,378 employees, with about 960 independent commission sales agents and more than 70,000 third-party capacity providers. Its BCO Independent Contractors employ about 8,514 drivers. That model shows in the federal register, where Landstar Ranger and Landstar Inway are listed in Jacksonville with no power units of their own.

CSX, a railroad (SIC 4011) rather than a trucking company, also has its head office in Jacksonville. Its 2025 10-K says its intermodal business shipped 3.0 million units and earned $2.1 billion, and that its Quality Carriers subsidiary is the largest bulk liquid chemical trucking provider in North America.

JAXPORT, whose fiscal year starts 1 October:

Half a million vehicles a year is work for car haulers, and the register reflects it: 1,096 of the metro's carriers (12.7%) list motor vehicles as cargo. Cargo types are self-reported by carriers, and FMCSA's open-data file doesn't always match a carrier's own SAFER record, so treat these counts as indicative.

What the register shows

FMCSA's Company Census File (29 October 2026) has 8,609 active carrier registrations in the five counties: 69.1% intrastate only, 75.3% declaring for-hire work, and 67.3% of those reporting trucks with just one. Carriers report these details themselves. The largest for-hire freight fleets, filtered to records updated in 2024 or later with a driver count consistent with the fleet:

Before you hire a Jacksonville carrier

1. Run the USDOT number in FMCSA's SAFER Company Snapshot and confirm the name and address match.
2. Check authority and insurance in FMCSA's Licensing and Insurance search: $750,000 is the federal floor for general freight (49 CFR 387.9).
3. For loads inside Florida, know that section 316.302 of the Florida Statutes applies the federal safety rules (49 CFR parts 382 to 386 and 390 to 397, as they stood on 31 December 2023) to intrastate carriers, with exceptions. "We only run in Florida" is no reason to skip the safety checks.
4. For an agent-based carrier, ask who the agent is, who actually drives the load and whose insurance covers it.
5. For vehicles, ask a car hauler for its damage claims rate and inspection process at pickup.

Selling to Jacksonville carriers

Illustrative example. The app and its rates are invented; the counts are from FMCSA's register and JAXPORT.

Dames Point Inspect (dpinspect.example) sells a phone app for vehicle condition reports at pickup and delivery, which cuts damage disputes for car haulers. In the register, 335 carriers in the metro list motor vehicles and report two or more power units. The owner decides at most of them, so one contact each; at a 7% reply rate, about 23 conversations, and if one in four starts a free month, 6 trial fleets. The opener cites the port's 506,237 vehicles: every one of those moves is a chance for a damage claim. Bebop can pull those car haulers into a list and research each before the first email. For reaching the right person at bigger carriers, see how to find decision makers.

Subject: Damage claims on port vehicles

Hi [first name],

JAXPORT moved more than 500,000 vehicles last year, and most car haulers we talk to say one disputed scratch can wipe out a load's margin.

Our app has drivers photograph and sign off each vehicle at pickup and delivery, time-stamped, so a claim comes down to evidence, not memory.

Want to try it free for a month on [number] of your trucks?

[Your name]

Jacksonville sources

Next step: compare Jacksonville with Central Florida's small fleets in the report on trucking companies in Orlando.