NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Fullbay’s sixth annual State of Heavy-Duty Repair report shows an industry delivering record revenue growth even as it wrestles with rising wages and an aging workforce that could threaten long-term sustainability. The 2026 findings, drawn from nearly 900 professionals across the commercial vehicle repair sector, point to structural challenges rather than a simple cyclical dip.

At the Technology & Maintenance Council’s 2026 Annual Meeting and Transportation Technology Exhibition in Nashville, panelists offered an early preview of the report, which becomes publicly available March 23.

Survey Demographics

The report draws from Fullbay’s network of 5,000 shop locations. Surveys went to 3,400 shops across the United States, Canada and Australia. Seventy percent of respondents run independent repair shops, with the rest split between private fleets and mixed operations.

Shop owners made up 30% of respondents, followed by technicians at 12%, service managers at 10% and parts managers at 10%. The median shop has eight employees and five technicians.

“What I recognize is there’s a lot of people that go behind this, whether they’re in Fullbay or part of our customer demographic,” said Trent Broberg, CEO of Fullbay, during a panel discussion at TMC. “Fullbay typically caters to the SMB and mid-market independent shops and fleets with in-house repair shops and facilities out there.”

Strong Revenue Growth Despite Headwinds

Fullbay shops processed $5.04 billion in service order commerce in 2025, with an additional $1.5 billion in parts revenue flowing through the system. Net new revenue from 2023 to 2025 reached $2.05 billion — a 68% increase that beat broader freight market softness.

Sixty-one percent of shops reported business was better in 2025 compared with 2024. Broberg said preliminary data suggest 2026 will continue the upward trend.

“The shops are seeing positive momentum, they’re continuing to grow, and they’re finding new ways to drive revenue within that,” Broberg said.

Peter Cooper, CEO of Ascend Consulting, tied much of the growth to aging trucks and equipment complexity.

“The age of trucks, average truck age in a fleet is definitely going up, and a lot of it has to do with the purchase price of the truck and the fact that they have to continue to use it longer,” Cooper said. “Also, with the changing emissions and the way the trucks have changed, a lot of fleets are kind of in the secondary market. They really do not wanna get rid of old trucks because they’re afraid the newer trucks and some of emissions. And, honestly, frankly, it’s they’re very complicated to work on. The older trucks are just easier to fix.”

Broberg pointed to improving freight rates pulling parked equipment back into service.

“You’ve got trailers, trucks up against the fence. Now that you’re starting to see some rates with some kind of buoyed effect, it’s kind of going up and to the right,” he said. “You’re seeing people pull those trucks off the fence and trailers with lot rot, and you’ve got to get those back into repair in working order to get them out on the streets and earn money.”

Labor Rates Climb Amid Technician Shortage

Median shop labor rates rose 10% year over year, from $135 per hour in 2024 to $149 per hour by the end of 2025. Mobile repair runs about 10% higher, near $160 per hour.

“Honestly, across the board, labor rates have to go up because there’s a very small pool of qualified people, and they’re all — it’s basically like an auction block at this point,” Cooper said. “And guys are leaving for a dollar an hour raise. They’ll leave a shop and go across town. It’s crazy what’s going on.”

Technician wages jumped 14.1% to a median $36.50 per hour — nearly three times the pace of inflation.

Workforce Crisis Is Structural

Fifty-four percent of shops reported understaffing in 2025, with 40% of owners saying hiring technicians was harder than the prior year. Demographics explain why this won’t fade quickly.

The median respondent age is 41. Only 17% of respondents are age 30 or under, while 42% of technicians have more than 20 years of experience.

“You’re only one hire away from success is the way I think about business and I think about staffing individuals,” Broberg said. “Generally speaking, you’re seeing an aging demographic, so that’s also a challenging solution.”

Jack Poster, VMRS services manager at the American Trucking Associations, highlighted the vulnerability of smaller shops.

“When you’re with five or six technicians in the shop, and think about it, you lose one, that’s a pretty big hit,” Poster said. “Where if you’re running a big business with like a factory where you have 500 employees, you lose one or two people, it’s not a big hit. But your people are so important to getting trucks done.”

Parts Margins and Tariff Impacts

Tariff impacts showed a mixed picture, with 47% of respondents reporting no significant effect while 46% noted increased replacement part prices. The muted response likely reflects timing and inventory buffers.

“That’s on the parts side of the business, which takes a little bit of time to work through the logistics and supply chain side of things,” Broberg said. “I think with shops most of the time, that’s just pushed through to the end consumer, so it’s really more concerning on the fleet side of things versus the shop side.”

Parts markups revealed a counterintuitive pattern: large shops posted the highest margins at 21% margin and 30% markup, compared with small shops at 17% margin and 22% markup. The gap reflects higher cost-of-service realities.

“Obviously these large shops are large for a reason. Scale because of relationships, because of how they service their customers,” Broberg said. “They’re retaining great technicians. They’re providing them benefits packages and 401s and the whole suite. So obviously cost to serve is higher, so they’re trying to compensate for that in a good way.”

Cooper expanded on the parts equation.

“Fleets expect the trucks to be fixed as soon as possible. And to do that, it takes parts staff,” he said. “A lot of these bigger shops have realized that they have to monetize parts and they have to make a profit on them. Otherwise, they can’t afford the staff.”

Culture Trumps Compensation in Retention Battle

Culture now outweighs raw pay in technician satisfaction. Culture ranked first at 49%, pay second at 36%.

Seventy-five percent of technicians said they would recommend their current shop to others — far stronger than automotive repair benchmarks.

“If you use the net promoter score in this industry versus automotive repair, we are way better off than they are,” Cooper said. “Which means there’s actually an opportunity here for fleets and shops to steal some people from the automotive field. Because most automotive techs are not happy at their job.”

Cooper defined culture through a technician’s eyes.

“Culture to a technician is respect. It’s recognition. It’s — and recognition is pay. Let’s face it. They want to feel valued, and how we do this in our society is we pay people,” Cooper said. “But they want more than that. They want to feel like they’re more than a number. As a matter of fact, that used to be how I would advertise to steal guys from the dealerships. I would put on my ad, ‘do you want to be more than a number?’ And they do.”

Transparency in pay listings gives shops a 26-point hiring advantage. Sixty-three percent of shops now offer technician bonuses, with clear retention benefits.

“Shops that don’t offer bonuses have a harder time not only hiring techs, but they have a really hard time retaining technicians,” Cooper said.

Training Gap Threatens Future Pipeline

Only 60% of shops provide formal training programs, yet most technicians say they want clear career paths.

“The majority of shops don’t even pay for training. They don’t do paid training. It’s crazy to think of that they don’t,” Cooper said. “And the shops that do, that’s where people want to go to work.”

Cooper stressed that structured programs outperform informal ones.

“Shops that have a career path and shops that have a real training program, not just says, ‘we’re gonna stick you with a guy who actually has something that’s somewhat regimented,’ are much more successful at hiring and especially at retaining technicians,” he said.

The median work week of 46 hours adds burnout risk, Broberg noted.

AI Adoption Gains Early Traction

Thirty-five percent of shops now use some form of artificial intelligence, with ChatGPT leading at 35% adoption and Google Gemini at 16%. Future interest is highest in diagnostics support (61%) and predictive maintenance (45%).

“We’re seeing a lot of adoption, whether it’s full bay products or otherwise. ChatGPT make it easier to communicate within the product and with your customers,” Broberg said. “So there’s a lot of a lot of forward momentum happening in the shops. More than what you would think, honestly.”

What It Means for Fleets and Shops

Fleet maintenance budgets will keep climbing as wages outpace inflation and labor rates follow. Shops competing for talent must offer more than hourly pay: benefits, bonuses, transparent wages and real training.

Broberg struck an optimistic note on the service side.

“It’s getting and will continue to get better. That’s the way that we think of things broadly. The industry is doing well on the service side,” he said. “You’re seeing aging fleets, which is helpful to the independent repair shops. You’re seeing technician wages on the rise. I think part of that is people understanding that you’ve gotta retain great talent, so that’s positive there.”

The workforce pipeline remains the biggest long-term threat. With 83% of respondents U.S.-based and only 17% under age 30, the shortage will likely intensify before it eases.

“It continues to be challenging on the flip side of that to find great talent, and AI adoption is in the early ages here,” Broberg said. “So we’ll see what the efficiency gains you’ll see out of the shops will come from that.”

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