J.B. Hunt announces promotion of Shelley Simpson

Shelley Simpson, chief marketing officer and president of truckload for J.B. Hunt Transport Services, has been promoted to chief commercial officer and president of highway services.

In the expanded position, Simpson will “oversee the commercialization of J.B. Hunt 360, the company’s next-generation supply chain solution, and its implementation within enterprise sales,” according to a news release. The Lowell-based carrier recently announced a $500 million investment into technology over the next five years, and the addition of Marketplace, a component of J.B. Hunt 360, to better match carriers with shippers.

Highway services was recently established “to help unify the management of all asset and non-asset J.B. Hunt services in the truckload and Integrated Capacity Solutions (ICS) business units,” the release shows. ICS is the company’s brokerage division.

Simpson, named to Northwest Arkansas Business Journal’s Forty under 40 class in 2009, will continue to oversee sales and marketing and will remain corporate executive vice president.

“I have great confidence in Shelley’s ability to lead our efforts to provide innovative, technology-based solutions for customers,” said John Roberts, president and CEO of J.B. Hunt. “She has a tremendous wealth of experience as a strategic leader and will be essential in helping J.B. Hunt deliver value to our customers in today’s digitally driven economy.”

Simpson started working for J.B. Hunt after she graduated from the University of Arkansas in 1994. She’s worked in several positions throughout the company including director of pricing for truck and intermodal, vice president of economic analysis, senior vice president of finance and administration, and in 2007, president of ICS. In the position, she developed a business unit “into the fastest growing area of the company, expanding its total number of available services and increasing annual revenue from $92 million to more than $850 million.” She was promoted to chief marketing officer in 2011 and to president of the company’s truckload segment in 2014.