The term "dedicated fleet," also known as "dedicated contract carriage," refers to tractors, trailers, drivers, and other resources exclusively devoted to serving a set of facilities or lanes in a transportation network. They usually are owned or leased by a motor carrier or logistics service provider that is hired by the shipper to manage its fleet operations. Traditional alternatives to a dedicated fleet include operating a private fleet, hiring common carriers, or contracting with third-party logistics providers for transportation services.

A dedicated operation is typically custom designed according to the shippers needs and desires. For example, the tractors, trailers, and drivers can all be wrapped and branded as the shippers company name and logo; rather than the carriers. The drivers can wear shippers branded uniforms or shirts/hats. This provides a unique professional approach to the shippers customers during the delivery process.

Dedicated contract carriage offers significant benefits to companies serving consistent weekly routes containing multi-stop scenarios.

For one thing, dedicated transportation is an extremely effective way to guarantee capacity. In addition to capacity, statistics have shown that a Dedicated Fleet modal can reduce transportation costs for a non-transportation company and has the potential to improve on-time delivery performance by 5 to 10 percent. Moreover, shippers with dedicated contract carriage arrangements can better negotiate fuel surcharges and reduce their regulatory liability than can shippers with private fleets. Finally, dedicated fleets allow shippers to focus their personnel and financial resources on their core business operations, such as manufacturing, rather than on transportation management.