Apr 23, 2004 12:00 PM, from staff and wire reports

Eden Prairie MN-based C H Robinson Worldwide Incs gross profits climbed 12.4% to $149.6 million in 2004, compared with $133.1 million in 2003.

Income from operations for the third-party logistics company rose 13.7% to $47.2 million in first-quarter 2004 versus $41.5 million in the first quarter of 2003. Net income advanced 15.6% to $29.1 million in first-quarter 2004 from $25.1 million in the first quarter of 2003.

John P Wiehoff, chief executive officer of C H Robinson. said, "We're happy with our results and feel the first quarter was a solid start for 2004. Our transaction volumes were up significantly. We gained a lot of new spot market, transactional business in the quarter, particularly in March. This was driven by a tighter truck capacity market, which made finding carriers tougher and did impact our margins on our contractual business.”