Strengthening Customer Service and Freight Security with Descartes 3G TMS™, MacroPoint™, and MyCarrierPortal™
Vesta Freight is a fast-growing, customer- and carrier-focused freight brokerage providing domestic transportation solutions across full truckload (FTL), less-than-truckload (LTL), and intermodal modes. Headquartered in Gallatin, Tennessee, the company supports shippers nationwide through a distributed, pod-based broker model aligned to customer and industry verticals. Vesta’s mission is to provide excellence to both shippers and carriers with every shipment, transaction, and interaction—acting as an “extension” of its customers’ operations through strong execution and best-in-class technologies.
As Vesta scaled rapidly (from ~100 shipments per month in 2022 to ~1,800 per month in 2025), the brokerage stayed committed to a cradle-to-grave operating model (one accountable point of contact across quoting, booking, tracking, and issue resolution) while standardizing execution, visibility, and carrier risk management on an integrated Descartes technology stack. With Descartes 3G TMS for brokerage execution and financial control, Descartes MacroPoint for real-time visibility plus carrier lookups, and Descartes MyCarrierPortal for carrier vetting (including driver and equipment verification), onboarding, monitoring and fraud prevention, Vesta delivers proactive communication, secure execution, and faster financial cycles for shippers and carriers alike.
The Challenge: Unifying Vetting Across Complex Logistics Network
Vesta Freight differentiates itself by delivering premium service to both shippers and carriers. The company’s pod-based, cradle-to-grave model reduces handoffs and creates accountability. Customers get proactive communication and if needed, they know exactly who to call and can expect that person to have immediate shipment context.
As the brokerage expanded into multiple verticals and increased shipment volume, Vesta needed an operating foundation that could scale without compromising service. Manual processes and disconnected systems would not keep pace with customer expectations for real-time updates, while the continued rise in freight fraud and cargo theft raised the stakes for carrier onboarding, shipment monitoring, and secure execution.
- Maintain cradle-to-grave accountability as volume grows
- Give customers self-service tracking visibility (including nights and weekends)
- Increase freight security through stronger carrier & driver verification and controls
- Standardize processes to support scalable onboarding and execution
We were using a lightweight TMS. It didn’t have visibility, it wasn’t integrated, wasn’t automated. As we grew our company from a startup brokerage we couldn’t do everything manually anymore. By moving to Descartes, everything that we do now is all integrated together, everything we do now is all automated, the systems are all connected.
The Solution: Automation Drives Productivity & Security
To support growth and protect customer freight, Vesta standardized on an integrated Descartes platform. Implementation focused on building repeatable SOPs and training for the distributed team. Vesta went live with Descartes 3G TMS partially within a week and fully implemented in about a month. MacroPoint tracking was enabled in a couple days, and MyCarrierPortal for carrier vetting, onboarding, and monitoring was deployed in approximately two weeks.
The integrated 3PL/Brokerage platform from Descartes includes:
Descartes 3G TMS™ — System of record for brokerage execution, order management, communication, financial workflows, and analytics; supporting management-by-exception and consistent processes across pods.
Descartes MacroPoint™ — Real-time tracking and in-transit fraud detection with shareable customer links and broad carrier compliance (mobile and ELD), reducing check calls and improving customer transparency.
Descartes MyCarrierPortal™ — Carrier vetting (with driver and equipment verification), onboarding and monitoring to reduce fraud and unsafe carrier liability exposure.
On the back-office side, Vesta uses 3G TMS to automate invoicing and integrates into QuickBooks for accounting. This enables faster billing and payment cycles, and better visibility into AP/AR details; helping the team audit charges and prevent duplicate payments.
I like the fact that we have the Descartes tech stack that can customize the solution to each customer. We’ve got the capabilities to execute to their unique SLAs, while managing accurate cost allocations to feed those cost metrics back to our customers so they get better visibility into costs across their different business segments.
The Results
With Descartes 3G TMS, MacroPoint, and MyCarrierPortal working together, Vesta Freight strengthened service quality for customers, improved freight security, and built operational discipline to support rapid growth.
- Scalable operations for a growing brokerage: Vesta built standardized SOPs and training around Descartes. Implementation took only days or weeks for the different solutions, not months. Enabling the distributed operating model with consistent execution. The Descartes tech stack supports customer-specific SLAs and reporting needs and leadership is confident that as customers’ needs get more sophisticated, additional modules within Descartes can be activated to enable new offerings, grow the business, and provide better service to Vesta’s customers.
- Differentiated shipper experience and responsiveness: Customers receive proactive updates, information on the carrier coming to pick up loads, live tracking access, and 24/7 support, which solidifies Vesta’s reputation as an extension of the shipper’s team. In one high-urgency scenario, when a shipper’s TMS crashed they turned to Vesta to cover 10 truckloads on their first day as a customer—with carriers vetted, MacroPoint tracking sent, and VIN validations completed.
- Improved freight security and reduced fraud exposure: MyCarrierPortal vetting, onboarding, and monitoring supports consistent carrier qualification at scale. VIN validation and carrier intelligence help protect freight and reduce the risk of fraudulent pickups. Carrier lookups and risk profiles in Descartes provide tracking compliance history as well as red flags to ensure only valid carriers with good customer service records are on-boarded. Vesta has set up more than 20,000 carriers in the system while onboarding hundreds per week and re-verifying carriers every three months.
- Faster, more accurate financial execution: Automated invoicing and integration to QuickBooks freed up approximately two days of finance team effort per week previously spent building and sending invoices manually. Integrated customer statements improved transparency and helped strengthen cash flow and customer trust.
- Better carrier relationships—and better outcomes for shippers: Vesta treats carriers as long-term partners with clear communication, proactive issue resolution, and on-time payment (including early pay options). MyCarrierPortal and MacroPoint are ‘carrier friendly’ solutions that streamline vetting, on-boarding, and tracking while protecting freight without adding unnecessary friction to the process. Stronger carrier relationships support capacity access and competitive rates for Vesta and their shipper customers.
