Trucking companies in Wisconsin: truckload headquarters, 3,913 employers and how to vet a carrier

This report is for Wisconsin shippers, dairy and paper producers choosing a carrier, drivers comparing employers, and B2B sellers whose customers are trucking companies, from tire and trailer dealers to insurers, benefits brokers and fleet software vendors.

Public trucking companies headquartered in Wisconsin

Two SEC-listed companies in the trucking SIC codes (4210 to 4231) have their principal executive offices in Wisconsin. Figures are from each company's 10-K for fiscal 2025.

Schneider says about 11% of its associates are based at its Green Bay headquarters, and its company tractors split into 7,800 sleeper cabs, 4,100 day cabs and 500 other tractors. Marten sold its intermodal operations effective 30 September 2025. Both figures are company-wide; their trucks run far beyond Wisconsin.

Wisconsin trucking in Census data

US Census Bureau County Business Patterns (CBP) 2023, NAICS 484 (Truck Transportation), state of Wisconsin:

Truckload is the story: 1,141 establishments with 27,004 employees, an average of 23.7 each. Specialized local carriers (the dump, bulk-liquid, livestock and farm-products haulers, including milk) are almost as numerous but average 6.4 employees.

Where Wisconsin's carriers are

Brown County has fewer establishments than Milwaukee County but more trucking jobs: 6,850, or 13.0% of the state's, at 38.5 per establishment.

Fleet sizes

All nine classes are published for Wisconsin. In broader bands: 3,415 establishments have 1 to 19 employees, 426 have 20 to 99 and 72 have 100 or more. A smaller share are tiny than in most trucking states: 65.3% have fewer than five employees, against 85.2% in Illinois.

CBP counts establishments with paid employees, so a carrier with terminals in Green Bay and Wausau counts twice; owner-operators without payroll are left out; and the dairy co-op's or the paper mill's own trucks are counted in dairy or paper, not trucking.

The federal register: private fleets outnumber for-hire

FMCSA's Company Census File (29 October 2026) has 65,666 active USDOT registrations with a Wisconsin physical address, 16.8 for each Census establishment. Without bus operators, 37,958 run only private fleets and 24,826 are for-hire, an unusual split: in Illinois for-hire carriers outnumber private fleets three to one.

Two-thirds of for-hire records (67.7%) are intrastate only, and fewer than half have been updated in the 24 months federal rules require (49 CFR 390.19). For a buyer or a seller that means most of the 65,666 records are farm, contractor and local operators, and the active interstate market is a few thousand carriers.

The largest for-hire fleets registered in Wisconsin

Active for-hire records, updated since October 2024, drivers at least half the power units; waste haulers left out. Self-reported on form MCS-150.

Schneider's two records add up to 10,435 power units. Marten's register count (3,794) is higher than the 2,654 tractors in its 10-K, a reminder that MCS-150 figures are the carrier's own and are updated only every two years. The largest private fleet in the state file is American Builders & Contractors Supply (ABC Supply) in Beloit, with 7,170 power units. For national context, see the largest trucking companies.

How to vet a Wisconsin carrier

1. Pull the SAFER record in FMCSA's Company Snapshot, and confirm the operation type: an intrastate-only number can't haul your load across the Illinois or Minnesota line.
2. Check authority and insurance for interstate for-hire work in FMCSA's Licensing and Insurance search. Minimum liability is $750,000 for general freight and $1,000,000 to $5,000,000 for hazardous materials (49 CFR 387.9).
3. Look at the update date. With 56.3% of for-hire records past their 24-month update, a stale MCS-150 is common, and a carrier that ignores it may ignore other paperwork.
4. Match the specialty. Milk, bulk feed, paper rolls and flatbed lumber each need different trailers and experience. The Wisconsin Motor Carriers Association runs affiliates for milk haulers, movers, towing and motor coach operators, which is a quick way to find a specialist.
5. Ask about winter operations: how the carrier handles weather holds, and who covers the load if a truck goes down.

Selling to Wisconsin trucking companies

Drivers are the cost that every Wisconsin fleet manages: Schneider says 70% of its roughly 19,000 associates drive, and Marten employs 2,660 drivers. Offers that help a fleet hire and keep drivers get read. To reach the right person at each, see how to find decision makers.

Illustrative example. The broker, fees and win rate are invented; the counts are from FMCSA's October 2026 file.

Badger Fleet Benefits (badgerbenefits.example) arranges group health plans for small and mid-size fleets. Its target is interstate for-hire carriers with a Wisconsin address, 11 to 100 power units and a current MCS-150: 789 carriers reporting 22,429 drivers between them. If 3% sign (24 fleets) with an average of 28 enrolled drivers at a $40 per employee monthly fee, that's $322,560 a year. The opening line is retention: what a driver gives up by switching to a big fleet's benefits. Bebop can build that list from a plain description and find the owner or HR lead at each fleet.

Hi [first name], [your name] with Badger Fleet Benefits. Thirty seconds and I'll let you go.

You run about [number] trucks out of [city]. Most owners your size tell me they lose drivers to the big Green Bay and Marshfield fleets over health cover, not pay.

We set up group plans for fleets of 10 to 100 drivers. Could I send you a side-by-side for [company] by [day]?

Wisconsin sources

Next step: compare Wisconsin with its neighbor's mix of carriers in the report on trucking companies in Minnesota.