• TPM25 | March 2-5, 2025
  • TPM25
  • March 2-5, 2025 | Long Beach Convention Center

James Schram

J.B. Hunt Transport Services

Senior Director-Temperature Control Systems

Jim Schram is a trusted refrigerated transportation leader that brings a great understanding and expertise to JB Hunt Transportation helping to facilitate depth and growth to their temperature-controlled service offerings. With over 40 years of experience within his career of temperature-controlled transportation, Jim has held many positions in and out of management and leadership. Growing up and within the temperature control transportation business, Jim has held positions that allowed him firsthand knowledge from the ground up to participate in and shape the temperature-controlled practices used today.

Some of his proudest moments in his career have been, working with regulatory change as a State VP of the ATA that allowed higher weight combos in western states and helping in the overall Temperature Controlled Intermodal (TCI) expansion that has made JB Hunt the largest provider of TCI in North America today through customer delivered value every day. 

Sessions With James Schram

Wednesday, 6 March

  • 09:55am - 10:40am (PST) / 06/mar/2024 05:55 pm - 06/mar/2024 06:40 pm

    TPM Cold Chain: Recovering From the Abyss: How Service Providers Are Preparing for the Next Volume Surge
    Now that the cargo volume surge and related disruption of 2020 to 2022 has passed, the international cold chain has time to reflect on what went well (not much) during the COVID era, what didn’t (a lot), and how to prepare for the inevitable next market uprising. Following a fairly muted 2022, ocean carriers spent much of 2023 adding reefer plugs and investing in new reefer containers, betting that they’ll win back refrigerated shipments. “We think the carriers will focus a bit more on the reefer trade than they have in the past two years,” Robert Sappio, CEO of reefer lessor SeaCube Containers, told the Journal of Commerce in June. Referring to eastbound trans-Pacific spot dry box rates that have tumbled more than 80 percent since the beginning of 2022, “If you are faced with the choice of chasing a reefer box or chasing a dry box that’s $1,500 or $1,600 in the spot market, it’s a no brainer.” Sappio said he expected global purchases of new reefer containers to grow 5 percent to about 300,000 TEU in 2023. For shippers, a continued influx of reefer capacity and containers would help to sustain rates that have declined by 30% or more since 2022 and significantly more than the unprecedented rates of 2020-2021. But with those rates falling, and earnings plummeting, will carriers maintain the investment pace? And, if capacity continues to outstrip demand, what measures will carriers take to close the gap? This session, featuring a panel of ocean carriers and forwarders will examine how service providers are adapting to new market conditions and what approach they’re taking toward the reefer market in 2024 and beyond.  
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