Ep. #66: Andrew Silver, Former CEO & Founder, MoLo Solutions

Episode Transcript
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Andrew Silver (00:00):
Hey FreightPod listeners.
Before we get started today,let's do a quick shout out to
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(00:21):
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(00:43):
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The team is led by CEO DannyFrisco and COO Roberto Lacazza,
two guys I've worked with frommy earliest days in the industry
at Coyote.
I have a long history with themand I trust them.
I've even been a customer oftheirs at Molo and let me tell
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(01:03):
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Derek Zetlin (01:33):
Welcome to the Freight Pod.
My name is Derek Zetlin.
You're probably a little bitsurprised hearing my voice
instead of Andrew Silver's.
This is a different and uniqueepisode of the Freight Pod.
I wanted to give Andrew theopportunity to tell his story.
He's done such a good job overthe last almost two years now
giving folks the forum to telltheir story and dive deep into

(01:55):
their businesses.
I wanted to give Andrew theopportunity to do that for
himself.
So this is a unique episode.
I'm going to play the role ofhost.
So, andrew, I'm going to do mybest to play you for the next,
however long this takes, you arethe guest, so we're shifting
roles here.
I'm really excited to be here.
Thanks for having me, and youknow I called you probably a few

(02:16):
weeks ago with this idea.
I think it was something thatyou had thought about, maybe not
necessarily as me, as the host,but here we are so excited to
be able to guide you down yourstory.
I obviously, again, I'm goingto try to do my best to play you
, as you've done so well for allof your previous guests.
So with that, I'll kind of kickthings over to you.

(02:40):
I think generally we start theFreightPod with a little bit of
background on your early years.
Certainly, freight is in yourblood.
You had your dad, jeff, on theshow a few weeks ago, which was
really intriguing and fun tolisten to.
I know a lot of people, butyeah, I just wanted to give you

(03:01):
the opportunity to tell yourstory.
I guess we'll start as close tothe beginning as you want to
here today.

Well, thanks for having me on my own show.
This definitely was somewhat itwasn't necessarily out of the
blue.
I guess credit to the old adagein sales that you'll never get
anything you don't ask for.
I have been asked by people inthe past to do an episode on my
story and I always kind of justpunted it and you maybe just

(03:29):
called me at the right place,right time and said, you know,
would you be interested?
And I kind of was like why not?
And so here we are, sohopefully we don't screw this up
.
But all right, so you want meto start back at the beginning?

Yeah, it may be better as I think about it.
I'll give a quick intro onmyself, since I jumped right in,
and maybe give the folks whodon't know me on the show to
have an understanding of maybewhy I'm here.

Yeah, go ahead.
It's your show.
I'm just the guest.

All right, fair enough, you're driving.
Yeah, as, as I didn't mention,I'm.
I'm Derek Zetlin.
I spent 14 years in brokerageprior to last year Actually, my
yesterday was my one yearanniversary at Good Ship.
So I've been with Good Ship fora year and enjoyed every minute
of it, really excited about themission that we're on as an

(04:20):
organization.
Like it's not this isn't a showabout me or Good Ship, but I at
least want to give a backgroundon myself.
Prior to last year joining GoodShip, I spent 14 years at
brokerage.
So 10 years at Coyote Logisticsand then the more recent four
years leading into last year atMolo Solutions.
So obviously a lot of overlapat both organizations.

(04:41):
With you, I felt like thatresume put me in a position to
be able to have thisconversation today.
So I know a lot of your stories, certainly not all of it, but
wanted to at least again giveyou the opportunity to tell that
story, and I was alongside youfor a decent chunk of that.
So just wanted to at least givethe background there.
I probably should have intro'dwith that, but I'm a first time

(05:03):
host and now we'd love to turnit over to you and kind of get
into your story, and both from apersonal standpoint, and then
obviously get into thebusinesses that I just described
.

It's crazy to me to think that you were at Molo
for four years.
I don't know why that seemslike such a long time, but it
makes sense, I guess sense Imean time in COVID doesn't seem
like real time.

So I joined in August of 2020, right in the
thick of it and uh, it's kind ofa black hole of time.
So maybe that's part of thereason why it doesn't feel like
four years.

Yeah, Okay, Well, yeah, listen, I I I definitely
think is professionally.
You know me as well, know me aswell as most, or almost as well
as anyone.
So we've been on two journeystogether and so I definitely
thought that you were positionedwell enough to do this, and I
also, frankly, there's a littlepart of me in the background

(05:57):
that's like there's a chance werecord this and I never release
it if it sucks.
So I'm keeping that in my backback pocket I think people will
like it.

So I think, uh, your listeners uh will enjoy
your story.
That's my opinion, so I thinkwe'll, uh we'll, do a good job
here today.

I'll do my best.
I think where I struggle withthis mentally is I don't.
This might this might seem hardfor some people who know me to
believe, but I don't actuallylike talking about myself so
much, so it's a big reason whyI've avoided doing an episode on

(06:36):
my story.
I like putting bits and piecesof my stuff into other people's
conversations as I interviewthem, but it feels like it's
hard to you know when you thinkabout telling your story.
I don't know why it feels likecredit is something that needs
to be given along the way, um,whether it's you know for your
accomplishments or to peoplethat built things with you, and

(06:57):
so maybe it's just me that I'mmindful of.
I don't want to sound superarrogant or like feel like I'm
taking credit for things, so Ithink that's part of the mental
block that I've had with thiswhole idea.
But in any case, I grew up innorthern suburbs of Chicago, in

(07:20):
a couple different townsHighland Park, lake Bluff, lake
Forest.
I was an athlete, or I wantedto be an athlete.
I played sports is probably theright way to put it Super
competitive basketball, football, baseball throughout high
school, and I worked too.
I grew up.
My dad worked in the truckingbusiness, as far as I knew, when

(07:44):
I was young and by high schoolI got to understand what freight
brokerage was and I had thisidea.
I told myself I wanted to be amillionaire by the time I was 25
.
I don't know why that was this.
I was financially motivated andI remember thinking that.

(08:05):
I remember telling my parentsthat when I was like 17, 18 and
my first job actually was as abaseball umpire, which was fun,
cause I had younger siblings whoplayed in the little league
that I'm umpired in, and one ofthem was very athletic and it
was easier to manage his games.
The other was not as athleticand it was a little more

(08:27):
challenging.
It was like T-ball level orlike 5, 6, 7, 8 years old and I
was umpiring and I'd try to helphim along, whatever.
But my first job was a baseballumpire and I was like 13, 14
and started making I don't knowwhat it was like 12 bucks an
hour or something like that, um,but I always wanted to work and

(08:52):
you know, when I was 16, myparents started coyote and, um,
that was kind of the first realjob I had an opportunity to
participate in.
I got, I guess, hired, and byhired I mean Jeff brought me to
the office one day I think I wason my Christmas break in high

(09:13):
school and I think he sat medown next to Brian Brenner and
Brian was at the time, wasmanaging an account, I think
like Pentair Pools, and he wasshowing me how to schedule
appointments and, you know,brian would eventually lead a
big part of the organization,like a lot of the people who

(09:33):
started there in the early dayswould grow into these big roles
and would be kind of stalwartsat that business.
I was really lucky, I think,because I was put next to all of
these really influential peoplewhen I was 16, 17, 18 years old
and I learned from them.
They became good friends ofmine or mentors or just people I
could count on for advice orinformation as needed.

(09:57):
Brian Brenner was one of those.
He would eventually run, Ithink, all of sales or a big
part of sales as I grew throughmy sales career.
Another guy who I sat next to inmy first days was Tim King, and
I've talked about him maybeI've brought him up once or
twice on the show before andanother very influential person

(10:18):
in the Coyote journey and heshowed me how to call trucks and
I mean, it was as simple aslistening to him.
I was Y-cording, as you calledit, where you had two people I
don't know it was a cord thatliterally made the shape of Y
and each end of it went to aheadset and so one person could
talk and the other person couldlisten to them on the phone.
And I listened to him call afew carriers and then he said go

(10:42):
ahead and start calling,listened to him call a few
carriers and then he said goahead and start calling.
And that was my first kind offoray into freight I.
You know, I still remember myfirst load I booked.
It was, uh, nina wisconsin tomechanicsburg, pennsylvania, on
a carrier called guyantransportation g-u-y-a-n, and I
think we lost like 200 bucks onthe load.
But uh, maybe that was thefirst um lesson in executing for

(11:07):
your customers, no matter what,as I would carry on for the
next 18 years in in the freightindustry yeah, it's funny.

I mean, you remember the origin, destination
, carrier of your first load,however many years ago.
Uh, it's funny how we allremember so many of the
specifics in this business.
Did you know you want at thatpoint, did you know you wanted
to be in freight and like, thisis the route I'm going to take,
obviously just given the freightbeing in your blood, as we

(11:38):
mentioned earlier?
Or was there ever a question ofwhat you wanted to do at that
point from a professionalstandpoint?

Yeah, I don't think I took it seriously right
away, because I remember gettingin trouble.
I got in trouble a lot as a kidand into my adulthood, just by
way of, I don't know, being arebel is maybe the right term.
I was always looking forsomething.
A rebel is maybe the right term.
I was always looking forsomething and you know, I
started, you know, messingaround with alcohol when I was

(12:16):
too young and marijuana when Iwas too young and you know
partying and stuff like that,which, like you know, frankly I
think some of that and itstarted before Coyote.
But even when I got there, youknow you had this very young,
vibrant culture of postgrads andso I kind of grew up there and
as a 17, 18, 19 year old I washanging out with all these 22,
23, 24 year olds who had justgraduated college.

(12:36):
They were living in Chicago forthe first time.
You know the kids who came fromIU and Wisconsin and they like
to go out and have a good timeand so I would join them in the
summers I'd go downtown and hangout.
So I say all that to say that Iremember distinctly there was

(12:57):
kind of like a wake-up call atone point where I was in maybe
my first year as an intern and Ididn't show up to work one
morning.
I had been out the night before.
I don't remember why, but inany case, you know, my my
manager had reached out to meand I hadn't answered, and so,
naturally, you know smallcompany at the time Jeff was

(13:19):
probably walking around theoffice and he's like you seen,
andrew.
Uh, he didn't show up today and, um, you know, I got the call
from my dad and said get to theoffice.
And when I got to the office hesat me down and was like you
know, this is serious and ifyou're going to be here, you've
got the same last name as mineyou need to like, act

(13:40):
accordingly and you need to showup, and otherwise I just
certainly I it's not, you're notmessing my day up with with
your nonsense.
So I don't ever want to have toget a call from your manager
looking for you and you know,something like that I think was
was a bit of a wake-up call tosay like, okay, if you're going
to be serious about this or ifyou're going to do this, you

(14:02):
need to be serious about this.
You know, know you've got otherpeople who are kind of counting
on you and it's not just yourname that you're kind of
carrying as you do this.
So I definitely loved the theaspect of the work, but I was
never a guy that was gonna.
I was always the guy thatwanted to figure out how to get

(14:23):
things done easier.
Like I remember one of my best,one of my biggest mentors in my
life, randy Miller.
He was my first sales managerand Randy's like a freight
savant.
For people who don't know him,people who do know him know him
as a freight savant, especiallyon refrigerated freight.

(14:46):
He was like a guy you could goto at any point any time of the
year and be like what should therate be on produce from Florida
to Illinois on August 15th?
And he'd be like, ah, that's amonth after it's done in Florida
, so $1.40, whatever, know, buck40, whatever.
But he was my boss, he was agreat mentor, but he was similar

(15:10):
to me.
He wasn't like a verystructured, organized person.
He was more like just get thework done, figure it out.
And I remember a time in this.
You know, by this time I was 23, 24 years old.
I was now like a full-timesales guy and I was doing well,
I was probably in the top 10% ofsellers and I remember him
sitting me down too and sayingyou know, if you could just

(15:33):
apply like you apply yourself20% of what you could, and your
results are there Like, can youimagine if you would be willing
to apply yourself 100% and whatthat might look like for you
versus 20%?
And you're kind of doing thebare minimum that you can do to
accomplish somewhat.

(15:54):
Well, you're in the top 10%,but you could probably do better
if you just applied yourselfmore.
It's a theme throughout my life.
Growing up.
That was always kind of anissue and I can't necessarily
tell you why.

Um, it just kind of was what it was so at this
point, um, just thinking aboutthe, the jeff example and the
randy example, is thispre-college, middle of college,
post college?
Where is that time, time wisefor for you?

well, those two, those two interactions, were pre
and post.
Jeff was pre-college.
I was like 17, this was when Iwas first getting into the
business and my point was justthat, like my point in bringing
up the ladder was with randywhen by the time with randy it
was I was older, I was like 24at this point and I was two or
three years into being a salesrep at coyote, a customer sales

(16:44):
rep at Coyote, a customer salesrep, I should say a shipper
facing sales rep.
And if you look at the timelineof my career at Coyote, I
started as a carrier rep and Idid that job for maybe four
years on and off.
On and off being.
I was an intern the firstcouple times and then, by, I

(17:05):
think, my third time as anintern.
I had such strong relationshipswith the carriers and I really
didn't enjoy school.
I mean, I enjoyed being atcollege.
I enjoyed being at Universityof Michigan.
I just didn't enjoy going toclass and I would sign up for,
like the big lecture class atthe big school, at least at
Michigan you could create aschedule that allowed for you to

(17:29):
do the minimum amount of work.
As I stay with that theme, Iguess, and my point being is you
could sign up for a lectureclass that had maybe three
classes a week, but attendancedidn't count, and your whole
grade was based on two tests.
You took a midterm and a final.
So I would seek out thoseclasses.
There wasn't a homeworkassignment every week, there

(17:49):
wasn't an attendance, and Iwould you know, sign up for
those classes and then by mysophomore or junior year, I was
continuing to work as a carrierrep, because I just had carriers
.
I had owner operators that werecounting on me and that I loved
working with and I made moneyworking with them, and it was as
simple as every day.
We got on the phone, they toldme where they were going to be

(18:12):
and they didn't really have totell me by the time we were this
far along in the relationship,but they told me what they
wanted for the week and I'd getthem all their loads and then
you just had to manage it and Iwas probably booking about 20

(18:33):
loads a day, um, as a kind ofcarrier rep working from ann
arbor michigan part-time as astudent.

He's got your laptop up in your dorm room just
cranking out, uh, carrier sales.

so I tried to actually have my laptop in my
fraternity house, which was adisaster, uh, I mean, if I'm
perfectly honest, like I wassitting there with my laptop and
there was a kid sitting fivefeet away from me with a bong
playing fifa, um, so we got alittle office above a bar in ann
arbor um, just a tiny little.

(18:58):
It had five desks.
Uh, eric wine garden uh, who'sawesome.
He, he.
I don't know if he's still atCoyote, but he wanted to live in
Michigan and this was beforethere was a real Ann Arbor
Coyote office.
So he and I just had this tinylittle office.
That was just a way to get awayfrom all the kind of college

(19:20):
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That's right.
I forgot about the Ann Arboroffice.
That makes sense.
So, um, you're at, you're atcollege.
You mentioned carrier sales forfour ish years, transition into
men chipper facing sales.
Uh, that was the Randyconversation I think there was
was the craft, there was a yeah,there was a stop in between
that.

So there was a yeah, there was a stop in
between that, so there was ayear off.
I took a year off school.
Coyote got its first bigrefrigerated contract with craft
foods at the time it was craftfoods um, which they still owned
the business that is nowmondelēz, and they had a
transportation operations centerin madison, wisconsin, and

(21:03):
because it was a large enoughaward, they wanted an onsite rep
and so I got asked to do thatand it was more of like an
operational role combined withsales, I would say, because your
onsite, well, I guess it waswhatever you made of it, and as
someone who was, I was living inMadison.

(21:25):
I didn't know anybody inMadison.
I actually I signed up for likefour rec league basketball
leagues as an individual player,so four nights a week I would
just go to a rec league and playbasketball, cause, again, I
didn't know anybody.
And then I made friends with allthe people from craft that I
was working with and my job was,I guess, guess, to manage the
account, and you know, I thinkit was 50 plus loads a day or

(21:47):
something of that nature.
And so there were operationsfolks who did all the scheduling
, um, but I was the yeah, youwere one of them at one point.
Yeah, I remember that and um,but my job I was like the face
of the business now and therewas still a sales guy on the
account I think it was Zach atthe time but I was the one that

(22:09):
the people at Kraft went to.
If there was an issue they justwould walk over to my desk.
But I thought it was sofascinating to be working on
site in a shipper's operationscenter because I just was so
curious about what information Icould get and what I could
learn to help us get morebusiness and I also was super

(22:29):
competitive.
I mean there was a CH Robinsonguy whose desk was like five
feet from me Super nice guy,mike Schoenhals.
But I had to make itcompetitive.
At one point there was AdamHaas sat across from me.
He's now in charge of all thefreight for craft.
At the time he was a carrieron-site carrier rep for martin

(22:50):
transport well, I didn't knowthat okay yeah, he was, and I
actually I think he won carrierrep of the year, whatever they
had like on-site rep of the yearaward and uh, this is just my
nature.
I was like campaigning formyself to win.
I made a sign.
I think I put it on his on hisdesk or his puppy, whatever

(23:12):
they're called a cubicle.
That was just like boat Andrew.
Carrier of the year that checks.
Yeah, but I spent a year thereand I mean I got to know some of
the really awesome people whowere from Kraft.
Some of them still are.
Plenty of them have gone off todifferent businesses.
Kraft has made a whole bunch oforganizational changes, from

(23:34):
selling off Mondelez to mergingwith Heinz 3G getting involved
and all that fun stuff.
Well, it depends who you askFun.
That's fun stuff.
Well, depends who you ask fun.
But in any case, um, yeah, Ispent a year doing that, which
was my first foray into thecustomer side of the business,
and then went back to school,finished up my last year, and I

(23:56):
actually remember I was drivinghome from ann arbor after my
last day in class and, um, I was, I was pretty sure I was coming
back.
Well, I guess I was definitelycoming back to coyote.
I just didn't know to do what.
And I called my dad and waslike, hey, you know I'm driving
home.
When should I start?
You know it wasn't like let mego, take off three months or

(24:18):
whatever.
I wanted to work and I wantedto make money.
And he's like, okay, and Iwanted to make money.
And he's like, okay, you canstart tomorrow, what do you want
to do and I said I don't knowwhat do you recommend?
He's like well, you know,you've done carrier sales,
you've done the operationalstuff.
The only thing you haven't doneis customer sales, and that's

(24:39):
the hardest job.
You should probably do that one.
I said, okay.
He said here's brenner's number, call him.
And, you know, figure it outwith him.
So I called brenner and saidhey, you know, I'm gonna come
join you on customer sales.
The company was still, I guessit's like 2013 yeah, company's

(25:00):
2013.
The company's pretty big at thispoint uh, hundreds of people in
downtown, I think and Brian.
One of the things I rememberfrom my call with Brian was and
he knew me pretty well at thispoint and he knew I was well.
I guess what he said was okay,customer sales, andrew, is very

(25:25):
different than carrier sales andyou need to be patient because
you're going to eat shit for awhile.
It's probably going to be sixmonths before you have a chance
to make commission, becauseeveryone's going to tell you no
for the first six months and Iremember hearing that and I even

(25:46):
maybe have said it I was likethere's no way I'm going to, I'm
taking six months to hitcommission.
Like, absolutely not, I no way.
And he's like Andrew.
You, you tend to lean towardsinstant gratification, which is
a hundred percent true.
He's like this is a verydifferent game.
You know, know, it's not likeyou just call up a carrier, ask
them where their truck is and ifyou have a good load, they take

(26:09):
it.
It doesn't work like that.
You call up a shipper and theydon't answer.
Or you call up a shipper andthey hang up, or you know, even
if they answer the phone, it'sunlikely.
They're giving you freightright away I.

I got the same advice from brenner for the
record, so I can certainlyresonate with that.
It's great advice.

It just doesn't.
You know, part of mypersonality is like if you tell
me I can't do something, that'swhen you get a hundred percent
of me, that's when I'm going toput every ounce of energy I have
into trying to do something.
And even if you don't tell methat, I might, you know,
manufacture in my mind someworld where you did tell me that

(26:49):
and use it as motivation to go.
You know, do whatever I want todo.

We're going to put a pin in that because we're
going to use that later, so I'mgoing to.
I'm going to make a note forthat one.

So so, yeah, I mean I joined customer sales and
it was such an awesome, it wasfun.
I mean it was a lot of fun.
It was hard.
As Brenner said, a lot ofpeople tell you to pound sand or
, more importantly, a lot ofpeople just not more importantly
, but more often people justdon't answer.
And I had this idea that I wasgoing to go through all old

(27:29):
accounts that Coyote had workedwith in the past but didn't work
with anymore and just thoughtlike, okay, maybe I'll find some
good ones there and I at leastcan get some loads on the board.
And in one thought you might belike, okay, that sounds like a
good idea.
Another thought you might haveis there's probably a reason why
they don't haul with themanymore.

(27:49):
I was hoping the reason wasgoing to be that it was just a
bad rep from Coyote and a goodrep could make it work.
That was kind of what Iconvinced myself is other people
might have screwed up thisopportunity, but I could figure
it out and make it better.
And that's when I stumbledacross a company called Ruby
Robinson and they were my firstcustomer and Ruby Robinson was a

(28:10):
produce brokerage and so theybought and sold mostly potatoes
and onions, but other stuff too.
They also owned a, a melonsbusiness.
So you know, certain times ofyear they were doing watermelons
with sweet mama produce was thename of their sister company.
And so I, you know, I callthese guys to get them on the

(28:31):
phone and they're brokers likewe were.
So it wasn't as much like I'mgonna make you wait six months
to earn my business.
It was just like can you helpme today?
And if so, can you do it at therate I want?
And if so I'll give you theload.
And so I started taking theseonions and potato loads Onion
loads out of Las Cruces, newMexico, which is like 60 miles

(28:52):
west of El Paso.
Potato loads out of Pasco,washington, twin Falls, idaho
there were some onions up inwestern Idaho slash, eastern
Oregon as well Going to the USfoods the pfgs of the world.
And these loads were anightmare.
I mean, I think the carrierreps to some extent hated me.

(29:14):
I, you know I was, I was.
We didn't have a ton ofrefrigerated freight at the time
and I was putting it on theboard and it was not easy to
move, but we just didn't have aton of it.
So the carrier reps wouldfigure it out.
And that was kind of my firsttaste of the customer side and I
grinded that account.

(29:34):
I mean we got to a point wherewe were doing like 15 loads a
day and the margins weren'tgreat.
You definitely want to havehigher margins on produce
business because there's waymore risk.
The bad bounces are way moreexpensive.
For people who don't understandbad bounces, bad bounces are the
load.
Let's say I get a load from LasCruces, new Mexico, to

(29:59):
Nashville, tennessee, which wasan order we used to move.
It's refrigerated, I think it's1,400 miles, I can't remember.
But let's just say they'regoing to pay me $4,000.
I find a carrier a day inadvance for $3,500.
And what would sometimes happenwas this reefer carrier would

(30:20):
show up in Las Cruces to thisfarm and it would take 10 hours
for the product to be ready andfor them to pull because they're
picking it from the farm andthis guy would leave after five
hours.
He'd be frustrated and leavelike you.
You know, I didn't know it wasgoing to take 10 hours.
I didn't know me.
I is the broker.
I didn't know it was going totake 10 hours.
They didn't tell me that.
Uh, and so the bad balance isthis guy says all right, right,

(30:43):
I'm out.
And Ruby Robbins says you stillgot to go pick up this load.
And so now, last minute, I'mfinding a new carrier and
instead of paying $3,500, I'mpaying $5,000.
That's just more likely withrefrigerated loads.
It's less capacity, so therates are more volatile when
you're having to find someonelast minute and that was kind of
the initial challenges I had.
It was tough freight, the.

(31:07):
And that was kind of theinitial challenges I had.
It was tough freight, theaccessorials weren't good, but
it was great freight to learnhow to be a broker.
I mean, if you can brokerproduce freight, you can pretty
much broker anything.
And I carried that account forthe rest of my career and as I
became a manager and then led anoffice or whatever you know, I
used to give that account to mynewest reps and I say, here, go
move these produce loads, goodluck.

(31:28):
And it was just a great way tolearn how to do the business.
And eventually those guysbecame the first investors in
Bolo.
So you know, when I ended upquitting Coyote, they were the
first ones to call me and sayyou know, would you want to
build a brokerage with us.
We're thinking about doing that, so yeah, would you want to
build a brokerage with us.

We're thinking about doing that.
Yeah, I had a feeling the RubyRobinson name was going to come
back up.
I was going to get there, butno, it's interesting just to
listen to how you remember somany intimate details of things
that happened 12, 13 years ago.
It's really interesting tolisten to.
You referenced this quickly,leading an office.

(32:06):
So career path for you carriersales.
Then there was the experienceat Kraft, then customer shipper
sales.
As you mentioned, you ended upin Denver.
I think I'm kind of goingchronologically in the right
direction here, but how did thathappen and can you talk a
little bit about the transitionthere?

Yeah.
So I had been in customer salesfor maybe two, two and a half
years and I had a solid book.
I think my gross margin monthlywas around $250,000 to $300,000

(32:48):
a month across a pretty goodbase of customers and so I was
probably in the top 10%, I think, at this point.
And I remember Coyote used tobe a one office shop.
Like everything's got to becentralized.
And then Coyote bought accessamerica which had offices all
over the place minneapolis,knoxville, chattanooga,

(33:09):
birmingham, whatever number ofplaces and so that kind of
pushed coyote to think like okay, maybe, maybe multiple offices
around the countrygeographically makes sense.
And they sent out a survey tothe entire company saying would
you be open to moving?

(33:29):
If so, where would you want togo?
And Denver won the vote and sothey were looking for someone
from the carrier side andsomeone from the customer side
to be kind of the office leaders.
I had no ties, interest in anyof it or connections to Denver,
but Marianne called me into heroffice and I guess they had been

(33:50):
thinking about me as apotential person to do this and
said would you be willing tomove to Denver to lead the
customer side of that office?
And I said yes on the spotbecause I was 25 years old and
had nothing else to.
You know, there was nothingkeeping me, nothing keeping me
in Chicago, and this was a goodopportunity.
So I said yes.

(34:10):
So Dave Herbert and I moved outthere in March of 2015 with a
group of 10 or 15 studs and thegoal was to build it into a, you
know, as you know, for and.
Uh, the goal was to build itinto, uh, you know, as you know,
for me, the goal was to make itthe most profitable office in
the country um, for in thecompany for coyote and and to

(34:34):
grow it faster than all theother offices.
And we definitely grew itfaster.
I don't know if we were themost profitable, though I
remember one year year seeingour.
I was there for a year and ahalf before moving back to
Chicago, but Denver was a lot offun.
I was not a great people leader, people manager.

(34:57):
I struggled with maybe whatsome people struggle with when
they move from sales tomanagement, which was I maybe
had 10 or 15 sales reps on myteam and it was hard for me to
teach them how to sell versustrying to just show them slash,

(35:17):
do it for them, um, and you know, I don't know if you've had
that issue before or seen that,but I'm familiar with that
feeling, yeah.

Yeah, for sure it's very common for high
performers, right, it's the, theinternal drive and the know-how
.
To then translate that to ateam I think is very common.
I absolutely know what thatfeels like.

Yeah.
So I think that was part of mybiggest struggle.
I mean, we, our office, grewquickly.
We, we brought in a bunch ofaccounts and grew them.
It was a tough freight year too.
I want to say 2015, 2016,.
I think rates were pretty,pretty low at that point, 2015,
2016.
I think rates were pretty,pretty low at that point, um,

(36:01):
and so it was hard to to grow atat strong margins, but you
could grow at at thinner marginsand make up for it in volume,
um, which was, you know, adecent strategy at the time for
us to at least get our footingand build out our, our you know
our network.

It also came in a really interesting time for
Coyote's business because youmentioned the Access America
merger acquisition was 2014.
Then we ended up selling thebusiness in 2015 to UPS.
So your transition to Denverwas right in the middle of both
of those transactions.
Did that impact any of the wayyou navigated Denver or was it
kind of just head down in Denvertrying to grow that office as

(36:38):
fast as you could?

No, it was pretty head down.
You know, the Coyoteacquisition happened I think six
months into Denver opening UPS.

Yeah, what did I say Coyote that's okay.

Sorry, yeah, ups buying Coyote happened, I think,
six months into me being inDenver and I don't remember
there being a much impact there.
I mean, I think there may havebeen some organizational changes
made high above my head as kindof all that was navigated, but
for me it was no change, nochange.

Nope, makes sense.
And so you said you were therefor a year and a half, so that
gets us to say, the 2016 ish airarea.
You then came back to Chicagoand led our Chicago sales team.
Um, so I think, chronologicallyagain, that's the next step for
you.
You want to just talk aboutgoing from Denver back to
Chicago and, ultimately, whatled to that, and then what, what

(37:37):
led you to to lead our groupand what that experience was
like yeah, you know, this wasthe only time I ever almost left
the industry.

Uh, I interviewed for a job at a company called
pillow pillow it's new for me.

I don't.
I don't know this part of thestory.

It was it was a.
It was a.
It's a new for me.
I don't.
I don't know this part of thestory.
It was, it was a.
It was a pillow manufacturerfor water beds, and so the
pillows were made of water aswell, and it was the first water
pillow.
I'm just kidding.
That was.
That was not the business itwas.
It was a company named pillowand bill driegert and clay
stroner worked there.

Bill driegert and Clay Stroner worked there.

Bill Driegert was the COO and Bill went up and
opened up Uber and now is partof Convoy platform via Flexport
and Clay is also at Convoyplatform via Flexport.
But, yeah, I had been at Coyotefor a long time and there was
this itch I always had or thismental flaw is probably the

(38:42):
right way to describe it today.
It was an insecurity aroundbeing the son of Jeff Silver,
the son of the CEO of a business, and kind of feeling like my
accomplishments would never bevalid enough.
Feeling like my accomplishmentswould never be valid enough.
Whether that was valid enoughfor me or for other people, I
don't really know, but it wassome kind of itch that was like

(39:06):
you need to go do somethingoutside of that business, you
need to go get outside of theindustry, you need to make your
own way, which is years later.
I realized how foolish that wasand I regret letting that be a
thought I had for such a longtime because, um, I think it was
bill gates's daughter who I sawrecently being interviewed

(39:27):
about essentially being a nepobaby and you know, nepo baby
being someone who was born whoseparents are super successful in
an industry and it gives themlegs up in said industry and
like she doesn't, she didn'thave any like insecurity or
embarrassment or regret about it.
She just was like, yeah, it's,it's what I was born into.

(39:51):
And with it, frankly, comesresponsibility to make the most
of the opportunity I have.
Because, you know, we're allborn into the situation we're
born into.
We can complain about it, wecan be embarrassed about it, we
can whatever, but, like, at theend of the day, all we should do
is make the most of it andcertainly honor what resources

(40:13):
and opportunities we have andmake sure not to, you know, be
an ass about it, not to messthem up, not to screw it up
whatever, um, and so, like Iregret spending so much time
feeling like this insecurity,when it could have just been
partially pride and alsopartially like responsibility.
You know, okay, I was giventhese opportunities.

(40:34):
I need to make the most of them, um, cause other people weren't
, and you know that, that.
You know I was given theseopportunities.
I need to make the most of thembecause other people weren't,
and I have a responsibility tolive up to the opportunity in
front of me.
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(41:41):
profitably.
Do you feel that way?

now, andrew, like now that you've run your own
business, sold your own business.
I'm obviously skipping aheadhere a little bit, but do you
have that perspective now versus, say, 10 years ago, when you're
going through some of thesemental challenges?
I'll phrase it that way say 10years ago?

when you're going through some of these mental
challenges.
I'll phrase it that way yeah,um, I I think my perspective now
is way more I.
I just don't feel like I didanything on my own.
I think that I was verygrateful to I was I was lucky to
have to be supported by myfather, by my stepmother, by my
mother.
Like I was supported by greatpeople and like you know, I

(42:20):
don't think Molo would have beenas successful if I wasn't
Jeff's kid.
Like I think that I was given aton of opportunity.
As a result of that, I learneda lot that put me in a position
to do the job I needed to.
Because of that, and I alsothink all the people we built it
with were like so instrumentalin the whole thing that it's

(42:40):
like you know, it's not evenjust about your parents.
It's about the people you'relucky enough to call your
partner, your co-founder.
You know the people you'relucky enough to call the
managers beneath you, whateverit is Like.
Some of that is osmosis, someof that's kind of luck that you
know they.
They happen to interview foryour company and you happen to
make a connection with them andthey happen to agree to work for

(43:01):
you and and then you know theopportunity is there and you
guys make the most of it.
So, um, yeah, I definitelythink my position has changed on
it and and I don't beat myselfup as much over it I don't see
it as some weight need to carryor a chip on my shoulder.
I don't carry it as a chip onmy shoulder anymore.

All right, that's fair.
I mean, that's obviously just asign of personal growth.
So credit to you for gettingthere.
Let's go back.
We were in Chicago You'releading the group.
We kind of went a couple.
We kind of oh hello.
Well, I should probably explainpillow, um, yeah.

So I was thinking I you know, I was wanting to
get out of the industry and Isaw that clay was a buddy of
mine and he'd gone to work forbill at this company pillow,
which was not a water pillowmanufacturer, they were a.
They were like an airbnbsupport, so for people who owned
condos or houses that they puton Airbnb, they would manage the

(44:04):
property for you.
They were out in San Francisco.
I went and interviewed withthem and thought about it and
then talked to my family aboutit.
My parents and they were like,listen, we think you should come
home, we think you should comeback to Chicago.
We've got a pretty big job weneed someone to do, which is

(44:24):
leading our Chicago sales team,which was like a $350 million
book of business across 50sellers, and we think that
you're in a position where Ithink you could get their
respect, which was a hard thingto do amongst a group of 50
sellers, many of whom had beendoing the job for a very long
time, and so they asked me to dothat instead of leaving.

(44:50):
So I said okay, sure, and Imoved back to Chicago in October
of 16.
But it was short-lived.
I don't think I made it sixmonths before I had a bigger
itch to scratch and I don't knowwhat it was that transformed my

(45:11):
mindset and took me to a placefrom I'm going to leave the
industry to I'm going to justleave the company and I want to
build my own company in theindustry.
But that happened and I got toa place where I felt like I
wanted to build my own businessin the industry.
I didn't want to be the CEO'skid, I wanted to be the CEO, and

(45:31):
so I quit Coyote in April of 17.

I remember that day.
You brought me into aconference room, probably 8 am,
and said I wanted you to hearfrom me, but today's going to be
my last day.
Personally, I had a ton ofrespect for you at that point.
You were leading our salesgroup, as you mentioned.
I was one of the individualcontributors on that Chicago
sales team and you were leadingthe group.
Then, obviously, you pulled mein that day and and, kind of,

(46:01):
the rest is history.
It's certainly a pivotal momentfor, I'd say, you and me and a
lot of other people, theindustry in general, because of
the decision to ultimately, uh,lay the groundwork for Molo.
So I'm glad we got to thatpoint in the story, but there is
a small gap there because you,you didn't go directly to Molo.
So I'm glad we got to thatpoint in the story, but there is
a small gap there because youdidn't go directly to Molo.
I know you spent some time atanother shipper, so before we

(46:24):
get to the Molo story you wentback into I think it's probably
sat out your non-compete at thatpoint in 2017.
Can you talk a little bit aboutgoing back to leading?
I believe it was Shamrock Foodsat the time.

Yeah.
So that was somewhat naive ofme to think I could quit and
just go start a brokerage thenext day and the CEO at the time
was Jonathan Sissler and, yeah,what I thought I could do.
I was wrong, and so I had thisidea.
Ruby Robinson reached out rightaway when they heard I quit and

(46:59):
wanted to start this brokerage.
I was all in.
I was like, yeah, let's do it soyou quit without like there
wasn't, the groundwork was notlate at that point, you just had
no I, I just I just knew I Ineeded to go and try to do this
and I took their call and weessentially agreed loosely on

(47:21):
terms, which I'll never agreeloosely on terms with anyone
again.
It's a mistake you learn inbusiness if you just do business
and you agree loosely on termswith people and you don't get
everything written to a T andyou don't protect yourself.
Well, because I've done bothsides and from starting a
company where you agree on termsloosely to selling a company
where you don't give yourselfenough protection across all the

(47:46):
paperwork and all the agreement, you know I've seen issues on
both sides of that.
So in any case, loosely agreedto terms where they were going
to put in $5 million over timeand we would build a brokerage.
We'd start with their freightand I had been kind of joking

(48:09):
around not even joking, but MattBogrich had become a good
friend of mine and we were in atext group that talked pretty
frequently daily.
A good friend of mine and wewere in a text group that talked
pretty frequently daily andwhen I told that group of people
that I was quitting, he was ata place in his career where he'd
been super successful sellingfor IBM, but felt like he was

(48:29):
just kind of a number at thismassive organization where he
didn't really matter and hedidn't feel connected to any of
the people he worked with, andso to him the idea of starting a
business was was interesting.
Even though he knew nothingabout freight, he figured well,
you can teach me the freight andI'm pretty smart guy otherwise
and I can help you know, run abusiness and I'll put everything
I have into it and we'll makeit work.

(48:51):
So that was the kind of initialplan, was him and I, and we
talked to Ruby Robinson and gota deal set up and I quickly got
my hand slapped by the Coyotelegal team.
That was just like, hey, youcan't go do this, like you're
not allowed to do this for ayear.
And so I'm like, okay.

(49:14):
And I actually told them.
I like reached out to them andsaid, hey, this is what I'm
going to do, just want to letyou know I'm not going to steal
any of your people or stealingyour customers, I'm just going
to doing this.
Like you know, I have to dothis.
And they were like, okay, well,no, you're not, you've got a
non-compete, so you're not goingto do that.
And I said, okay, well, let'sfigure this out.

(49:34):
So that was actually when Ireached out to Will Jenkins and
Stephan Mathis, two guys who I'dworked with.
Will had worked for me and was,like always, one of the hardest
working guys I'd ever known andjust had an incredibly positive
attitude.
And Stephan was had been acarrier rep who booked some of

(49:55):
my reefer loads and he was justwas a stud carrier rep and you
know really good dude who, um,again, had great head on his
shoulders and, like you know,call them Papa jumbo, cause he's
got this kind of Papa feel tohim that people just like to be
around him.
And uh, will was easy, he waslike I'm ready tomorrow.
I think he had taken a job hedidn't really enjoy and, uh, you

(50:18):
know, we we knew each otherwell enough to, I think, believe
that we could build something.
And so he's like, yeah, I'lljoin you.
And Stefan took some selling.
Like Stefan took me a while toconvince him he was working at
another company Kander Expedite,I think was the name of it Good
company, nicole Glenn's the CEO, she's great and I think he
liked her a lot and didn'tnecessarily believe or know that

(50:38):
this business was going to be ahit and he was worried about,
you know, screwing up what hehad going.
But eventually we convinced himand got him on board and then I
stepped out.
I had to you know Coyote wasnot letting me out of my
agreement so I kind of said, allright, you guys figure it out.
Matt Will, stefan, ruby,robinson guys there were three

(51:01):
of them.
It wasn't the actual company,it was just the three main sales
guys.
I said, you guys got this andthey went off to work.
They started the company inJuly of 17.
I went and worked at a shipperit was actually Tilos was the
name of the company and theywere a third party that managed

(51:24):
all the freight for ShamrockFoods, maine's Paper and Food
Service and a company calledNicholas Co.
And this was something startedby a guy, Todd Jackson, as a way
to kind of try to compete withthe bigger food distributors.
And so the thought was you know, shamrock and Mainz and

(51:45):
Nicholas Co are much smaller incomparison to, like, us Foods
and Cisco.
However, if you could bundlethem all together and
essentially create onetransportation network for them
other and essentially create onetransportation network for them
, maybe there are economies ofscale and there's an opportunity
to compete better with the bigboys.
So that was kind of the originof Telos and it was a small team

(52:06):
but they had a lot of freightthey're managing and I got
connected to Gabe who's the CEOthere, gabe Villareal.
He's awesome and he and Iworked out a deal and I started
helping manage his carriernetwork, which was, you know, it
was fun it's probably the bestword to think of just because I

(52:27):
had sat on the other side ofthat table so many times and now
I was, you know, in the seat ofbeing inundated by sales reps,
emails, calls, all of it, and itwas fun to deal with that.
And sometimes I messed withpeople, uh, because I couldn't
help myself.

Um, but I go ahead , go ahead.

No you go, no, I just was.
It was a fun job and I I, youknow I set up.
I set up good carriers.
I made good relationships withbrokers.
Andrew Voss today is a goodfriend of mine.
He works with Direct ConnectLogistics.
He was a broker hauling for mewhen I was at Tilos and listen,
it was a pretty simple thing forme, like do what you say you're

(53:11):
going to do.
If we make an agreement on alane and a price for a certain
amount of time, move the loadsat that price on that lane for
the duration of time.
If you have issues, justcommunicate them with me as
proactively as you can and thenwe'll figure out how to navigate
issues together.
Pretty simple philosophy andguys like Andrew did a great job

(53:33):
for me.
There were other people who didnot do as great of a job and I
had to fire, but it was fun.

I'm going to selfishly put myself into the
story a couple of times here, soI guess, insert myself, so I
remember getting emails from you, forwarded emails from you.
There's probably a group of usat Coyote where you would just
share poor solicitations or poorbrokerage activity.

(54:04):
We'll call it.
Which I know we enjoyed.
This is back in 2017 as welland uh I uh also respectfully
declined the opportunity, uh,which I know you you'd like to,

(54:27):
to bring up uh yeah, you couldhave been some test.
You could have been like molo,employee number four my, you
were like one of the only peopleI was willing to potentially
steal from coyote well, Iappreciate that yeah I know it's
, it's humbling, you know, Ilook back on it and uh, it's the
, the courting, if you will, orthe uh salesmanship to get me to

(54:51):
join molo was a three-yearprocess.
So you, you started in in thoseconversations were in 2017.
I, I ended up joining uh in inAugust of 2020.
So, uh, yeah, I mean, look, Iappreciate the opportunity.
I didn't take you up on it, butI did jump on board three years
later, so that Stefan probablytook a little bit less
convincing than I did.
Um, it's I mean, look like Ihonestly, uh, it's credit to the

(55:14):
four of you, and and and othersthat joined before me.
What you guys were able tobuild.
I think you had Jeff on the showum, obviously, in his opinion
to you he was very direct aboutit and I knew this previously
was that he and most a lot ofother people, myself included,
just didn't see the need foranother brokerage and thought
there'd be a lot ofconsolidation in the industry.

(55:35):
And, uh, you know, myperspective at that point in
2017 was I just don't see it.
So you know, looking back on itnow, what are we eight years
down the road?
Credit to you all Certainly thefour of you.
There are obviously otherpeople that were instrumental in
growing Molo.
I know we're going to get tothat here in a moment, but you

(55:55):
know, for me personally at thatpoint in the middle of 2020, I
was like, okay, they proved meand a lot of others wrong, and
that was a lot of the reason forme ultimately leaving Coyote
and joining the Molo Group.
So I just wanted to at leastgive that perspective on the
story and I know we'll get tothe Molo origin and business
here in just a bit.

So it's interesting because I think
about that a lot even today yourpoint around does the world
need another broker?
And it's not even necessarily.
Does the world need anotherbroker?
Maybe the question is, can anew broker succeed still, and
can they succeed still withoutsome highly unique
differentiator?

(56:38):
That's probably a better way toput it, yeah 99.9% of brokers in
the industry don't have aunique differentiator.
The few that do are they ownsomething, they're a part of a.
I think a broker that ownsequipment owns assets trailers.

(56:59):
That's different, it'sunique-ish, it's challenging
because there's a history ofasset-based brokers or
asset-based carriers that havebrokerages.
Those don't tend to be thebest-performing brokerages and
I'm just speaking fromhistorical performance.
I don't have numbers to backthat up, but it is a belief that

(57:22):
I think most in the know peoplein the industry would agree
with.
And that often is becausetypically an asset-based carrier
with a brokerage will treattheir brokerage like an overflow
or like a secondary kind ofbusiness to the assets, and that
really becomes challenging ifyou think about, let's say,

(57:44):
you're an asset-based broker andyour brokerage has this lane
from Chicago to Dallas fivetimes a day and your asset has
plenty of that, usually two, sothey don't need it from the
brokerage.
But when the market gets slowerand the asset all of a sudden is
low on volume and they want totake the freight from the

(58:07):
brokerage, which typically thecompany allows them to do, what
happens to the carrier that wasrunning that lane consistently
for you?
And typically they get madesecond fiddle to the owning
asset.
So that's one example of wherethat becomes a problem or has
historically been a problem.
I do think shipper-owningbrokerages, I think, is an

(58:31):
interesting concept that couldbecome more prevalent in the
future.
It, like you know, it's just adifferent resource to have as a
brokerage.
If you own freight, um, and youhave relationships with vendors
that could be a little unique.
so I I don't know I, but mypoint is like I still think
about that today because, youknow, my non-compete ends in um

(58:56):
just under 18 months and Iwonder could I start a brokerage
November 1st 2026?
And could it be successful ifit's?

not, not that you're counting.

Yeah, I try not to count because it's so far
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I mean, it's crazy.
I think it's been two yearssince I got fired, but it has
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Derek Zetlin (01:00:23):
I remember that day too.
I mean you mentioned the needlike we're on the thread of the
need for another brokerage,probably a good segue for the
origin or the continuation ofMolo.
You're at Telos, thenon-compete expires.
You mentioned that being a year.
Now you're guns blazing,starting Molo.

(01:00:45):
I think we're probably in 2018at this point.
Talk about where the businesswas at that point when you
jumped back in Obviously Mattand Stefan and Will kind of
bridging the gap there for ayear and getting things off the
ground, with you sitting atTELOS, and then you jump back in
, bring us up to speed on whatthat was like and then,
ultimately, how you all grew thebusiness to where it became.

Andrew Silver (01:01:11):
Things were so chaotic.
I joined as employee 25,technically, april 25th 2018.
I was the 25th employee.
Was I the 25th or am Iconfusing that?
No, I think I was the 25themployee.
Sam Rivera and I started at thesame time, I thought, or maybe
Kirsten Woolley and I, one ofthe accounting people and I
started at the same time.
In any case, the business wasbeing run out of a

(01:01:35):
2,000-square-foot I guess whatprobably used to be an apartment
, maybe.
I guess maybe it was an officespace.
It was pretty run down andthere were just desks jammed in
everywhere.
The accounting group was in acloset.
What was once a conference roomwas now basically more desks

(01:01:57):
and it was jammed in there.
It was so fun.
What was once a conference roomwas now basically more desks
and it was jammed in there.
It was so fun.
I mean, everything was exactlyhow it should be for a startup.
Like there was rarely toiletpaper in the bathroom, like I
mean just I don't know, that'snot a good example of how it
should be at a startup, but Ijust mean like things were very

(01:02:18):
disorganized and very much.
Just figure it out.
I don't know why I remember andfeel like bringing this up, but
I remember when we were only afew months in, before I had even
gotten there and this just kindof speaks to the chaotic nature
of how the business was foundedor started I remember there was
a day where I went on LinkedInand all of a sudden I saw like
three big titles for people atMolo where, like people just and

(01:02:44):
I call Vogrich I'm like whatthe hell is going on over there?
Did you just give these peoplethese vice president titles?
He's like what?
I don't know what you'retalking about and people are
just taking titles forthemselves.
That's kind of where thingswere in the first year of the
business.
I'm like who is this personputting VP of this and that?
And he's like we'll fix it.

(01:03:05):
So I got there and there were 25of us and you know what was
interesting?
Matt had been running thebusiness.
Matt was the de facto CEO orthe president.
I don't even know if people had.
I don't think he had givenhimself a title yet At that
point, despite other peoplegiving themselves titles.

(01:03:27):
He had not.
And and it was hard for us tofigure out how to navigate that
because, again, for a year heran the business, he was the
point man on all communication.
And I came in and I think partof me was like a little
disgruntled because it was likewhere I probably should have

(01:03:49):
just been grateful, but I waspretty much a mess.
But I just think I was likethis is supposed to be, like,
you know, I was starting thisbusiness and I couldn't.
So I you know none of thesepeople knew that I had been the
original idea behind the thing.
And so I came in and now I wasgoing to be the CEO and Matt's
like.
We've hired Andrew as the CEO ofthe business and I start

(01:04:10):
handling all communication andMatt was really good about
letting me fill in the placesthat I was good at filling in
and I think he had to take a bitof a not step back.
But he had to be very malleableand he was extremely malleable,

(01:04:32):
and what I mean by that is hehad to be be able to shape,
shift into whatever role thebusiness needed.
And you know it can't be easyto essentially be the CEO of a
company for a year that you pouryour life, your heart and soul
into where you're putting.
He was putting 17 to 18 hourdays in at this time.
I mean he had just gottenmarried too, but like he had to

(01:04:53):
because nobody else could I mean, nobody else was going to do
the accounting for him, um,things like that.
And so it's got to be hard to belike the face or not the face,
but like the point man runningthe show, and then one day you
just kind of take a step back,like, okay, he's going to do
that now.
Um, but we, we found ourfooting and and we were a and we

(01:05:16):
were a great team.
I mean he was such a good yinto my yang, such an excellent
operator.
I think far and away he was themost important piece of the
Molo puzzle and I became theface of the business.
And I don't know if that wasright or wrong.
I think it helped in some, someregard, because my connections

(01:05:39):
to Jeff and people saw the nameand thought, okay, this guy
probably came from a good, goodbackstory, that like he knows
what he's doing, so maybe thatgot us more opportunity.
Yeah, I'll tell you what as youpause.

I mean I was always super impressed with matt
, like and honestly I I may nothave told many people this I,
when I came in 2020 um, or I wasthinking about coming in the
beginning of 2020 I obviouslyknew you and folks like chris
agnew and others that werealready there.
I had a lot of respect for thatgroup and liked working with

(01:06:19):
them because of our history atCoyote.
And then I met Matt and I waslike I was blown away by Matt At
that point.
He was like he came from IBM,he had no freight background and
the things that he was sayingand talking about were at a
level that shouldn't have beenfor someone who had three years
of experience in the business.
And then, when I came over, itonly got exacerbated.

(01:06:42):
From there he ran the wholebusiness to your point.
Everything ran through Matt.
You obviously played a hugerole as the leader, which I
thought and, to your point, Ithought that the dynamic there
played to people's strengths,but Matt was super impressive
coming from the outside in andthat that role grew

(01:07:03):
exponentially in 2020, 2021, aswe ultimately sold the business
to our best.

I mean Matt was everywhere and again, just like
to your point just was really,really impressive from an
operating standpoint and as aleader yeah, I mean, I
appreciate you saying thatbecause, like I always feel like
I don't do a good enough job ofmaking sure the world knows,
like, how important he was tothat story, to my story, to my

(01:07:29):
success, to the business'ssuccess, like it just none of it
happens without him.
Like I really think if I nevercame to molo, it still becomes a
multi-hundred million dollardeal, million, multi-hundred
million dollar brokerage.
And I think you could say thatabout pretty much everyone else

(01:07:50):
except for matt.
I don't, I don't know that weget there without him.
I really don't.
And and part of me, I think,because I became such the face
of it, I always carried thisalmost guilt that it's like he
should be the face.
He was so much more importantthan I was, I think.

I know it's interesting.
These are things I thoughtabout and have thought about
during and since.
I mean I don't think it may bethat unique to businesses
interesting and these are thingsI thought about and have
thought about during and since.
I mean, I don't think it may bethat unique to to businesses
where you have a ceo that playsa certain role and that is very
externally facing and kind ofthe figurehead of the business,
but there are either one personor many people in the business

(01:08:31):
that everybody knows is or maybefolks don't know that are super
, super, super valuable andbasically irreplaceable in the
business.
I would guess that that's notsuper unique, but definitely the
case here and I will say Ithink you're also discrediting
yourself a little bit.
The business needed yourpersonality and leadership

(01:08:54):
during COVID.
I came right in the middle ofit, matt.
As I mentioned, I was superimpressed with the actual
running of the business from,say, an operations standpoint,
kind of the role of what Iconsider a president or COO.
But the group rallied aroundyou and your leadership in a
time where I'll use the worduncertainty we didn't know what

(01:09:17):
was coming in the business andin life at that point.
We're in the back half of 2020into 2021 and it's shelter in
place and there's all thesecrazy things going on.
People rallied around the two ofyou, but you played a really
instrumental role in making surethat people saw the vision of
the business.
And I mean the, the momentumthat we had and just the, the

(01:09:39):
charisma that you broughtforward and kind of tying
everybody together.
I thought was really reallyimpressive.
It fired me.
I remember, after, say, youknow the all hands calls or
whatever we called them, um,where everyone would jump on a
zoom call and you, you, wouldlead.
I remember just wanting to runthrough a wall after all of them
and that was important.

(01:10:00):
And so I do think to your pointthe two of you, as the leaders
of the business, really playedoff each other well Matt
certainly more so behind thescenes than you, but it was
definitely a good duo from aleadership perspective.
At least that was myperspective.
I definitely feel that waytoday.

Thank you.
The only certainty from COVIDwas that leaders would use the
word uncertainty whilecommunicating to their teams,
which is like COVID was such aperfect example of focusing on
what you can control.
Like I mean, if that lesson, Ifeel like you can always look at
a situation and take solacefrom thinking about focusing on
what's within your control.

(01:10:37):
Like I mean, if that lesson, Ifeel like you can always look at
a situation and and take solacefrom thinking about focusing on
what's within your control.
But COVID was like the ultimatescenario, persisting over time,
where all you could do wasfocus on what was within your
control.
And you know, our, our business, we we haven't really talked
about numbers or anything butlike our business grew at such a

(01:10:58):
ridiculous rate that every year, the business was transforming
itself.
Every year, the business had toundergo some very significant
change, because it was just howwe had to scale.
If you think, like our firstyear, we started in july.
We moved our first load July5th of 2017.
In the back half of that yearso July through the end of

(01:11:21):
December of 2017, we did $5million in revenue.
In all of 2018, we did $40million.
In all of 2019, we did $130.
In all of 2020, we did $275.
And then 2021 was $625.
In all of 2020, we did 275, andthen 2021 was 625.

(01:11:47):
So the first few years it's 8X,then 3X and then 2X, and then a
little more than 2X to 50 to175, to 400 to a thousand.
You know, over a five-yearperiod.
It was really tangible becauseyou jump on the Zoom calls and
you see how many people are atthe bottom of all those calls

(01:12:08):
and it felt like every two weeksthat number would just
skyrocket and I remember seeing500 for the first time, being
like man, this is insane yeah,and you know what for me I
thought, you know, as I thoughtabout what I was good at and
what I wasn't a lot of theoperational things I couldn't be

(01:12:29):
counted on because I wasn'tconsistent enough in like the
last thing I wanted to do washold you to a kpi, wanted
nothing to do with that.
And matt, thankfully, was ableto take on all of that and so he
owned the operations of thebusiness and my job became, um,

(01:12:52):
a couple of things, but part ofit was like cultural with the
people and I made it like I madea significant effort to know
every person at molo and thatgot so hard and and I failed at
the end of it.
I mean, I was, it was.
It was.
It was either beyond what I wascapable of or beyond what I was

(01:13:13):
willing to to tackle.

That was an impossible task, but I hear you.

Yeah, but I felt like that was important.
I felt like we wanted to have Idon't, like I don't.
I used to use the word familywhen you talk about work,
culture, and I get why peopledon't anymore and and I don't
but like I didn't want us tofeel a like, a very.
I wanted us to feel like agroup of people that cared about
each other and that would go togreat lengths to support one

(01:13:45):
another, while sharing a commonmission and vision for what we
were doing together.
I think that's the best way todescribe how I felt, and I felt
like it was my job to instillthe mission and the vision in
people, however I could, and tomake them feel important however

(01:14:07):
I could, and sometimes that wasas simple as good morning.
People take for granted howvaluable not valuable, but how
easy and, I guess, meaningful itcan be.
If you're the CEO of a companyand you spend 15 minutes every
morning walking around youroffice saying hi to your team, I

(01:14:29):
think there are people thatreally appreciate that.

There absolutely are.

But I think there were, and one of my favorite
memories is from the earliestdays of Molo, my earliest days,
and our office was two and ahalf blocks from a Starbucks.
I want to say it wasn't far,but in the earliest days every
morning I would go get icedcoffee for everyone and when we

(01:14:57):
had 16 people in that office Iwould go.
Sometimes I'd bring vogers orother people and it's you'd be
surprised how much of a workoutand how hard it is on your
wrists to be carrying two of thefour cup holders with full cold
brews.
Even just for two blocks is asignificant workout on your

(01:15:19):
wrists.
But there was something Ireally just enjoyed about
bringing people coffee in themorning and coming back to the
office and like who wants to icecoffee and, and you know,
giving it to whoever wanted it.
Like it's a small thing butit's something that I took, it
gave, it filled my cup, it gaveme a lot of joy.
Um, and I also think again, Ithink it, it, it, it.

(01:15:43):
I think it's easier for someoneto work for, I think it's easier
for people to work for someonewhen they know they care about
them, and so, like, I tried tomake sure that our team knew
that I did because, like I, youknow I just there were certain
things I knew I was not going tobe great at that some CEOs are
great at and you know I wasn'tgoing to be the guy spending

(01:16:05):
hours and hours every day inExcel, but I could.
I could get in front of people,whether it was our employees,
our teammates or our customers,and make sure that they
understood exactly how we weretrying to build our business and
understand what are the thingsthat they need for our business
to be better.
I felt like it was important togive our people a space where

(01:16:27):
they could talk to myselfdirectly and articulate issues
they had with the business,issues they had with our
philosophy Didn't mean that Ialways would agree with them,
but I felt like giving them thespace to communicate those,
those feelings, was, I don'tknow, part of part of what I I
think I did well.

There's no doubt.
There's no doubt.
Uh, if there's any sort of uhhesitation there, you shouldn't
have it.
I mean, I think you, that wasyour, that was your superpower.
And then I think you did areally great job surrounding
yourself, with the people to runthe business.
That perhaps were the placesthat were not your strengths
right, and you obviouslymentioned Matt, and there were a

(01:17:10):
multitude of other people thatyou brought on board over time
to play those different roles toultimately grow the business
and manage the crazy growth thatwas going on during those years
, because you have to have theright people and leadership in
place outside of the very top.
Say, with you and Matt, yougrow from 100 to 200 employees.

(01:17:32):
There are a lot of managementof people and change that has to
happen to be able tosuccessfully manage through that
.
I think you guys did anunbelievable job doing that and
putting the right people inplace to be able to accomplish
that.
I remember when I came on andyou and I were talking in the
middle of 2020, as I mentioned,I joined August 1st of that year

(01:17:56):
I mean you were verytransparent and open to me.
You were like we're on a rocketship.
We need to grow.
We need capital to grow.
I don't want you to getblindsided by that, so I just
need you to know that, if andwhen you come, we're going to do
a cap raise likely privateequity.
There's a potential for us tosell the business, but we're

(01:18:20):
really motivated to keep thisthing going and grow it.
So that's like the back half of2020.
We sold the business at the endof 2021.
So what was the transition likefrom your seat?
And again, you were reallytransparent, not only with us as
leaders in the business, butwith the entire employee base,

(01:18:41):
as you're thinking about raisingcapital and growing the
business.
What was that like in 2020 and2021, amidst the chaos as we
transitioned to ultimatelyselling the business to ArcFest
in 2021?

Yeah, what was that like?
It was extremely stressful,I'll tell you that, and I was
not in a place where I wasdealing with it.
Well, I started drinking a lotthrough that process, which was
a big mistake.
I just did not deal with theemotional stress well, and we

(01:19:24):
spent two years talking tointerested parties about
acquiring our business and therewere two companies before
ArcBest that had come sniffingaround and both of them we
thought about, and this wasbefore we were going to do a
capital raise.
This was before we were eventhinking about private equity.
This was kind of out of theblue.

(01:19:44):
These companies were interestedin buying someone and and our
name somehow got put in front ofthem and they reached out and
the philosophy was kind of likewe might as well hear what they
have to say and see if we cancome up with a deal that makes
sense for us in terms ofallowing us to continue to build
what we want to build, becausethere was zero part of us that

(01:20:05):
wanted to be done.
That was the only certainty waswe wanted to continue to build
our business.
Just the same question of likehow can you make a successful
brokerage today, or is thereroom for successful brokerages
who don't have unique resources,and that was a question I
constantly wrestled with.

(01:20:26):
You know, as part of being thehead, I was the de facto head of
sales and there were people whomanaged the sales team and had
titles.
They managed and led the salesteam, but it all kind of made
its way to me if it hadsomething to do with selling to
customers, and so I spent a lotof time mentally thinking about

(01:20:50):
how do we differentiate?
Because service is importantand I believe to an extent it is
a differentiator, but it's notenough of a differentiator to
take us where we want to go, andso I think the first time I got
a call was in June of 2020.

(01:21:10):
No, this was the second time.
The first time was shorter.
I mean, there was a company thatwas really good at LTL that
looked at it.
There was a company that wasreally good at LTL that looked
at us.
There was a company that wasreally good at Intermodal, and
that was in June of 2020 whenthat one called, and we spent a
year talking to them and it justI never felt safe enough with

(01:21:33):
what the future was going tolook like and it never felt like
the deal was put into aposition where we could could
really win and build what wewanted to.
And so I think, as that dealdied down and we realized we
weren't going to do it, that'swhen we said let's, let's go
raise some money, let's just,let's just do it on our own and

(01:21:56):
let's raise some capital and putus in a position to get to
multi-billion.
And so we hired JP Morgan and,through connection, someone knew
someone and they had done bigdeals like this and Matt and I
had no idea what the hell wewere doing, but kind of just let

(01:22:17):
them take the lead.
And we spent a few monthspreparing to go to market,
essentially creating a sim thatwould essentially have all of
our information, essentially apackage of the business to
propose to people so they couldtake a look and see if it was
something of interest to them.

(01:22:37):
And that was when we gotintroduced to Danny Lowe at
ArcBest and he came in.
I remember he came to ouroffice and actually the first
time we talked I was giving himthe names of other brokerages
they could consider buying,because they didn't want to buy
one at our size.

(01:22:58):
There were so many things thatwe thought this would never work
, because we were too big or toosmall.
Well, two separate things.
One, we were too big for whatthey were initially planning to
buy and two, there were a lot ofthings that on the surface that

(01:23:18):
he was like this would neverwork.
He's like you need freedom andwe have a history of kind of
smothering companies when we buythem, so he's like there's a
lot of signs that would say thisshouldn't work.
And we talked about it and overtime I just really got to like
Danny Matt really got to likeDanny Matt really got to like
Danny and we liked the rest ofthe team that we met, judy and

(01:23:41):
the group there, and it lookedlike a deal that could make a
lot of sense.
Again, I'm looking fordifferentiators.
I'm looking for ways to cementour place and put us in a
position where we can always win.
And ArcBest has this massiveasset-based LTL network through
ABF that you know, the big LTLplayers outside of Yellow, like

(01:24:06):
they all seem to have a footingthat would be hard to lose, like
a strong foothold in the spacethat will allow them to compete
for decades and beyond.
And so my thought was theseguys have thousands of LTL

(01:24:26):
customers.
We have like 400 truckloadcustomers and we don't have a
very robust sales team.
We never built out a largesales team.
We always were pretty small onthe sales side and pretty
enterprise-oriented in terms ofthe business we moved and pretty
enterprise-oriented in terms ofthe business we moved, and so
it just seemed like a perfectfit and my thought was these
guys can introduce us to thethousands of companies that they

(01:24:47):
have as customers and we'llshow them how we do business,
and this thing will grow to themoon.

I'm going to pivot for a second.
I'm going to pivot for a secondbecause you're sparking some
questions from my mind here.
We kind of went down thisthread a minute ago or a few
minutes ago and I'll bring itback.
Do you think now, becauseyou're saying you're looking for
a differentiator, because youwere concerned that just sheer

(01:25:14):
grit wasn't going to get you towhere you wanted to go?
Do you were concerned that justsheer grit wasn't going to get
you to where you wanted to go?
Do you still feel that way?
Because you said, thinkingabout into the future and kind
of the landscape of brokeragetoday, do you feel like you need
that type of differentiator tobe successful, or can you just
kind of run through a wall toget where you need to go, kind

(01:25:36):
of the way Molo was the?

first few years, the way you described Molo.
It's such a hard question toanswer.
I think the willingness to runthrough a wall can get you
pretty far in anything.
I mean it's just the idea thatyou'll never quit and you'll do
whatever it takes.
So few people really have that.
People think they have that,but I think it's rarer.

(01:26:01):
It's more rare than than thanyou might think on the surface,
and so I do think it's veryvaluable.
But the industry is changing man.
It's changing fast, and I'm sofascinated and I don't know if I
mean the word fascinated in thesense that I'm like awestruck
that I think it's amazingbecause I'm not there, but I'm

(01:26:22):
just fascinated by the rise ofthese AI bots and agents that
are going to start talking toeverybody.
And I'm not fascinated againfrom a place of thinking like
it's incredible.
I'm not fascinated again from aplace of thinking it's
incredible.
I'm more fascinated, curious,and I could see it crashing and
burning, and I could see itbecoming the cornerstone or a

(01:26:46):
big part of how every brokerageruns their business, how org
charts change and how staffingchanges as these bots get better
and better.
And is there a world where theyreplace the need to run through

(01:27:08):
a wall.
I don't know and I'm supercurious about it, but I think
the jury is still out there andit's it's going to be
interesting to see that play outin the next I don't know 12, 24
months, because you know, if itworks, every broker will have

(01:27:31):
it and companies will arguablybecome less differentiated.
Right, because if currently,100% of your phone calls to
anyone are handled by people,then it's very different the way
that your people are talkingversus someone else's people.
That's just natural.
But if everybody hires thehappy robots, the clone ops, the

(01:27:57):
fleet works I shouldn't havenamed companies Now I feel like
I got to name all of them.
Whatever, if everybody hiresthese guys and they actually get
to a level of quality andproductivity that they can
handle 90% of the phone calls,how different are any of the
brokers really going to be?

People are going to have to evolve.
Yeah, it's alwaysdifferentiated, for sure.

The organizations all share the collective data
to improve the bot forthemselves and for the group.
The answer that the AI bot guyswill say is well, the
differentiator is going to behow you instruct the bot and how
you SOP the bot, and whoeverhas the best SOP is going to win

(01:28:45):
.
How different are they?
I mean, how much?
How much differentiation areyou going to get on your SOPs?
I mean, like you know, itshouldn't be that hard for a
brokerage that reallyunderstands brokerage or a
leader who understands brokerage, to create the right SOPs to
execute effectively.
So that's what I'm curiousabout, because it's hard for me

(01:29:07):
to answer the question and I'mso hopeful that I'm in a
position to play the game.
I miss playing the game.
I'm sad I'm not in the gamewhile everyone else is in
dealing with this and part ofthis potential technological
revolution in our space.

but my time will come, I'm sure so, under the
assumption that you know we, weget there.
You've mentioned 18 months, notthat you're counting, but does
does the evolution or thistechnical revolution, does that
make you more or less excited tothen ultimately play that role
in the future?
Because it's A, it's anopportunity to create something

(01:29:47):
new that you've kind of beenitching for, that you talked
about, or?
B, everyone's going to be sosimilar that it doesn't allow me
to differentiate the way I wantto.
How are you thinking about thatif you're looking down the road
?
18, 20 months from now?

So it's hard to do that.
It's hard to think about it 18to 20 months down the road,
because if you just think aboutwhere these AI agent companies
were 18 months ago, they didn'texist, yeah.
So it almost feels like you'replaying the wrong game by trying
to play it 18 months in advance, because you just don't know
who the players are, thecharacters, the rules, like any

(01:30:24):
of it.
But in general, I think that Ithink that why I would do it
again, regardless, is because Ithink I can get an edge against,
frankly, the leaders of theother brokerages, and I think

(01:30:50):
that edge comes from I lean intothe customer more than most is
my perspective.
It could be wrong, but I thinkthat I think about the customer
in a different way than a lot ofother companies do, especially
because I don't only think thecustomer is the person who pays
the bills.
I think the customer includesthe employee base.

(01:31:13):
I think the customer certainlyincludes the driver base and the
customer certainly includes theemployee base.
I think the customer certainlyincludes the driver base and the
customer certainly includes theshipper.
But I think that at Molo, theproof is in the pudding that we
had a recipe that worked in alot of ways and applying those
same principles should if theplaying field is otherwise

(01:31:38):
evened by technology.
I think we can win on kind ofthe rules we create for our own
game it's funny because I meantto say this earlier.

Uh, it's on the same idea.
I remember sitting with you andMatt in early 2020, as I was
kind of deciding what I wantedto do, and I asked you two the
question like what is thedifferentiator of Molo?
And you turned to Matt and saidI knew he was going to ask that
question.
I told you he was going to askthat question and you came back

(01:32:12):
to me and said do we really needone?
Like I think we're proving thatwe don't necessarily need one.
We can just out, grit out, runeverybody and if we do what we
say we're going to do, we willgrow.
I used to think that we neededsome special sauce or
differentiator.
I don't feel that way anymoreand I remember you saying that

(01:32:33):
to me with Matt in the room, andthis again is the first half of
2020.
You saying that to me with Mattin the room, and this again is
the first half of 2020.
And that was part of the reasonthat I ended up joining.
I was like, okay, you answeredhonestly and I can get behind
that and I do agree that or didagree at the time and still do
that effort and commitment andjust fundamentals can get you to

(01:32:55):
a very large number or acertain place in the business.
So I certainly felt that waythen, and the business and the
industry and business in generalis evolving, with certainly the
way you described it, with allthese different technologies and
AI.
But I also agree to your pointthat commitment and grit and

(01:33:17):
work ethic are as important asever, despite all those other
components yeah, I mean, I'mwith you, I think it.

You know, if if I can just simplify it as much as
possible I had this thoughtthat was essentially if.
If we just make our customerhappy today, they're going to
give us more freight.
If I can deliver 10 loads wellfor a customer the way they want
me to, I'm in a pretty goodposition to ask for the 11th

(01:33:49):
load.
And we created so much of ourbusiness strategy around such a
simple concept, which was justto make the customer happy.
And I think when you kind ofuse that philosophy it clears
out a lot of the nonsense andyou don't find yourself making

(01:34:13):
decisions trying to save a buckor two here or there.
If it, if it got in the way ofthe execution for the customer,
you create more pressure foryourself because you have to be
better at organizing yourselfinternally and executing
internally so that you can runat a profitable numbers.
But I think it was easier fromthe concept of like.

(01:34:36):
We just were super focused onmaking sure the customer was
happy and in doing so it wasnever a question of if we were
going to grow.
It was just going to like werewe going to grow with the right
customers with the right freightin a way that allowed us to
make money.
Those were the.
Those were the questions thatwe had to get really good at
answering.

Do you feel like you did or we did?

I think we did.
I can only speak until the endof my tenure, which was March
9th 2023.
23 um and I think we, I thinkwe did.
You know, I, I think we ranfatter than we needed to, I
think we were bloated at times,um, and like, I don't think we
were as efficient as we maybecould have been, but I think we

(01:35:27):
did execute on those things, uh,in a way that that I was happy
with.
I mean, it's hard because you,because the industry is so
cyclical, but at the top, wewere performing better than 99%
of our competition, with growthand profitability, and I got

(01:35:48):
fired before we left the top, soI can't speak for the bottom.

I mean look, it wasn't specific to freight
brokerage, I think there werethe hiring practices and what
needed to be done in the middleof COVID, and a lot of
businesses were higher nowbecause of the business need and
we'll figure it out later.
So we certainly weren't alonein that category when it came to
probably over hiring, but atthe time it wasn't over hiring.

(01:36:15):
Those people were necessary tobe able to execute the business
because the opportunities flowedour way faster than we could
essentially execute them, or atleast as fast as we could.
But yeah, ultimately, whenthings calmed down, did that
mean we were bloated or had toohigh of a headcount?
Sure, but it was necessary tobe successful as the orders were

(01:36:38):
coming in in the middle ofCOVID.

Yeah, I mean, listen, there were times where
both things could be true,because we would feel bloated
and also, at the same time, feltlike we didn't ever have enough
people.
That was one of the hardestthings about building a business
in a cyclical market isespecially in COVID.
It goes up and down so fast.
I mean I remember the firstcouple weeks of COVID when our

(01:37:05):
orders had tripled.
With some customers Like Aldi,we doubled overnight.
I mean we were doing like 100and something loads a day for
them and we just did not havethe people.
We were having our marketingpeople come try to schedule
loads for us and I remember likecavalry laid off a bunch of
people and you know Dent, whoused to work there.
I'm like, can we hire like 20of these people tomorrow to help

(01:37:27):
?
And then a month later therewas no freight.
So like it was a very hardthing to plan.
You got to give so much creditto megan sweeney or savelle and
and kara kinney, because weneeded them badly.
I mean megan led our talent andcarolette hr um, and we we had
a really good supporting cast.

(01:37:48):
That, um, everybody owned theirroles so well and I, I, you
know, I think that that put usin a position to.
I mean that's more credit toVogel because he put people in a
position to own their roleswell, but it was, it was, it was
fun, it was.
It's hard to not look back andjust say it was fun.

(01:38:09):
It's stressful and at points asmiserable as I became to be
around, you know, as I navigatedstress poorly.
I think that it's we.
We took on a lot and our teamdid such an amazing job of like

(01:38:29):
getting from one day to the next.

Yeah, I mean, I remember being on multiple calls
with Matt and Chris Agnew at 10PM trying to navigate what was
going on.
And, uh, I think Chris's wife,casey, thought we had some sort
of special relationship, givenhow often I'd call him either an

(01:38:52):
odd hours in the night or ortexting just because of how much
craziness is going on and and.
But that wasn't unique to tothe few of us.
It was.
It was everybody navigating thechaos and and and really trying
to ultimately because we caredso much there, there was so much
passion and effort in thatgroup during that time.
Um, yeah, I look back on it andand and you know there are

(01:39:16):
obviously things that I wish Ihad done better.
I know you feel similarly andthen have reflected on that in
other episodes.
But I mean, man, we were, wewere running fast and genuinely
trying to do what was a best forthe business and be best for
our people, and that was neverin question.
So, even as I look back, I meanthat is certainly the forefront

(01:39:38):
of what we were all trying todo, which is easier said than
done, in the midst of a ton ofvolatility in the freight market
and a world that was navigatingCOVID, which, again, no one
knew what was coming the nextday.
So it's definitely interestingto think about as we kind of

(01:40:03):
shift a little bit from the saleto kind of what happened after.
I don't want to belabor that,but I am interested in.
You kind of touched on this alittle bit with just some of the
AI and technology advancementsthat's going on in the industry.
But what do you see from thesidelines today, although the
freight pod is instrumental inthe industry, but from the

(01:40:23):
sidelines of brokerage, where doyou see things going and what
do you see with the landscape ofthe business?
We've been calling for aturnaround in the freight rates
and the freight market for thebetter part of two and a half
years and it hasn't reallyhappened.
What do you see objectively,because you're not part of a
freight brokerage today?

I definitely think there's consolidation
coming, and by consolidation Imean I think there are a lot of
brokers on life support.
I think there are a lot ofbrokers that are tired.
I think that there are leadersthat are tired, and this has
been a very long downturn andprobably a very stressful one.

(01:41:06):
So I would not be surprised tosee a lot of acquisitions that
that otherwise would becompanies going under.
And you know, I think thebrokerage is is is going to

(01:41:31):
change in that.
You know this.
This AI technology is becomingmore abundant.
I do think, if I had to guess, Ithink this is going to replace
a lot of roles, and I don't knowfor sure.
I haven't operated a brokerageand seen this stuff in action,

(01:41:56):
but it feels like brokerages aregoing to be able to operate at
way better ratios of loads perperson.
We used to say like a fiveloads per person across your
company was a good number, andtrying to get there was the goal
.
I could easily see thatdoubling or even tripling.

(01:42:18):
If the technology works the waythat it should and it's hard
for me, not being in it, totruly understand where it's
going to go, because I need tosee the drivers interact with it
.
I need to see the customersinteract with it.
I need to see the customersinteract with it.
I need to see the employeesmanaging it, and that would make

(01:42:42):
me feel better about having areal instinct to what the future
might look like.
I don't think it takes long tofigure out once you actually see
if it works or not and how itworks.
But my guess is it will get toa place where brokerages will
not need nearly as many peopleand sales might continue to be

(01:43:05):
the most important role orbecome even more important of a
role as that plays out.
If I'm an operator who spendstheir time scheduling
appointments, I'd start lookingfor a new job or I'd start
learning new skills or movinginto a role within the company.

(01:43:25):
That I just think sales is theanswer.
But I know a lot of peopledon't want to be in sales.
A lot of people don't want tohunt and eat what they kill, but
I think that's the safest roleto be in in a brokerage in the
future.

What about industry-wide?
You mentioned the prolongeddownturn, so, thinking about it
outside of just the brokeragelens, what happens here?
We've been calling for the, forthe recovery for I don't know
the better part of 18 months,and and it hasn't come is is.

(01:44:03):
I know leaders in the industryfeel differently about it.
I'm I'm interested in youropinion.

I've never been a crystal ball guy.
I, I and I definitely didn'tthink the industry, the market,
was turning around.
I thought people were justsaying that because they wanted
it to.
Um, and you know, the tariffstuff has only made it more
challenging.
There are now people sayingthat there's going to be the
tariff bull whip because allthese ships are going to launch
from china now and I'm surethere will be a backlog from

(01:44:29):
what wasn't shipping for a fewweeks, but enough to like
categorically change marketrates for a sustained period.
I don't necessarily believethat, but I don't look at the
data close enough to have aninformed opinion.
It really is outside of anyimpact it'll have to me in the

(01:44:50):
next year and a half.
But I never was that guy.
Anyways, I didn't think it wasmy job to try to predict the
future as much as prepareourselves for whatever was
coming, regardless of if it wasgood or bad.
That's kind of back to thefocus on what's within your
control motto.

Yeah, noble answer .
So we talked about.
You mentioned the 18 monthsnumber.
So, looking at the end of nextyear, when, when your
non-compete expires, how do you?
How do you spend the next 18months?
I know the people listening atthis point.
If you're over an hour and ahalf in this episode, you're

(01:45:31):
probably a a long time freightpod listener, like like I am.
I've listened to almost everyepisode leading into this one.
I've got to get caught up.
So, outside of the FreightPod,what do?

the next 18 months look like for you.
Well, I'm hoping there's a dealthat's had or made so I don't
have to actually wait 18 months,because I really do miss
building, like really building,and I spend my time today.
I spend a little bit of time onthe podcast every week and then

(01:46:09):
it's a lot of free time.
I play a lot of pickleball.
I play pickleball at least oncea day, typically for two hours,
and as the weather warms upI'll start playing golf again.
And I try to be mindful thatthis doesn't sound like I'm
complaining, because I'm verygrateful to have the ability to

(01:46:30):
take the free time, but I misslike feeling pressure and
responsibility in building abusiness and feeling like you
have to get creative to figureout how to solve a problem or
get on someone's radar apotential customer.

(01:46:50):
And, um, there are a fewfeelings in in in the world that
I enjoy more than getting anemail response from a shipper
that I've been pursuing for sixmonths.
Seeing that email show up on myphone or in my inbox like that
is a gratifying feeling that Imiss so much and I just I want

(01:47:15):
to get back to that.
So I'll be sad if I wait 18months before I'm doing that
again.
But you know, if hopefully I'min a position where I'm doing
that sooner, we're working on it.

Got it.
Well, this is generally the asa longtime listener, this is the
point in time where you turn tothe guests and say anything
else you that we missed or youwant to add.
It's been uh, I really enjoyedthe.
You know you open it up,telling your story pre coyote
through the end of Molo, um, anyanything you wanted to add that

(01:47:52):
I missed.
I tried to navigate this asbest I could.

So I didn't have any expectations coming into
this.
I didn't know if I was tellingmy story the way we did or if
you were going to ask questionsabout who knows what.
I really came in with zeroexpectations, um, which was
freeing.
It was nice to not feel like Ihad to craft the story or be

(01:48:19):
responsible for how it went.
Do I have anything to add Aboutwhat specifically?
Maybe that's the fault in how Iasked that question.

Yeah, now you're on the other side of the table.
It's generally how you ask itto guess, at least from what
I've heard.
No, look, I'm happy to own theresponsibility.
I kind of went in prettyopen-minded here today.
Also, I wanted to see where youtook it.
I was trying to navigate thatand kind of at least let it
organically evolve theconversation and I think just

(01:48:55):
telling the story and hearingyour perspective the folks who
listen to the podcast and enjoyhearing from leaders in our
business about themselves, theway they think about the
business, their stories and thenultimately how they see the
industry and just how they'vethought about business in
general I think is kind of thetheme of the freight pod.

(01:49:16):
I wanted you to be able to playthat role today, so I think we
did that.
I'm obviously open to people'sfeedback certainly yours but I
wanted to give you anopportunity to tell that story.
I feel like we did a prettygood job of that today.

Thank you.
Yeah, no, I feel good about it.
So it's not, it will get getreleased, I'll give you that it
did not.
It did not get cut mentally byme already, so and I won't
listen to it after we finishrecording.
I can't do that.
But, um, what you know whatI'll add, I'll add something
about ryan dauby.
Ryan dauby passed away a fewdays ago.

(01:49:49):
Um, I only got to know him inthe last few years and from what
I knew of him, from how I knewhim, he was a really really good
guy and I didn't know him fromhis AFN days, from his back
haulers days.
I did interview him.

(01:50:10):
I regret how I did thatinterview in hindsight, but I
listened to some of it the othernight when I got the call that
he had passed and I was very sad, shocked, frankly, because I
had talked to him maybe fivemonths ago and he had just been

(01:50:30):
diagnosed and he was in goodspirits and it's hard to fathom
how quickly someone can be takenby cancer like that.
At least, this is the firsttime for me knowing someone well
enough that to see it happenthat like that.
But he and I got connectedthrough Kevin Nolan, a good

(01:50:54):
friend of his and Kevin's a goodfriend of mine and Kevin
actually told me that I remindedhim of him and that's probably
why he connected us.
He's like you guys are verysimilar in a lot of ways and I
saw he and I went to Bionlicksfor lunch, at my favorite burger
spot in the northern suburbs,and he was so attentive and so
interested and so curious aboutmy life and my story and and you

(01:51:16):
know how he could help me.
Um, we talked a number of timesbecause he was interested in me
partnering with him at his.
He was doing weed cannabislogistics and our best mola
wasn't allowed to do cannabisand so I thought that might be a
way around the non-compete.
So, like, technically we're notcompeting because you're not
allowed to move weed.
So, um, so I.

(01:51:37):
It's just as a result of that,he and I met a bunch of times
and he was just such a good guyin the time I spent with him.
I mean just the amount ofinterest he showed in me and you
just don't get that from peopleall the time, especially people
who've been CEOs A lot of time.

(01:52:00):
They want to tell you theirstory and they want to tell you
what they're doing, and that'sjust not what he.
He wasn't looking for me tohelp him.
Um, he was, like activelytrying to help me and, as there
was some things I was navigatingthat I wasn't dealing with,
well, and and I used him as likea mentor resource, like I just
wanted his advice and he wouldread my emails and like, look at
things that I was showing himand just took such an interest.
And so I think our industry losta really good person, and I

(01:52:23):
think it's our responsibility aspeople who have been touched by
someone like that in light oftheir passing, to kind of shine
that light on them and make surethat the world around us at
least hears one more time frompeople like us that he meant
something to us and that he wasimportant to us and that he
played a role in our life in ameaningful way.

(01:52:44):
So rest in peace to Ryan Dobbyyeah.

No, it's a good reminder.
Right, life is short and don'ttake things for granted.
So I remember listening toryan's episode, uh, of the fray
pot and be really impressed andI didn't know him personally
either, uh, but certainlyenjoyed that episode and then
also heard that I heard the newstoday um, some some stuff, uh,
flying around LinkedIn in hismemory.

(01:53:17):
So I appreciate you bringingthat up.
I kind of ended the episode ona sad note, but certainly
worthwhile to bring up because,to your point, I think the
industry lost a good person thisweek.
So thanks for mentioning that.
But no, andrew, as I mentioned,we'll kind of land things
serious.

(01:53:38):
I'm host.
I'll make the final call hereAgain.
I wanted you to be able to tellyour story and we didn't come
in with a script, we didn't havea game plan, just wanted to
hand over the mic and I thinkthat your listeners, the people
who have been along for the rideof the FreightPod, your
listeners, the people who havebeen along for the ride of the

(01:53:59):
FreightPod, will enjoy thishearing the way you think about
your story and our industry ingeneral.
So I'm glad we got to do this.
Thanks for giving me theopportunity to host and grab the
mic from you.
Maybe we'll have to do it againor talk about our business a
good ship but wanted this one tobe about you and your story as
the guest of your own show.
So hope people enjoyed it.

(01:54:19):
Freight pod listeners, thanksas always for jumping on and,
andrew, thanks for playing guesttoday.
We'll see you next week, thankyou.

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