In order to improve the reliability of a hub and spoke network and maintain the normal operation of the hub and spoke network during the failure of the initial hub, a new hub backup optimization method for the hub and spoke network was proposed, in which a backup hub was selected for each hub point to make the initial cost and the backup cost of the hub and spoke network the best. Firstly, the hub backup variables were introduced into the basic model of a hub and spoke network, and an extension model of nonlinear programming was established. The extended model was linearized by the linearization method of variable substitution, and mathematical solver CPLEX was used to solve the small scale problem of the hub and spoke network hub backup. Then, the scale of hub and spoke network nodes was increased, and a genetic algorithm was designed to solve the problem of large scale hub backup optimization in the hub and spoke network. Finally, in the CPLEX and genetic algorithm, the proportion weights of the initial hub and spoke network cost and backup cost were adjusted, the exact solutions and optimal solutions of initial cost, backup cost, hub location and backup hub were obtained respectively. The optimal values of the initial hub and spoke network, backup hub as well as the objective function were obtained by the example experiments. The experimental results show that, the backup hub of the the proposed method shares the traffic and capacity of the initial hub, and when the initial hub fails, the backup hub can undertake the transportation task of the initial hub and keep the hub and spoke network running. The proposed optimization method of hub backup can be applied to the emergency logistics and security management of logistics network.