CEO Devin Burke Candid Interview on International Shipping Industry

Last Thursday, Universal Cargo CEO Devin Burke sat down at a coffee house and gave a great candid interview, which includes an outlook of the international shipping industry and how businesses – both importers and freight forwarders – stay alive in this tough market and these challenging economic times.

And we’ve got the video here! We uploaded it to YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram as well.

Of course, only in the blog will we also provide an easy to follow transcript of Devin’s unique combination of silliness and insight that comes with over forty years in the international shipping business.

Q: I’m sitting here with Devin T. Burke, the  CEO of Universal Cargo. So let’s just get to know you.

DEVIN: Don’t forget, I’m known as the King of Shipping by Chuck Small.

Q: Okay, so how long have you been in this shipping business?

DEVIN: 65 years– No, I’m just kidding.  Forty… in this business – 1985 – 41 years. And I know I only look 49, so it’s pretty amazing.

Q: So you’ve seen the ups and downs, the ebbs and flows of this industry…

DEVIN: The ebbs and the flows. Right now, it’s ebbing.

Q: Yeah, so tell us a little bit about the shipping industry in the market right now.

DEVIN: For the last three to four years after the pandemic, we’ve been in a perfect storm of nonstop shit. As they say in Spanish, mierda.

So you got everything from the tariffs, which have been a huge part of the slowdown and the constraints for importers to not ship.

Then you have the carriers, even though they have way too much capacity, they have figured it out. Ever since the pandemic, they’ve figured out how to control the market with blank sailings, so they are able to keep the rates relatively high. They shouldn’t be this high.

And any time there’s a crisis like the Iran War, or before it was the Red Sea conflict, the carriers go, “Oh! We’ve got to raise prices!” Oil prices going up? “We’re gonna raise prices.” Oil prices go down? “Uh, no, we still got to keep the prices up.”

So right now, in the summer of ’26, we’re looking at our fourth year of very low demand. Importers are not spending the money. And it’s also due to inflation that’s been persistent, a nagging mosquito that won’t go away when you’re camping at 6 p.m. And you just want to relax, but no, that mosquito just won’t leave you alone.

And that’s basically what’s happening with the market.

Q: How are customers surviving through this time, and what is Universal Cargo doing to stay afloat?

DEVIN: Well, I think this time is good for everybody that’s in this industry, whether you’re an importer or you’re a shipping company…

What did he just say? After all that mierda talk, Devin thinks it’s a good time for importers and shipping companies in this industry? Find out how next week when we post part two of this interview.