Cold Calls, Tight Lanes, and Government Freight with Garrett Bowers

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:37):
You welcome

Blythe Brumleve Milligan (00:42):
back to another episode of everything
is logistics, a podcast for thethinkers in freight. I'm your
host, Blythe Milligan, and weare proudly presented by SPI
logistics. And today we aredigging into the reality of
scaling a modern logisticsbusiness. We talk a lot about
the tension between carriers andbrokers, but my guest today sits
squarely in both seats. He's athird generation trucker who
took his family fleet from 12trucks to over 50, pivoted into

(01:05):
government contracting duringthe pandemic, and is now an
agency owner with our friendsover at SPI logistics. He's a
big believer that most ceilingsare just the bottom of the next
floor. So please welcome in, theowner of Bowers trucking.
Garrett Bowers, welcome in.

Unknown (01:20):
Garrett Blythe, thanks so much for having me on the
show. I've been an admirer forlike, a long time, kind of
secretly wondering what it wasgoing to take to get an invite.
So it was pretty cool to getthat in my inbox earlier. The
check

is in the mail. First of all, and then
the second of all, I have hadyou on my list for a long time.
We just had to, you know, gothrough the other guest
priorities. But now here we are.
We had to have some SPI execs onand some agents on, you know how
it goes. And then, of course,the freight season is what it
is, which is exactly what we'regoing to be talking about today,
because it's been a little bitof a challenging one. But I

(01:54):
don't want to go there just yet,because I was, we were talking
before we hit record, and I waslistening to a couple episodes
that you had with friend of theshow, Chris jolly. And you guys
were talking about cold callingat 5am

Unknown (02:10):
well, okay, so first of all, when is freight on your
freight customers mind? Youknow, typically, I mean, most
people want and I mean, I don'tknow, I don't know how
everybody's day is from from alogistic service provider
standpoint, but I walk in, youknow, typically at the office,

(02:30):
between seven and 8am just likeanybody else Central Time, and
it is a stack of emails,basically asking, Where's this
truck? What's this plan, right?
And it's, I mean, it's naturalto assume that all of these
shipping managers just want tomake sure that their day is
lined out, or they need tofigure out as early as possible
what they need to do to pivot.

(02:53):
So while you have that on theirmind, go ahead and talk to them,
because maybe they just gotdumped on, you know what I mean
by somebody, and they're like,hey, yeah, actually, my primary
just fell off. What? What canyou do? And I don't know. I've
just had more success dealingwith people in the morning. Not
going to say that everybody outthere in the freight world is a

(03:16):
morning person, but you know, Ithink it's safe to assume that a
lot of people, you know, if, iftheir shipments are lined up
right, and it is the afternoon,and everything did go smoothly
that day, your email is going toget ignored, right? Your call is
like, I didn't have any problemstoday, and they're telling me
I'm fine tomorrow. No, I don'tneed you, you know, and it's

(03:39):
just been my experience withthat, I don't know, huh?

Well, that I mean, I mean, that makes
a ton of sense, because I thinkit was, I don't know who posed
the question to who, but whenyou guys pose that question of,
when do you find more success,when you're cold calling in the
morning or the afternoon, mybrain immediately went to the
afternoon. I was like, Oh, theafternoon, when they first get
to work, it's so busy they'retrying to knock things out for
the day. But then you that is aperfect explanation of why. I'm

(04:06):
not

Unknown (04:06):
saying that's, that's like the rule book, you know? I
mean, there's maybe, maybe it'sjust people in Oklahoma, Kansas
and Texas, right? They're justnicer in the morning, I don't
know, but, yeah, jolly and I, welike to, we were actually
texting before I got on the showhere today, like we were, we
were going back and forth on, onwhat prospecting looked like,
you know, even right now. And hehad opened a couple doors this

(04:29):
month, we had the opportunity toopen some doors and like, again,
we'd like to kind of spar backand forth on what works and what
doesn't.

Well, well, let's, let's continue that
on that path of theconversation. Because, I mean,
at the time of recording, we'rein, you know, week away from
Christmas. This will airsometime early in January of
2026, and so what does, whatdoes the day to day business
look like for you guys rightnow? Is it? Is it all busy as

(05:00):
all heck? Is it? You know, theChristmas peak season is that
kind of already passed? Whatdoes, I guess, sort of the
status quo look like at the endof the year for Bowers trucking?

Unknown (05:10):
So yeah, for listeners that are going to be listening
to this in January, this istoday. Is Wednesday, 1217,
right? And it is, it is hot. Themarket is hot. It's moving.
People are pushing things out.
We are even going as far as preplanning loads that have to load
December 23 but can't delivertill December 29 or 26th right?

(05:30):
You know? And we're trying toget those things lined up.
We're. Are having our driverssign kind of a roll sheet
saying, Hey, I am willing towork over these particular
times. Give me these times offfor Christmas. And you know, all
of those things, we're reachingout to other carrier partners
saying, Hey, I have this. I knowyou have drivers that need to go

(05:51):
home to this lane. What do youthink about loading early, other
things like that. And then, ofcourse, there's always like that
year in crunch, right? Because,I don't know, in the
manufacturing world, it seemslike the week of Christmas is
like the apocalypse, right? Imean, we need to get all of
these things done right away.
And then I don't I, you know,shipping matter. I want to

(06:11):
forget about you for a week.
That's cool. We totallyunderstand. But, yeah, there's a
lot of pressure, I think, notjust in the central United
States, all over. I mean,different zones are going to be
hot, if you're looking at theDAT map right now. Kansas, the
state of Kansas, which is likenever read for Van shipments, is
bleeding right now. You know,just because it, you know, the

(06:35):
market, the market is churning.
Amazon is soaking up a greatdeal of capacity right now. Why
wouldn't they? You know, here ina little bit, I'm about to hit
Confirm on some other Christmasshopping that I've delayed, you
know, to try to get done. So I'mguilty of adding to that UPS

(06:56):
FedEx those particular line haulopportunities, they're soaking
up outside capacity right now.
And good, good for the owneroperators in the small fleets
that have the ability to pivotand take advantage of those
things. Also you want to sitthere and go enjoy it now. But
you know some of the, some ofthe steady guys like, like us,
you know, our customers, ourshippers, and what they still

(07:19):
need to be taken care of, too.
So we have to figure thosethings out, right? And so we've
had to onboard a few newcarriers this week. We've had to
kind of think outside the box,preload and repower later and
other things like that, just tojust to try to meet demands.

And so it's actually because in my
brain, I'm assuming, okay, well,most of the Christmas shopping
season is done, all of the merchthat is

Unknown (07:46):
maybe Blythe, I mean, you strike me as somebody who's
probably more organized thanother people, not me.

Well, I just would have thought that
maybe a lot of these shipmentswould have been delivered a
month ago, like, I help meunderstand why, you know, the
week before Christmas, or, youknow, even over the holidays,
that you know what kind of goodsare being are being prioritized
right now?

Unknown (08:09):
Well, okay, so let's maybe take a look at some of the
inventory strategies from like,your big box shippers. Some of
those have been strained alittle bit from the from the
tariffs, right, and all thosethings and and I would say that
whoever really got it right oninventory planning, whenever it
came to the goods, the the hardgoods, the durable goods, and

(08:32):
everything that everybody youknow really wanted to buy for
Christmas, whoever got good atordering those things and
actually hit it right? Isprobably not feeling that
crunch, but it's those thatdidn't plan for the the consumer
demand to go complete otherproduct direction, are probably
the ones adding fuel to the firefor for the rise in spot markets

(08:53):
that we're seeing, or spotmarket rates that we're seeing
right now. We all know though,it's a bubble. I mean, this is a
bubble that's going to lastmaybe another 10 days, and I
know that that takes us a littlebit beyond Christmas, but again,
that that's just kind of myexperience with it. It. I
remember freight markets where,you know, 2014 to about 2018 we

(09:15):
used to see a lot of activityright there between Christmas
and New Year's, I don't predictthat right now. I just, I don't
see it. I think, I think thatbetween van and reefer right
now, they're hot. But if youlook at open deck, which is
something that we really prideourselves on, open deck, freight
is really staying prettystagnant and moving loads, both

(09:38):
in and out of our particularregion, has has been really
pretty readily available for ourcustomers.

So it's not, I guess that was going
to be my next question. Is maybethe market turning a little bit,
but it's hard to tell. I thinkin any of these something more
sustained.

Unknown (09:56):
Blythe, if I knew the answers to that you would be
writing me a check for thispodcast. I don't, I don't know
those things. I I would love tosit here and speculate, but, I
mean, we are an industry drivenby historical data and
speculation, right? I mean thatthat is just what, what we are.
The The cool thing about it is,over the last, and you might
agree with this, 1015, years,there's been a truckload of

(10:20):
technology just poured into thisindustry that is, I about cursed
right there. I'm sorry. There'sbeen a lot of of of technology
just just poured into analyzingdata to try to to get a grip. On
those things, but again, withtariffs, with rising inflation,

(10:42):
with all of those things, I justdon't think that there is a rule
book for seeing exactly when toanticipate and, you know, growth
or any type of marketcorrection, right? I don't think
that growth is necessarily onanybody's vocabulary list right
now for their business plan. Imean, we would all love to say

(11:04):
that we're going to take on moreloads, right? But we're going to
do that as cheaply as possible,or we're going to figure out how
to how to do that without addingany additional staff, or, you
know, making sure that there areno sliding scale cost associated
with those with the you know,taking those things online,

and as someone who you're, as we said
in the intro, you're, you're athird generation trucking
company owner, and sohistorically speaking, give the
audience a sense of your thehistory of your family's
company, and then kind of howit's evolved over the last,
maybe since you've took over 10years tenure,

Unknown (11:41):
yeah, so, something I'm really proud of. I mean, so my
grandfather started Bowerstrucking like a long like, he
got our D O T number from, like,back in the 60s, right? And how
we maintained that D O T and MCnumber, I'll never know,
because, bless her heart, if youknew my grandmother, she is not
the greatest at organization andpaperwork, but hey, we still

(12:04):
have it today. You know, itevolved a little bit from like
sawmill hardwood lumber daysback, back then, because really,
that that's what my grandfatherwas, was really needing a D, o,
t, number four at that time torock, sand and gravel. As
strange as that transition mightbe for a long time, I mean,

(12:28):
nearly 20 years of rock, sandand gravel. So, I mean, we
weren't really breaking that 150air mile radius, right? Didn't
have to run like, you know, thefull, the full fledged log book.
In fact, a few drivers Iremember hiring back in the day
didn't even know how to run thatlog book, you know, but they,
they knew how to keep track oftheir hours, right? And, and

(12:49):
that was, that was really all weneeded. My dad had a great deal
of contribution to that. He, heworked at a carbon refinery for
a long time. They were, theywere bought by by some other
foreign entity that decided theyreally didn't need, you know,
union workers or or reallydidn't want that union

(13:09):
representation on their on theirfacilities anymore. And he was
like, I've got somewhere else togo, and I've got some ideas. And
so he really grew the the rock,sand, gravel side and and
started dealing with the NRCSand some other government
programs. And I think that'skind of what gave me the flavor
to go, you know, okay, there,there, there's a way to figure

(13:33):
out how we can be specializedand needed, and maybe curtain
ourselves outside of just theopen market, you know, demand,
right? And how do you do that,right? How do you make it to
where you set your own rates?
That's, that's the big part,right? I mean, how do you make
it to where somebody's not justalways dictating to you what you
get paid, you know, for yourservices? And I think, I think

(13:56):
that's what we what we've alwaystried to do was, you know, while
we do value a great deal of ourbroker, broker partnerships on
the carrier side, and here I amspeaking to you as, obviously, a
broker, broker agency, you know,we, we appreciate good carriers.
And there's a lot of things tobe said about pricing and about

(14:16):
spot pricing and other thingslike that. We try as much as
possible to curtain those highsand lows that everybody sees to
make sure that things just run,you know, pretty, pretty
vanilla, right for everybodythat that's involved. Because I
don't have to tell you, if yourcustomer is not screaming at you

(14:38):
because the truck didn't showup, or this didn't break down,
or whichever, and you know,you're able to do those things
without really making any noise,then you're the most valuable to
them, right?

As long as you're not a pain in the
butt to them, then stick around.

Unknown (14:56):
That's right. That's right, but no, so in 2008 I
think I am, like one year on thejob of dispatch, slash,
mechanicing, slash, being thesafety director, slash, you
know, just whatever, whatever,whatever needed done. Our

(15:18):
largest customer sold out fromproducing asphalt. They had five
rock quarries as well. I mean,they took like 10 of our trucks
every day and kept them busy.
And I mean, it was kind ofdevastating. They sold to a
company that did not need us.
They had their own trucks. They.
They just, you know, they weregoing to rewrite the rule book

(15:38):
on on that business. So I justhad to kind of pivot and figure
out, well, if you look at PoncaCity, it is centrally located
between Wichita, Kansas,Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and
Tulsa, Oklahoma. And if I lookat that triangle, there are a
lot of manufacturing hubs inthose particular areas, and a

(16:00):
lot of metros right there where,you know, I discovered its, I
discovered D, A, T at thatpoint. I mean, like, I'm really
late to the game, right? I'm,I'm like 23 at this point, you
know. I mean, like 2324 at thispoint. And I'm just like, well,
I got to figure out what I'mgoing to do with these trucks.
And so, yeah, we kind of startedto diversify right there and

(16:24):
figure out where, where we coulddo these things and what we
could do. And through a wholelot of trial and error, and I
mean emphasis on error, we wekind of pulled some strings
together, and I think we've gota great set of customers today
that just really kind ofcomplete the package, not just
for, you know, brokerage but butfor carriers and owner

(16:48):
operators, you know, to kind ofcome aboard and know that
they're going to get loaded bothways. Or, you know, have route
strategies that can actuallymake money and and support a
family.

And I think part of that big pivot for
you guys was also going into thethe government contracting side
of things. Is that accurate?

Unknown (17:07):
So that was, that was a great experience. I think that
was a huge feather in our cap, Ithink on our website, and I
probably need to change thatverbiage. But the website. We
were the first, right? We werethe only there for a little bit.
I don't think that we are. Now,I've had a couple of copycats
come in that, but that's okay,right? To do those things. But

(17:31):
yeah, I had so one thing aboutme, I will, I will spend a lot
of hours after five o'clock atwork, and usually when the
phones are off and other thingslike that, I am cruising. And I
really like looking at thedifferent resources and the
different things out there thatinvolve freight. So I'm looking

(17:51):
at the Oklahoma City markets,for instance, and I'm really
trying to pour over what I cando, because there's just so many
things that I am coming intoOklahoma City with that, like
it's 90 miles to get back toPonca City, and every time that
is just empty for me, and it'salways taking up all day for my
trucks, and I'm just trying tofigure out how to prospect
something. Well, Tinker AirForce Base is right outside of

(18:13):
there, and I'm realizing notonly is that Oklahoma's largest
employer, but there isabsolutely no Oklahoma interest.
As far as fleets brokerages, youknow, trucking companies that
pulling in and out of theirgates. These are all being
posted by brokers that are like,out of Virginia or out of, you

(18:35):
know, the northeast, orsomething like that. I mean,
not, not even, not even close.
Well, Tinker Air Force Base is,like, one of the big three. And
I don't know how much you mightknow about DoD work, but like,
there's Hill Air Force Base,let's see Scott Air Force Base,
I'm sorry, in Illinois, TinkerAir Force Base in Oklahoma, and
then Hill Air Force Base inUtah. And it's those three that

(18:55):
that the DLA operate DefenseLogistics Agency operates Wow,
and makes most of theirdecisions out of those
particular hubs. And it's notthe necessarily the the most
freight goes through there, butthe decisions are made between
those three bases on just abouteverything, especially when it
comes to domestic transportationfor the military. And I mean,

(19:18):
yes, they're Air Force bases,but they are making the
decisions for all branches ofthe of the military. And so
having that pretty, you know,pretty close to where we're
from, I thought was, you know,something to bring up to maybe
some elected officials and justpeople that might help me. And,
yeah, they, they had theopportunity to do so, we've got

(19:41):
a chance to do some cool stuff.
I mean, we've hauled the AirForce One staircase a number of
times. We hold the fuel truckfor Air Force One to the g7
summit back when it took placein Quebec. I mean, there was
just some, you know, just neat,neat things. And I don't have to
tell you, from a driver'sstandpoint, a lot of them are

(20:03):
pretty patriotic in nature. Idon't know how many truck
drivers, you know, but you'regoing to definitely see a whole
lot of American flags, okay, onon the sides of trucks, right?
You'll see a lot of veterans.
You'll see things like that.
And, yeah, you know, it's prettycool.

Yeah, I've got for the people who are
watching, I got your websitepulled up here, which is what
the number one tip I always givepeople on their trucking website
or just brokerage website, isthat show pictures of you
hauling cool stuff is exactlywhat you're showing on.

Unknown (20:37):
Picks up there. Yeah, yeah, that, yeah. That was a
helicopter, I think, out ofWright Air Force Base in
Missouri, which, by the way,that's where the b2 both, both
launches its missions out ofhubs, out of so even when it
goes to Afghanistan, thatthing's coming out of Missouri
and going back to Missouri thesame night, yeah, and

Blythe Brumleve Milliga (20:58):
that's, I, I guess I'm getting caught in
a little bit of ignorance here,but I had no idea that there was
a Defense Logistics Agency aswell.

Unknown (21:07):
Yeah, yeah. No, they're, they're and they're
pretty fright savvy people. Imean, you have to the military.
First of all, they are a No BSoperation. They are not somebody
that loves to hear Garrett's awshucks charm all the time. You
know when, when something's whensomething you know might might

(21:28):
go differently than planned ordifferently than ordered. They
are there somebody that you youneed to have your stuff in a row
at least 24 hours in advance andbe ready to report all details
or don't pass go, you know? Imean, just don't even try,
because they just don't want

to hear it. So did you cold call
them at 5am

Unknown (21:47):
do you take a little bit of cold calling? Well, one
thing I will tell you, yeah,military officers,
transportation officers, they'reup pretty early too, yeah, but
don't ruin their day. Yeah,don't do that. I have, yeah, I
have received a few of thosephone calls when things did not
go as planned, and they're notfun.

So how does one start to work with the
guy? Is it just, I mean,

Unknown (22:15):
yeah, you know, I don't this is not, I mean this, this
is pretty well knowninformation. So the the biggest
thing somebody has got to getregistered on sam.gov okay? And
through sam.gov you're going toget what they call a unique
entity identifier, okay? Andthat, that is quite a process.

(22:36):
They're going to, they're goingto want to know all of that. You
know stuff about your business,all of those particular numbers
that you never knew you had. Youknow you're you're going to have
to be able to plug those intothe computer and and get
registered, right? And then youhave to wait for an open
enrollment and period for whatthey call the SDDC, which is the
surface. There's a lot ofacronyms in the military, but,

(22:58):
like, this is, like, surplus,right? Yeah, domestic
distribution center, anyway,that that open enrollment takes
place, like every two years,okay, unless you can get, like,
a special case, which, which iswhat we were able to get
congressionally for fromOklahoma, whenever I brought
this up to a few electedofficials, and they, they kind

(23:21):
of rushed our stuff in therebecause there was an imminent
need. I mean, talking to some ofthese transportation officers,
you have people bidding freight,and they, I don't know, we're
all we've all seen it throughbrokerages, right? You try to
plug somebody in there who hasno background in freight at all,

(23:43):
right? I mean, maybe they, maybethey were great at selling
insurance. Maybe they were greatat doing, you know, something
else. But right, they may noteven know the difference between
a flatbed and a step deck, youknow. And you've got them
sitting there spot bidding theseparticular military contracts,
and they're, you know, they'resending dry vans in for
something that needed a stretchflatbed, you know. I mean, like,
they just, it happens. I mean,it truthfully happens. And

(24:07):
that's what these to thetransportation officers. That's
what they were sick of. They,you know, just really, really
tired of saying, Yeah, I havethis, you know, military vehicle
that's oversized, and all thosethings. And I would really like
somebody to not send saya inhere to pick that up. You know,

(24:27):
yeah,

that's super interesting. And so, so
you go through theadministration or administrative
process, but I'm also curiousabout, like, talking to some of
the government officials, wereyou going to like networking
meetings or like businessjournals or

Unknown (24:43):
conferences for those things? Yeah. And I think the
deeper that you get into it, themore you realize so Tinker has
an annual conference that Iwould suggest, really, anybody
that's interested in it to go,and you don't even have to be
afraid. You can be in anything.
Just think about what thegovernment like might want to
buy. One of our good customersis out of Oklahoma City, and

(25:03):
they make specialty crates andpallets and other things like
that. And they're like a primecontractor now for the
government, and which, which isreally awesome to see their
success and how they've grown,you know, over the years. But
again, you just think aboutlike, whatever the government
needs, they have to purchase itsomehow, and it has to be
purchased a certain way. And ifyou have the stamina to pull,

(25:26):
you know, pour through all ofthe jargon, and, you know, try
to Google what acronyms mean,you know, for the military and
other things like that. So. Youcan sound somewhat, you know,
educated when, when you'retalking to these folks there,
there are conferences and otherthings to go to where you can
make connections. And thebiggest thing is it's, it's

(25:48):
almost like the military is onecompany, but you never really
know who's in charge of what.
And that's not to say that thatthat's disorganized. It's just
we're the outside right as ascivilians and and service
providers. So I there's so manypeople that you are going to

(26:10):
connect with that just don'thave any decision making
authority, but they're going torefer you to somebody who's
going to refer you to somebody,and then finally, you're going
to reach that person, andthey're going to be in charge of
a lot of things, and maybe morethan what you realized, right?
And if you can maybe impressthem a certain way, or keep them

(26:33):
on your mind, you will start tosee how the military will use
certain, certain guidelines tobasically route around their bid
process and start awarding you,you know, freight services, you
know, purchases from theirvantage point that are outside
the norm, and just kind of aname, your name, your quote,

(26:58):
treat me where I and we'll makethis happen, you know. And being
on that call list for Tinkeroutside of their prime tractor,
their prime contractor isCrowley logistics, which I think
everybody knows Crowley. I mean,they're Jason jacks, yeah, there
you go. You're huge, yeah. Andthat's very old company too, and

(27:21):
very deeply, deeply interwoveninto government contracting. But
let's just say Crowley everdrops the ball, we're on that
call list, at least for TinkerAir Force Base. And that's neat,
because when, when you havethose transportation officers
that have your cell phonenumber, and they just say,
Garrett, now it's got to move. Ineed a truck here by four, you
know, or I need a truck here by10pm tonight. That it that's a

(27:44):
great place to be. And I thinkthat's really what we wanted out
of it was somebody to just seethe value of what we offer, know
that it'll get done, or knowthat we're the bat phone, right,
of doing those things. And Idon't think the ambition was
ever to grow really, in trucknumbers. I know that everybody
is like, Oh, you run a truckingcompany. Well, the first

(28:05):
question is, how many trucks doyou have, you know? And it's
like, I'm measuring you againstother, you know, just just by
truck numbers. And it's, it'sunfortunate. It's really just
about value, you know, for us.
And I don't really care aboutthe number of trucks, I do, you
know, when we start talkingabout volume, I like to, I like

(28:28):
to talk about volume of loads,but it's also about making sure
that we're talking about thegood stuff, right, not just the
the small margin, you know,other other things like that
that are can get loads or loadsthat anybody can ship, right? I
mean, like, what? Why? Why dothat? They're, they're just
going to price shop all thetime, you know, getting into a

(28:49):
customer niche that sees thevalue in you, and you see the
value in them, and then it'spretty hard to fall out

of, yeah, if I'm reading between the
lines, it sounds like you reallyput a strong focus on building
for the long haul, for lack of abetter phrase, but

Unknown (29:06):
I'm gonna tag on that one.

But it's really about doing the hard
day to day work that you don'tnecessarily see that work line
up in the balance sheet fortoday, but it might be there in
six months from now, or even twoyears from now, because you've
made those connections and laidthat groundwork that I

Unknown (29:27):
think that's a really good way to put it. I mean,
everybody can see the value ininstant gratification, but if
you start getting, you know,price gouging on people, and
they start sending out RFPs, or,you know, somebody changes roles
on in the transportationsetting, and they they all of a
sudden say, Well, I just want tocheck your prices and, you know,

(29:50):
against somebody. And I don'thave to tell you, you know, a
lot of a lot of customers areknocking on every or not of
freight providers are locking ona lot of customer doors right
now, every single day. And ifthey can, just simply, I mean,
I'll, I'll tell you this, I'mguilty, like I can look at the

(30:10):
trucking side or the asset sideof of any load board, right?
See, see freight moving. See aposted rate, right? And just
know that's probably so and so Ihaven't got a load from them in
a while, or they've never reallyanswered my call if I was new
the contact there, and I justhappened to say, Hey, I could

(30:32):
move this for this what you knowthat's yeah. It happens, right?
And why wouldn't you, you know,look at that research and know
what they're dealing with, orknow what you know, know what,
what somebody is able to dosomething for, if you, if you
have the capacity to fulfill thepromise you know, to be able to,

(30:53):
you know, get into a customer'sdoor, or freight strategy that
you know is going to add valueto your company. The biggest
thing for us is always trying tofind flatbed loads to Houston.

(31:59):
And we will, we will workpainstakingly hard to try to
find the best paying loads thatget us in and out of Houston. I
think it's probably my mostfavorite truck market to work
with, because it, while it doeshave its highs and lows, there's
a lot of import, export volumeand whatnot that's involved

(32:20):
right there. It usually is ahuge supplier to anything
Midwest, and I don't know. We'vejust had the opportunity to work
with some really great carriersand had some really great
customers and products that shipout of

that area, as you have, you know,
you've taken over the business.
You've seen some of these, youknow, kind of weak spots and and
started, you know, diversifyingyour customer portfolio. How
have you adjusted, especiallyover the last couple of years,
it's no secret that we've beenin a freight recession, and it's
been an incredibly challengingmarket for the majority of the

(32:57):
industry, and so knowing that,how have you adjusted your
business to start building orlaying the groundwork for an
even maybe a different path inthat long haul?

Unknown (33:10):
So yeah, we, we've done a great deal of adjustment here.
And I will tell you, humilityhas entered my vocabulary quite
a bit over the last two and ahalf years. And I don't know,
you know, how much longer we'rekind of into this. You know,
operating costs are reallyoutweighing what, what people

(33:30):
are willing to pay in freight,or what your, you know, what
your competitor is willing to doit for, really, is what it comes
down to in freight right now.
But we have scaled backtremendously on our asset side.
You know, I know you opened theshow saying that we, we had
over, over 50 units, and we did.
I mean, in 2022, I think we wererunning at 68 units today. I

(33:55):
stand here telling you we'rerunning 24 that is a tremendous
amount of downsizing, right? Wehave really tried to perfect our
operating ratio to have not onlyeverything kind of dissected
down to the penny per mile ofwhat it takes to operate, but

(34:17):
also rate per mile is not aprofit and loss statement,
right? A profit and lossstatement is money over time.
And so we have to both, youknow, kind of, kind of weigh
out, okay, is this rate permile? Yes, that's the cost of
operating. But also, you knowwhat? What does a profit and

(34:38):
loss statement tell us over themonth? You know? And you have to
take per mile into considerationmore and more, because a P and L
is just a snapshot, right? Andwhile a P and L is going to look
horrible one month and great thenext month and whatnot, then you
can start to really figure outwhat your what your averages
are. And I think those arethings that I I would tell you

(34:59):
that even now I'm still a littlecloudy, but we really had a rear
view mirror on our on ourfinancial ability to project.
And these are blind spots ofmine. I mean, for goodness
sakes, I'm more of a freightsalesman than I am an
accountant, and thankfully, youknow, I've got people like my

(35:22):
wife, who is very well versed infinances. I mean, she's, she's
got a master's degree infinance, and she's nice, yeah,
she's, she's way smarter than Iam. I've got my sister now in
the operation, who's who's beendoing a great job helping bring
value, you know, to thatdepartment. We have the same

(35:43):
bookkeeper, controller thatwe've that we've had now, I
think, for nine years, and shehas, as well, you know, trained
her mindset right there. She'salso the person that knows the
most about our TMS, so we reallytry to be nice to her. It's
always, hey, can you fix this?
When, when we when we mess itup? Right? And then, of course,

(36:03):
our dispatch team, you know,figuring out what to what, what
we're going to have tooutsource, what we're going to
have to broker, and what we'regoing to carry, you know, each
day, and keeping that in mind sothat we don't a feel the
tendency that we have to buymore trucks, right, or or hire
more drivers, which is always,you know, one thing is a hell of
a lot easier to do than theother. And you know, they sell

(36:25):
trucks every day. And I don'thave to tell you use trucks are
you. On their tails right now. Imean that the price of a used
trucks is just, gosh, incrediblylow, you know. And price of new
trucks kind of starting tosoften, you know, as well. So

(36:46):
when you take that intoconsideration, and you figure
out, you know, what your driversneed, want, and what it's going
to take to stay with you, youknow, growing the asset side,
it's just not been anybody'splan right now. And I think, I
think just figuring out how youcan hoard cash, stay efficient,

(37:08):
keep cash flow going, andconcentrate on profit,
concentrate on percentages. Andthat's what's going to, you
know, carry you through theseparticular times, staying busy,
not the not the play, not theplay at all. You know, you've
got to know these things. And Iprobably preaching to the choir

(37:30):
from anybody that would listento your show right now and hear
those things. But sometimes, youknow, it does help to hear
things that you already knowagain from somebody else.

Yeah, especially from the aspect of
being so open and vulnerableabout, you know, the losing
trucks, or not necessarilylosing trucks, but making that
difficult decision to maybe letsome people go. And that's all
decisions, and especially when Iworked in house at a at an asset
based brokerage, I remember whenour company started hitting, you

(38:02):
know, tough times, and the firstthings to go that the entire
intermodal department laid off.
We went from 300 trucks down toless than 80 and, you know, and
it was a big turning point, andthat probably should have been a
warning sign, you know, for alot of us, because the company
did end up going out ofbusiness. But we had some, we
had a little bit of runway,because we had, you know,

(38:25):
guaranteed contracts with, Ithink was the American Red
Cross, you know, we had all ofthe water loads that were being
delivered all over the countryin that particular year. We, you
know, had a few hurricanes. Ithink it was Hurricane Sandy
that had hit New York. We hadhad that contract. And, you
know, we're in the middle of,are we going to stay open or are
we going to close our doorswhile these water loads need to

(38:47):
get delivered to the people whoneed them? And so it's just, you
know, it's a lot of thesedifferent fluctuations where
you're trying to make thosedecisions, to keep taking the
freight, but is it the rightfreight to take, and will that
lead to the longer runway? Andunfortunately, it didn't lead to
that for us. But it sounds likeyou're making those tough

(39:07):
decisions, and it's

Unknown (39:10):
okay to yeah, we've had to fire some customers. And
then, of course, we've had somecustomers that have just, you
know, over the the case oflosing capacity, they were just
like, well, you know, I mean, ifyou can't provide your trucks,
we've got to go, we've got tolook elsewhere. And, you know,
that's okay. We've just, that's,that's market share, sure, but

(39:32):
is market share strength, notnecessarily. You know, you have
to. You have to sit here andweigh out. What does it cost to
do business? You know, for thatcustomer, one podcast that I
really liked listening to theother day was James lemon, and
you where he was talking aboutthe quote that I've I've taken

(39:53):
out of that, which I thought wasreally good, you can't control
your revenue, but you can'tcontrol your cost. Yes, wow,
that poof from us. You knowsomebody that considers
themselves a freight salesman,like you can't control your
revenue. What? Yeah, yeah, butyeah, exactly speaking, from

(40:16):
somebody that has had a hardtime of trying to figure out how
to control the cost, you know,other things like that, and has
learned a lot of you know,lessons in that particular
regard. The both both goodlessons, both very tough, you
know, lessons to overcome thatthat is a profound and extremely
accurate statement. And I havetried to work my tail off to

(40:39):
figure out how to be friendswith James lemon, right, like he
is so black and white and tooand smart and all those things.
And it's like, yeah, man, I wantto know a little bit more about
what you know and what you lookat, what you see, you know. And
so, yeah, he's, I really enjoyedlistening to that one. But a lot

(41:01):
of the scenarios that he wastalking about, I mean, I don't
know if you know, but I had, wehad a brokerage before that was
that was just under our camp,right under our MC and Blythe, I
will tell you, I threw a lot ofbalance sheet Money, Money
earned, money generated out ofmy brokerage to try to save my

(41:25):
my my asset company from a freefall. And a lot of that. That,
you know, was also for thereason for downsizing and other
things like that. And, you know,we, we were experiencing those
times where our days to pay,we're getting stretched out.
And, you know, especially infreight markets right now, if
your days to pay is not 30 orunder now, I mean, what, what

(41:49):
carrier wants to take that riskwith you. They don't, they
shouldn't. They don't need to.
You know, I lost a lot of goodpeople over that. I mean, people
that, you know, were strongpeople, people that I had taught
the business, you know, from dayone. And you know, they've got
other, other opportunities andall those things, and I'm

(42:10):
grateful for those things, butthat that was tough learning
exactly you know how to how tomake sure that these costs can,
you know, sustain and prop uptheir own entity and and make
sure that that both things couldbe served because that, you
know, brokerage, a lot offreight brokerages are really

(42:30):
just banks for thetransportation sides of these
companies. And if you look at itand operate in that particular
mindset, I think you're going torun a very successful operation.
But who doesn't tell you to savemoney? Right? I mean, everybody
tells you to save money. Savemoney. Save money. What is the
economy ever look like whenpeople are like, No, spend,

(42:52):
grow, go, you know, you know, dothose things. It's always in
hindsight, right, right when youlook at those things. But I
think if you look at the moneymarket right now, you look at
consumer demand, or consumerspending, and these households
that are carrying, you know, acertain amount of debt and all
those things. And here we are.
We're going through the holidayseason where everybody kind of

(43:15):
usually spends more than theyprobably should. Right? We're
going to see some some economicpitfalls here. I think, I'm not
an economist, but, you know, Ithink here next year, that could
really set some more trends forthe transportation industry that
we we might not be reallylooking forward to.

Yeah, I kind of would echo a lot of
those statements, because itespecially from a consumerism
mindset. Because just in my ownpurchasing habits, you know,
ever since covid, you know,there were a lot of things that,
you know, we were just or I saywe as a household friends like
we would just purchase at awhim, because money was still I
was fortunate enough that moneywas still flowing pretty freely

(43:58):
during that time frame. And, youknow, investments were sky high,
and, you know, spending wasstill sky high. But especially
since all of this, you know,tariff drama that has started
entering into the realm ofconversation, it's kind of made
me snap back a little bit from alot of those purchasing habits
that I didn't realize that I haddeveloped, like purchasing, you

(44:21):
know, from like temu and Sheinand 200 bucks, and you'd get a
million things, and if youdidn't like it, you just return
it. And a lot of thosepurchasing habits are just not
sustainable, then the productscrap. And, you know, it's, it
was a lot of like the that kindof consumerism that I think has

(44:41):
been reeled in slightly, but Ialso think that there is a large
swath of the American publicthat is still in that spending,
consumerism mindset. We've seenit with, you know, sort of
record credit card balances andthings like that, that where the
Buy Now pay laters reckoning isgoing to come for all of those
different things. And I, part ofme, is like, it's kind of good

(45:05):
that we're all kind of addresssome of those spending habits,
kind of, you know, mirror infront of your face a little bit,
but it's also bad for businesstoo. So it is, I guess the messy
middle is where I you know, whendo we get to that messy middle?

Unknown (45:22):
Consumer, yeah, consumer spending, I think, is
really what's kept us out of theeconomy crashing or hitting a
recession, I think, any soonerthan what we might or are in
currently, however you you know,view it right now. You know,
through the pandemic, throughall of those things, you know,

(45:44):
people are sitting at home, youknow, buying a lot of things
because they just needed it,right?

Or they couldn't go anywhere. And
that was how they, you know, gottheir little dopamine hit.

Unknown (45:55):
And that's right, and I think that that's how prepping,
you know, the movement ofprepping, really, really started
about too. You might have been alittle bit of a prepper before,
but then, you know, the news ofthe pandemic and all the
unknowns and all of thosethings, right? That, if that
didn't make you want to, youknow, buy a shelter, build a
shelter, do something.

Blythe Brumleve Milliga (46:19):
Because that is like, I have a bug out
bag and underneath the the bedright now, it's just something
I've always had got. I used towatch the show Doomsday
Preppers, and I was like, Youknow what this sounds? Like
something. I need to know

Unknown (46:31):
what it sounds it sounds logical, right? Totally
sounds logical. My wife put herfoot down. She's from Georgia,
and she told me she was notgoing through another Oklahoma
storm season without a stormshelter. And guess what? The
storm shelter is turned intosomewhat of a, somewhat of an
area where we're going to keepMREs and other things like that,

(46:52):
right? And anybody in Oklahomaknows, like, if you're in a
tornado shelter, you may be inthere five to 10 minutes, right?
I mean, maybe, you know, but wecould probably live out of that
thing for a month if we wantedto.

That's actually, I mean, coming from
Florida, you know, hurricaneseason, we have to do sort of
the same preps on our side ofthing, but we have a little bit
more time to prepare when, whenthose things are,

Unknown (47:15):
yeah, you Florida folks. I mean, like, golly, you
get like, a week, like, hey,hurricane, such and such is
gonna hit land by whatever.

And if it's like a, you know, a
category one or two, we're justthrowing a party three, four and
five. It's like, all right,maybe we should take this a
little

Unknown (47:32):
seriously, like you are just adding to the stereotypes.
I'm gonna stop you for yourlisteners, okay,

well, I will, I will say I had a
little bit of a sidebar, andthen we'll get right back to,
you know, talking about thebrokerage side of things. But I
had a girlfriends all went outfor Christmas dinner last week,
and we had this other woman joinus that had just moved from Las
Vegas, and she told us she waslike, Florida is unhinged. You
are the craziest group of peoplethat I've ever been around. And

(48:02):
she came from Vegas,

Unknown (48:04):
I couldn't that is saying something. That is saying
something, wow, I don't, I don'tknow if I've gone that far. I
haven't spent, like, a greatdeal of time, I guess, in
Florida. So maybe I don't know,

it's multicultural. There's so many
things going on in this state.
You know, we could have a wholeepisode on that. So maybe we'll
have to have you back, and wecan talk about the crazy
cultural parts of Florida versusOklahoma. And then we can talk
about doomsday prepping.

Unknown (48:30):
I was going to say Oklahoma. You know, we have
tiger King out there, right? Andso if you, if you benched on
that one during the pandemic,then you see exactly what
southern Oklahoma is all about,right? I could

have sworn he was from Florida. I
don't know why. Maybe the one, Ithink one of the other people,
Carol, Carol, that's right. Whatwas her name? Carol, Carol
Gaskins, I

Unknown (48:54):
think something like that. Yeah, yeah, there were
songs, right? There's Floridaties. There was a Florida tie
nonetheless.

No, I do want to so obviously it's not
a very good like tonal switch,but you were talking about
making the difficult decision toshut down the brokerage, or
maybe pivot the brokerage intosomething new. And that
eventually is what brought youto SPI and so I kind of wanted
to figure out, you know, whileyou're running the asset

(49:24):
division in figure out, youknow, what makes it work, and
the finances and the, you know,sort of the customer
diversification that you need tomake that side of the business
work on the brokerage side ofthings, how did you figure out
that pivoting into agency or anagency owner was the right move
to take?

Unknown (49:43):
So looking at the business, you know, stepping out
of the business and you know,being, being the person that's
supposed to work on thebusiness, instead of in the
business, which is really hardfor me to do some days, right?
There, there's folks that comeinto my office, you know, even
this morning, and I'm like,covering a load, and you know,

(50:04):
we're actually making a prettypivotal decision, right? And I'm
like, Yeah, hold on, I gottatalk to this person, right? So
it is one of those things,Blythe, where I'm looking at our
days to pay. I'm, I'm, you know,losing good key members of the

(50:26):
company, I'm threatening thebusiness service ability to
really good legacy customers,and I've got to figure something
out. And so I was one of thosefreight coach podcast listeners
from like, you know, long timeago. Hey, Chris, you know I

(50:48):
need, I need paid for this onetoo. No, I'll put a plug in.
Like, I really enjoyed listeningto to those things and whatnot.
And, you know, bam, all of asudden he announces, like he is
starting freight coatslogistics, and he's, you know,
working with SPI and I'm, I'mlooking at these things, and I'm

(51:09):
like, alright, you know, let'slook at these agency models,
let's look at these things andwhatnot. And SPI just just kind
of kept popping up, right? Andso I give jolly a call, and I'm
like, Listen, I'm going to cryon your shoulder a little bit
like, I just need a I just needan hour to, like, talk to you.
You talk to me. And like, let's,let's just. You know. And he

(51:31):
goes, Man, everything thatyou're telling me, I really
think that you need to talk toMike michili. I'm like, Alright,
who's that? You know? Tell meabout that. And Mike calls me
when he is on vacation, andwhich I thought said a lot, you
know about it, because not a lotof people want to entertain a

(51:53):
talk, you know, taking onanother freight agent, which is,
you know, quasi, you call melike an employee, right, you
know. So, I mean, who reallywants to take time to do that
when they're when they're away,you know, from work, or, you
know, trying to, trying to getthat, that, you know, mind reset
time in but b just how he talkedto me over the phone, like he

(52:13):
was just like, so easy to justsit there and strike a
conversation up with. And so Ikind of think back to that
moment, and I'm going, man, isthis what I want to do? Is this,
you know what? Not? Well, we getto looking at the contracts, and
we're getting to look at things.
And Mike goes, Hey, come torendezvous boots. Like, don't

(52:35):
care if you made a decision ornot. Just Just come. You know,
we're going to fly you up heretheir annual conference for
folks, yeah, yeah, exactlythere. And so it was in British
Columbia. And mind you, Ihaven't signed anything with
them yet, which I ended up doingbefore I went, because I was,
like, really, kind of fell out,like, here they are. They're
spending money on me already,you know. And so it's like,

(52:56):
alright, let's, let's go up hereand let's talk. Let's, I pride
from the other agencies thatobviously they're the very
successful agencies up there, oryou, you know, you wouldn't be
at rendezvous, but like, you'retalking to these guys, I pride
for them to tell, alright,what's, what's what everybody
doesn't talk about, right? Like,tell me the horror stories, you

(53:20):
know, what? Couldn't get it. Imean, it was just the payments
there. They do what they saythey're going to do. They're
going to back you up 100% of theway. If you don't, you know,
engage with home office, that'syour fault. I mean, if you don't
ask for the resource, that'syour fault. You know, like you
need to just, just be open. Feelfree to engage and and, you

(53:44):
know, trust. And what's reallygreat about looking back and
seeing this is the amount ofcarriers that we are able to
work with that even my littlebrokerage at that time, you
know, what wasn't touching orwasn't doing things, and I was
proud of what we were able toaccomplish and build. But this

(54:06):
is another level the technology,the tech stack that is just
given to you, okay, the theother resources that you have
within other agencies to reachout and not only provide, you
know, rates for our own trucks,right to to other SPI agents,
but but to really Get people'sfeel on sharing, carrier

(54:29):
information, sharing, you know,rate, you know, we're
collaborating. I mean, there area few agents that I'm reaching
out to today, even just goingback and forth. Hey, what do you
see here? What's going on here?
Hey, I have this customer inOklahoma. What should I wear,
you know, before I go visitthem, and it's, you know, one of

(54:52):
those things that it's just likethat is invaluable, I think, for
the direction that I alwayswanted to take the company and
just didn't know it. I thinkthere are a lot of things to be
said about being able to hangyour own particular shingle on
the door, but when it came tothis particular partnership, and
the way that it came about, andthe deal that they were able and

(55:17):
willing to talk to me about anddo. Blythe, I can't say enough
good. It was, it was just, it'sbeen great, and I am less than
Golly. I'm going on nine monthswith them. So, you know, it's
pretty it's pretty fun. My teameach day, I say each day. I

(55:42):
mean, like, you know, once amonth or so, they're like, you
know, being on boarded with SPIwas probably one of the best
decisions you've made in quite awhile, you know, which is to
say, I probably make a lot ofbad decisions, but they're like,
You got that one, right?

You know, if you are still operating
a trucking company in 2025 and,you know, it was still, you
know, carving that path for 2026and beyond that, you were
obviously making a lot of gooddecisions, well, decisions, but
they're,

Unknown (56:10):
yeah, tough, and that's it. You know what? We were all
wanting to throw parties in 2020and 21 and 22 right? I mean,
like, free, you know, you hadname, your name, your price out
there. There wasn't a customerdoor out there that you couldn't
go, you know, hit talk tobecause, hell. Everybody's

(56:31):
starving for capacity. I don'tknow, this guy can't provide me
a truck, can you, you know? Imean, that was just the way it
was. RFPs were just goingthrough the roof, because
that's, that's how, you know? Imean, when you see all these
RFPs, that's when, that's whenshippers want to try to start
controlling cost, right? Andit's when you don't see RFPs
that shippers are like, kind oflike where we're at right now.

(56:53):
Let's try to see if we can gokeep it going.

Yeah.
So what was that onboardingprocess like for you and the
team and to fully, you know, getup to speed,

Unknown (57:03):
that that was something that I think that probably made
me realize a little bit more ofmy unique ability to for the
company, and I think it's maybewhere I serve the company in the
best capacity. I'm trying tosurround myself now with people
that really take my my blindspots. They can really, they can

(57:27):
really help me with thosethings, which I mean number one
thing you should do inleadership, right? And here I
am, 18 years in, and trying tofigure, you know, kind of
finally, thinking that maybe Ihave a few things figured out,
okay, but onboarding with SPI,their training online, all of
those things. It's prettyawesome. And you're, you're

(57:48):
dangerous at that point, right?
And you're able to book a loadtheir customer qualification
process. And doing those thingsactually forced me to go re
engage with customers that Itruthfully hadn't in a long
time, and sitting there tellingour story, having that face to
face talk, traveling, you knowquite a bit more. You know

(58:11):
being, being, whether it's onthe road or in an airplane, you
know, going somewhere andmaking, making those stops. It
forced me to reengage. It forcedme to resell. You know what we
do and what we should be knownfor, and what, why we need them,
right? You know, to make thiswork, that part has been
crucial. That part has beenvery, very critical. And, and I

(58:33):
think that that's, you know, youlook at how they do those
things, they just want to makesure that everything is
streamlined, so that we don'thave to go back through and fix
a whole bunch of things thatmight be wrong or whatever, that
I think anybody in the freightindustry might know. You know

(58:58):
through if you're in anothersetting, like, yeah, you might
have the load chip, you mighthave the pod, but this and this
and this is wrong, and we're notgoing to get paid until That's
right. You know, they they justmake sure that all of those
things are in place beforehand.
It's not knee jerky. It's nothey, we'll set them up later.

(59:21):
You know, give me a line ofCree, you know, line of credit
on this deal or whatnot. Youknow, which it's it's just slow
down process. If they want youbad enough they will wait on
this. And I've and I've learned,I've had to learn that for
myself. Like, okay, yeah, it'sgreat to be wanted at that
moment, because maybe someshipper got dumped on and

(59:41):
they're like, You know what,Bowers, you back in? Okay, okay,
awesome. I don't have anythinglined up with you. And while I
may have sent you this, thisbilling instruction sheet from a
month ago. Let's pull that backup in the old inbox, and let's,
let's figure that out. And Ithink that that has probably

(01:00:02):
allowed us to not only harvestmore quality business, but a lot
less of our customers arespotty, whereas before, I think
if you were to graph mycustomers, you would have seen
so many, you know, looking ataccounts and a bar graph, it
would have been up, you know,this, this one's, you know,

(01:00:23):
using us for everything. Thisone uses us once a year, you
know, and and all of thosethings where now it's pretty
steady, right? And we're able toencompass not only inbound and
outbound volume, but, I mean,we're able to do it to such a
degree of quality that even theback office is liking what SPI
does, because the invoices areall correct, the POS match,

(01:00:48):
everything is right in line. Andwhen you start making the back
office happy, you can bet thedecision makers also are
influenced a little bit on theirdecisions.

Blythe Brumleve Milligan (01:01:00):
Yeah, one, 100% and it sounds like you
know that, especially just onthe podcasting side of things, I
can speak to the helpfulnessthat that SBI has has given me.
And even, you know, betting onme before I fully, you know,
sort of bet on myself. And, youknow, just having that sort of,
like invisible hand of supportand then genuine friendship and

(01:01:21):
relationships with these peoplewho you you happen to work
together with and and that, Ithink, is like the, the best
blessing I know, a lot of peoplewill sort of poo poo on. Know,
the companies that say, youknow, we treat everyone like
family. But I think that that'svery important, that if you at
least attempt to try to treatpeople around you good, and

(01:01:42):
that's what SPI does,

Unknown (01:01:43):
Mike, Mike and Joe, you know, took some time to come to
Tonka city and spend some timehere with us. And, well, you
know, we went out to eat, wetoured the town a little bit. I
got to show them around ourtruck yard and things like that.
And, I mean, what does that say?
You know, these, these guysobviously have a hell of a lot
more to do running this now. Youknow, 300 plus million dollar

(01:02:05):
brokerage, I mean, like, it's,it's, it's, it's amazing to see,
you know what? What valuethey've been able to create just
by having a model that says,Let's partner, like, let's you
do. You do what you're good at.
We're going to do what we'regood at. Now, let's go get it,

(01:02:25):
you know? And it's pretty greatAnita too, like somebody that
just absolutely does a fantasticjob making sure that you have
what you need, you have theanswers, and you know, just
knows her stuff. I can't, can'tsay enough good about the
leadership there. And what'sreally cool, if you want to get

(01:02:47):
on Joe's good side, is starttalking about A and M, right?
And they're, they're having agreat football season right now,
so it's been pretty easy to goahead and connect with them in
that regard. Yeah, yeah.

I think it's probably important,
especially for any sports fans,to check the record of the team
before you start.

Unknown (01:03:04):
Yeah, yeah. Exactly, exactly. Oklahoma State is just
oh, we'll see

well, knowing all of these, these
things with you know, everythingthat you've gone through with
your customer history, or notcustomer history, but company
history, and being able to kindof take a look in the mirror and
try some new things and try anew partnership. How do you
think that you know identifyingthose gaps that you had in your
own business. How do you thinkthat that is setting you up for

(01:03:34):
2026, and beyond?

Unknown (01:03:36):
So the cool thing about where I think that's setting us
up, especially for the marketthat we're in right now, is we
feel very confident in beingable to supply capacity that I
know that we would have had agreat deal of apprehension
before, or before would havejust been a gamble, right? There
is so much more confidence whenit comes to supplying rates,

(01:04:02):
figuring out exactly what I knowthat we should be able to offer,
rather than just, you know, Isaid, you know, blanketing, you
know, three bucks a mile, youknow. And that's what we need,
okay. Well, where did you pullthat number from? You know, and
you could be a loser. You couldbe a huge winner, you know, at

(01:04:22):
that rate or whatnot. We knowjust exactly that we need to
stay within that 10 to 12% realmto to to harvest freight and do
well. And we know that if we gobeyond that, great, but we might
want to make sure that you knownobody else is knocking on the
door and stealing, stealingother lanes for us, right? And

(01:04:45):
then we know that before the ifit goes below that, it's really
not worth our time, because itis like, I said, before I can
get load, and three otherbrokerages are working on it.
And why bother, you know? Why?
Why do it? It's probably goingto take you twice the amount of
phone calls to book loads likethat and qualify carriers for
loads like that than it is goingto worry about your steady, your

(01:05:06):
steady profit customers.

I mean, it sounds like you have
really, especially over thecourse of this conversation, you
know, really talked about a lotof the fundamentals that you
need to have on the asset sideand on the brokerage side, and
then moving into an agency role.
It sounds like it could havebeen, you know, the the perfect
sort of, you know, leg up in a

Unknown (01:05:32):
begin with, right? It was definitely the storm to
begin with. But, yeah, no, I we,we sink, we seek a lot of
comfort in the in the futuredirection with the SPI
partnership, and I think thefuture direction for our, for
the asset company, and really,you know, how big do we really
need to be and, you know, toservice what we have. And are

(01:05:55):
there strategies outside of ourasset company, or strategies
with the brokerage that couldcomplement our asset company
right to make sure that again,you know, keeping drivers in the
seat driver turnover isexpensive. That is the most
expensive thing, I think that,you know, we can all talk about

(01:06:16):
insurance, we can all talk aboutfuel, we can all talk about that
hidden expensive turnover isjust, it's a killer. And those
are one of those things that Ithink getting to a smaller
number has allowed us to reallysafeguard. Against and allow us
to be picky about about who wetake more. So it's not about

(01:06:36):
necessarily feeling trucks asmuch as it is making sure that
we got the right person in thereor the people that we know that
we can depend on.

Yeah, it's really the fundamentals and
the quality over quantity. Yes,I think that's what is going to
help, you know, not just thefreight industry, but really
that a lot of industry, yeah, inthis market,

Unknown (01:06:57):
that applies across the board, right? Whether you're
running any type of business,yeah, that that really should
apply across the board.

Any advice for potential agents out
there that might be consideringSPI. Maybe they're running their
own brokerage right now andfeeling the pain. What advice
would you give them?

Unknown (01:07:17):
So during my months with SPI, I've actually had the
opportunity, Mike has set me upwith a couple people that have
considered SPI, and I've hadthat opportunity to maybe do
like that recruiting call, Iguess is what you would call it,
to try to see if I could tellthem my story. And you know
what, what I think of thebenefits are right now, there is

(01:07:41):
a lot of compression in theindustry where I think things,
money, all of those things aregoing to be taken into huge
consideration. And there's goingto be a lot of those closed door
meetings, whether you're in thecompany setting, or you're in
the agent setting or or any ofthat that are taking place,

(01:08:03):
trying to figure out what whatis the next move if you feel as
an agent that your book ofbusiness. Could it all be, you
know, threatened by somethingfinancial or, you know,
something, something that ishindering your ability to to

(01:08:24):
move freight? Gosh. Look at thiscompany. You know, look at SPI
the way that they assertthemselves in the market is
truly eye opening to me. And I'mnot just talking about, you
know, just D, a T and Ansoniaand trans credit and whatnot.
It's the ability to book withmega fleets that we have that

(01:08:49):
run on such a, you know, a veryprofessional operational level
that I have had now have theopportunity to really engage
with and and talk to and see howthey they operate their
business. You know, I mean, theold adage is, big companies do
those little things right? Andit's, it's really interesting to

(01:09:09):
see the difference between thosedispatchers, and your smaller
fleet dispatchers, and how theyconduct themselves. And SPI has
access to those trucks, right?
They, they have the access toprovide those, those particular
things. And the last thing youknow that I'll that I'll add to
that, is their non domicilerule. I think anybody that owns
trucks is probably pretty happyto see a lot of that legislation

(01:09:33):
pass and and see some of thatenforcement taking place. You
know, whether it's a Gestapotactic or not, you know, it's,
it's one of those things wherewe do have to sit here and look
at, is this something that trulyneeds to be done for public
safety and other other othereconomic factors. Right? In

(01:09:56):
Canada, you're not allowed to bea United States citizen and a
United States company and haulCanada intra Canada, or Hall
freight intra Canada. You know?
I mean, you're just not allowedto do that. So in the United
States, something could be saidthat that's probably a pretty

(01:10:17):
good play here too, right, to dothat. And so SPI taking that
stance, I thought, you know, Ihad a lump in my throat, or I
kind of gulped or whatever, whenJoe came across with that
announcement, but it's also likehe's right. I mean, the
leadership team's right. We sithere and we We pound our chest

(01:10:42):
on on cargo safety, you know,fraud prevention, all of these
things that are plaguing theindustry right now, and things
that you got to watch, you know,having a small brokerage as a
service provider, becausethere's a great deal of risk if
they don't have these particularresources to really comb

(01:11:02):
through, carriers, you're goingto lose some things, and you're
going to be coming to customerswith your hat in your hand and
your wallet out, trying tofigure out how you're going to
make this right. These arethings that if going through the
proper steps with SPI we cansleep better knowing that
freight is on the road and it'sgoing where it's supposed to go.

(01:11:23):
And I mean, it's not to say thatmy customer network necessarily
deals with a whole lot of thosethings that need to be stolen
and. You know, or look that tobe stolen. But again, anything
can has a value, you know, andif it's not showing up, or it's
not doing that, or, you know,you've got these particular
carriers, or just simply don'tfollow directions and have

(01:11:44):
absolutely no regard forbrokerages or or consider
brokers customers, you know,that's what they're safeguarding
against to provide a completedifferent layer and level of
service. And, yeah, suckswhenever you get on highway.
And, oh, hey, wanted to bookyou, but you fail. And I, I

(01:12:06):
mean, you're, do you're dnu, Ican't, you know, you're gonna
have to contact them. I can't. Igotta move on, you know? I We
can't. We can't do this. Youprobably saved yourself a hell
of a lot more headache than ifyou tried to go seek an
override, you know. And it'sjust not worth it. Move on.
Figure, figure those things out.
And we've had just so muchsmoother operations. I mean, a
truck not showing up or or, youknow, trucks being late or not

(01:12:30):
being it's so rare now that Iremember from running my own
camp, you know, at that time,how frequent those things were.
Now granted, obviously, maybedealing with a little bit
different truck market duringduring the the peaks of that
deal. But it's just amazing nowhow much smoother things are,

(01:12:51):
and I have to attribute that tothe carrier onboarding process.
I do. I really do.

Yeah, I think, you know, echoing
everything you just said, Ithink shippers and customers,
too are becoming more aware ofthe things that they should
require about the freight that'smoving. Because no one wants to
be a news story.

Unknown (01:13:10):
No, they don't. That's exactly right. You don't want to
be the next Netflix documentary,right? It's, I have gone as far
as to even have customers writelike letters of recommendations.
Since the Bowers SPI strategy,you know, went and went to place
and they they have thrownmetrics out there that compare

(01:13:30):
our our OTD scores, which is astaggering difference, and
something that I I will tellyou, I don't know that I was the
best at tracking that stuffbefore I thought I had an idea,
but there, you know, yourcustomers are tracking those
things, probably whether yourealize it or not, and it
allowed us to onboard with acompany I never thought we had a

(01:13:55):
shot at for brokerage and andnow, I mean, today, we're
handling like seven loads forthem, just, just today and and
we'll continue to be their firstcall on overages and other
things that are outside of theirof their contract carriers. So
I'm grateful, you know, forthose things and the resources
that we have now.

Yeah, and I think too, from just
talking with them on pastepisodes and just understanding
the dynamics within just theagency model in general, I think
for SBI to have that, you know,that low concentration or low
competition rate for differentareas of the country, different
areas of North America. Theydon't want a lot of overlap with

(01:14:37):
a lot of their age. Yeah, theydon't. And then them providing
all of the resources for you, soyou can, to your earlier point,
focus on the things that you'regood at, and maybe they can be
the ones to shine some lights onsome weaknesses that you didn't
even know you had. And so beingable to reset a lot of those,
those foundations, I think, isjust the best business model,

(01:15:00):
maybe in all of you know,talking and brokerage, because I
don't know why more peoplearen't going out and becoming an
agent

Unknown (01:15:08):
well, and something's to be said about that, right? I
mean, there's protection andcomfortability within w2 but
then there's, there's otherrisks and and rewards involved
into 99 okay? But I think thelucky or the fortunate part
about the US onboarding with SBIis there was nobody in our

(01:15:29):
region, and they, you know,seeing that and wanting to, you
know, take time and have apartnership right there. I man,
we, we struck while the iron washot. You know, we Right place,
right time, I guess, you know,for those things. And you know,
just nine months in, I'm seeinga whole lot of things that I

(01:15:51):
wish that we would have donebefore, but, you know, hey,
we're doing it now. And Blythe,you know, as it leads into 2026,
in the future, it's just reallysolidified, I think, what we
need to be as a company and as aservice provider, and I think
who our identity is in thefreight market, what we want to

(01:16:11):
be known for, and I'm I just, Icouldn't be more pleased, not
not just with with my team, forhanging with me, those, those
that hung with me during thesedifficult times. I I owe them
everything, and I'll neverforget it. You know, those were
some dark, difficult days thatwe were going through. But I. I
think seeing the light righthere, it's just been so much

(01:16:34):
more fun right to get back outthere on offense, rather than,
you know, coming up with excusesor playing defense. You know,
it's just so much more fun toget out there and attack and
start, start getting back a lotof the things that we had
before,

that's awesome to hear gonna and I
think that that's a perfectplace to end it, as, you know,
sort of SPI being the flashlightin the dark when you need it the
most. And I think for you have areally, you know, inspiring
story, you know, the trials andtribulations of working in
logistics. And that's, you know,that's the nature of this
industry, of this beast thatwe're all in is, you know, you

(01:17:11):
got to be willing to solvedifficult problems and do it a
lot and do it over over again.
But luckily, you have greatpartners and in that respect.
And so Garrett, for anyone whois listening, and maybe they
want to reach out to you and seehow, you know, working with SPI
is, or, you know, maybe even dobusiness with you. Or maybe
there's some other, you know,government bases that are

(01:17:31):
listening and they want you tohaul their freight to. Where Can
folks reach out to you, get incontact with you all

Unknown (01:17:37):
that good stuff. Yeah, well, so I use LinkedIn a lot.
That's that's like a reallygreat engagement tool, I
believe, for our industry, areally good networking tool. So
please find me on LinkedIn.
Garrett@bowerstrucks.com.comgarrett@bowerstrucks.com.com
it's two R's, 2t in thespelling. Please feel free to
email. And you know, I love toconnect, and I love to talk

(01:18:00):
freight Awesome.

Well, I will put all of that in the
show notes, just to make it easyfor folks. But this is a great
conversation, Garrett, and Ihope others enjoyed it as much
as I did. Thank you again.

Unknown (01:18:11):
Hey, Blythe, thank you so much.

Thanks for tuning in to another episode
of everything is logistics,where we talk all things supply
chain for the thinkers infreight, if you like this
episode, there's plenty morewhere that came from. Be sure to
follow or subscribe on yourfavorite podcast app so you
never miss a conversation. Theshow is also available in video
format over on YouTube, just bysearching everything as
logistics. And if you're workingin freight logistics or supply

(01:18:39):
chain marketing, check out mycompany, digital dispatch. We
help you build smarter websitesand marketing systems that
actually drive results, not justvanity metrics. Additionally, if
you're trying to find the rightfreight tech tools or partners
without getting buried inbuzzwords. Head on over to
cargorex.io where we're buildingthe largest database of
logistics services andsolutions. All the links you

(01:19:02):
need are in the show notes. I'llcatch you in the Next episode,
in go jags. You you.

All Episodes

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

Crime Junkie

Betrayal Season 5

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Cold Calls, Tight Lanes, and Government Freight with Garrett Bowers

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

.css-r6mb8g{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:1;overflow:hidden;}Stuff You Should Know

Crime Junkie

Betrayal Season 5

All Episodes

Cold Calls, Tight Lanes, and Government Freight with Garrett Bowers

Stuff You Should Know