Nate Shutes: Hello and welcome to the Bootstrapper's Guide to
Logistics, the podcast highlighting founders doing it
the way that doesn't get a lot of attention.
We're here to change that by sharing their stories and
inspiring others to take the leap.
Josh Klebanoff: It's a roller coaster ride that you might
ultimately fail.
Nate Shutes: That's when I kind of knew I was on to something.
It was very hard.
It truly is building a legacy.
Josh Klebanoff: The more life you live, the more wisdom you
have, because we are where we're supposed to be, kind of
answering the call.
Nate Shutes: Don't shoulder entrepreneurship on your own.
I'm your host, Nate Shoots.
Let's build something together from the ground up.
Hi everybody, and welcome back to the show.
Big thanks again to Jim Bramlett for sharing his story
with everybody last week.
He has a wealth of knowledge behind him in his career in
supply chain and as an entrepreneur, and I hope you all
found some value from that and maybe got a little bit more
curious about Final Mile, an area that I'm deeply passionate
about and could talk about for hours, but that's a different
podcast that I'll have to start, maybe one day, dedicated just
to that.
But today we're going to go a completely different direction
and spend some time with Josh Klebanoff, who's the co-founder
and COO of Yolk Transport.
Josh does event logistics and transportation everything from
concerts to races to drone shows and everything that you can
imagine in between and this is going to be a neat one for me
because and I think, for a lot of our listeners because we get
to experience these events as consumers, but we oftentimes
don't know what it takes to actually make all of that happen
.
So we're going to cover a lot of territory today.
But, Josh, first of all, thank you for being here and for
opening up and be willing to let us all behind the curtain.
Why don't you do a quick introduction of your background
and a little bit more about Yolk ?
Josh Klebanoff: a quick introduction of your background
and a little bit more about Yolk .
Yeah for sure.
Thanks, nate, and appreciate you welcoming me on the show.
So my name is Josh Klebanoff.
I'm the founder and COO of Yolk Transport.
We started back in 2016, but I actually landed in the logistics
space, like most, in a very strange fashion, graduated from
college in 2011 and also, like most, had no idea what to do
next, so followed some family footsteps and tried to get into
the real estate, banking, finance world, where I was
completely miserable for about 18 months.
One day said screw it, I don't know what I'm going to do next,
but it's not going to be this.
And I quit From there.
Everyone around me said what are you doing?
What are you doing?
And I said I don't know, but this is not what I want to be
doing.
So I started actually temping at a company called Tough Mudder
at the time and if the listeners aren't familiar with
that, it's an extreme mud run obstacle race.
So it was like a 12 mile, 13 mile run that we would put on
and they would do somewhere between like 30 and 60 events
throughout the year.
So I started temping there, truly just as an assistant in
the operations department had no idea about anything and it was
super nitty gritty.
Get your hands dirty, figuratively and literally right
.
So I was in the office till 9pm just ordering supplies for the
events for the first couple of months and then after that
started hitting the road like a traveling gypsy to offload
trucks and set up barricade and hang signs and open folding
tables and all of those things.
So I was there for about five years and in that time I was
maybe like employee 15 or 16.
And within that five-year time the company grew to around 100
or so employees.
I went from temp to head of supply chain and really got my
feet wet in the whole industry of both events and logistics and
said to myself I was like I kind of like this.
Said to myself it was like kind of like this.
So that's really how I kind of got my start both in the
logistics world and in the events world.
I was there for about five years and then we found out and
I met my business partner there as well.
He actually worked for me at the time and we were just like
there's got to be a better way to deal with trucking in the
event world, because every single person that works in
events and orders or needs trucking, they've got the creme
de la creme or they've got bottom of the barrel.
There was no one at all in the middle and there was no one that
got and understood events.
And for us, the tipping point on how we decided to jump ship
from there and start this was I think it was with I'm going to
say CH Robinson or TQL or something like that, and Nate,
if you feel like you need to cut that out, no, totally good,
Keep going that, and.
Nate, if you feel like you need to cut that out, no, totally
good, keep going.
But we were in Fairburn, georgia, like three hours
outside of Atlanta, and the gates opened at 6am on Saturday
and there was a merch load that had to be delivered Friday
morning so we can offload all the t-shirts, get it in the
merch tent and set up sales.
Trucks, missing, trucks, missing, trucks, missing.
My now business partner and I are standing in the field with
our phones plugged into a golf cart so that they're not dying,
and calling the 800 number for CH and saying where's the truck?
Where's the truck?
I think it was double brokered or I don't know.
Something happened.
The load finally shows up at three o'clock in the morning on
Saturday and we slept on site in a mobile mini and the truck
shows up and we opened the doors .
We're like all right, we got to hustle.
Doors are at 6am, let's load in the t-shirts, get the tent
ready.
Rory, my now partner, opens the doors and what's in the truck?
It's a truckload of olive oil.
It's not our t-shirts.
And we look at each other and we say, well, we're in deep.
You know what for this event?
Like no merch sales.
So C-level folks are not going to be happy.
One and two, we have to do something to better this
industry.
We have so many friends within this space.
They need better service.
So you know, have to prioritize .
Obviously, the first thing first is like deal with what's
going on on the ground, right?
So send the truckload of olive oil back, figure out the
warehouse where it actually is.
Neither of us have slept.
We drove two hours or three hours to Atlanta and just
started doing runs back and forth in a suburban once we
found the boxes of t-shirts to get to site.
So we ended up selling some stuff not nearly as much as we
should have, and then, once that event ended, we were like we
need to leave this company and start something.
So that's how I got my start and I would say the first five
years, really the first two, three years I had no idea what I
was doing working at Tough Mudder, absolutely no clue.
But it was very much like the fake, until you make it kind of
thing and I learned on the fly and made things happen Right.
And I think both of those components in the logistics and
the events world are imperative.
You have to be able to learn from your mistakes and you have
to be able to grow and pick things up quickly, um, and you
have to make it happen right Cause logistics is not that job
where you can just send a bunch of PowerPoints around and be a
consultant type thing.
Nate Shutes: You, you, at the end of the day, you have to make
it happen, and that's where I learned how to do that and
everything was super slow paced and there wasn't a whole lot of
creativity happening and there was maybe not a lot of
adrenaline, except for maybe, when a big deal would close or
something like that.
But logistics is this unique intersection of yeah, you got to
do all the math, you have to have a good tech stack to be
able to do it well, but you also have to go out and unload the
truck and you got to be up at 3 o'clock in the morning and doing
the suburban runs.
And it's also such a physical, in-person um, oftentimes manual
thing experience and so that you , you get both parts of the.
Your head is challenged and it's intellectually demanding,
but it's also just so real world and tangible and hard work.
Josh Klebanoff: Yeah, absolutely A million percent, and I think
that's what helps me kind of get up every morning and get into
this.
Not only, like you said, it is hard work, right and, like now,
running this company for almost 10 years.
Unfortunately, I'm sitting at a keyboard and a desk all day,
pounding like a little monkey, but there's so much that happens
on the ground and I think also like that for us, proves success
and helps our clients buy in a little bit too, because we're
not just desk monkeys.
Every single person that works at our company has been on the
ground offloading trucks and knows what it's like to get a
forklift stuck in the mud and how much it sucks.
Nate Shutes: Oh cause you're doing a lot of stuff outdoors.
Josh Klebanoff: Everything is outside.
Nate Shutes: Yeah.
Josh Klebanoff: I mean, tell this all the time.
You're not just bumping docks and you're not moving widgets
from A to B.
Everything's outside, Um, and the show must go on Right.
So like if the forklift stuck in the mud, you still have to
load or offload the truck because it's got to get to the
next place or it's got to get offloaded and get set up.
So get in your phone and figure out who nearby is going to sell
you four tons of mulch to put on the ground and make it happen
.
So that's the adrenaline.
That is exciting.
But, to your point, that happens every single day.
And that's not just closing one deal in real estate where you
got to wait six weeks and sell a house or whatever it might be.
Every single day you got to buy the mulch right.
So there's always something that happens and it's fun to
think outside the box and make all that stuff happen.
Nate Shutes: Well, let's go deeper on this, then.
Let's go deeper on this then.
I love the idea of, following a concert tour, for example, that
the circus has to start at seven o'clock and you've got 30
000 people waiting for the main act to come on stage and the
show must go on.
So how do you like think through that sequence of tear
down, pack up, drive, unpack, set up, perform, repeat, and
it's all happening Like, help the novice who doesn't know
anything about that?
Like, what does it actually look like?
Josh Klebanoff: Very little sleep to start.
No, so I mean, it's all in the planning elements.
The execution is obviously incredibly important, but the
planning components are, I would say, more important, because if
you don't go through the planning pieces of making this
all happen, your execution is going to fall to complete crap.
Um, so, like you said, there's load offload, drive, show, load
offload, drive, drive, rinse and repeat.
Um, show, load offload, drive, drive, rinse and repeat.
It's not.
It sounds easy but it's not right.
So there's inventory that needs to be tracked.
You need to make sure the mileage makes sense.
There's so many different components that go into this.
And then you're acting not only as a transportation provider
but also as a consultant to your clients or the tour or the band
, whatever it might be, because they don't know or they don't
think about it, like I'm sure you see this all the time.
Logistics is one of the highest cost centers for any company,
but also oftentimes the very last thing that's ever thought
about.
So if you have Shakira that comes in as a client and says I
want to perform in Miami, and then a client and says I want to
perform in Miami and then three days later I want to perform in
LA, you're going to tell her either a that's not possible, or
you're going to spend six million dollars moving your show
from Miami to LA, or, if you want a nine day gap, that six
million dollars is going to drop down to I don don't know
600,000, right?
Because you're moving 30 truckloads instead of eight
dedicated 747s, right?
So there's so many different things in the planning component
that have to be looked at and thought through to make sure
everything works.
Sometimes money doesn't matter, and people will tell you that
until they're blue in the face, but when they get the invoice,
that narrative changes a lot.
So money does matter.
So we always want to be forward thinking, both in terms of
efficiencies, cost and how to make it as easy as possible for
everyone.
How do you break?
Nate Shutes: into the let's just stick on the music theme,
because I think most people would find a lot of interest in
that.
So you mentioned Shakira.
How do you break into the let's just stick on the music theme,
cause I think most people would be.
We'll find a lot of interest in that.
So you mentioned Shakira.
How do you even get into the professional touring logistics
space to to get a job or to get not a job to get a customer?
Josh Klebanoff: I told you that I'd have to kill you Cause I'm
creating my own.
It's a tough break.
It's.
It's pretty hard, hard so, for we've been doing this for about
10 years over the time.
Um, when we first got our start , the company that rory and I
worked at, they became our first client, um, and then all of the
vendors that serviced that race , that event also became clients
.
So we we started in a very different place than we're at
now.
We started more so like with tenting and things that happen
at small town races, and over time we really learned the
production world and we knew the production world because we
came from it.
Um, and we both have a passion for music.
So that's where we knew we wanted to be and that's where we
knew the larger jobs were.
So we started going to all of these different conferences
where these people were and you just need one shot, right.
So like you get it.
You get on well with somebody.
They give you one shot and then they give you two shots and
then they give you three shots and then you kind of scale from
there and then, once you're in with that person, that person
knows somebody who's like oh hey , I was working with these guys
Like they did a good job.
They they did what they said that they were going to do,
which is unfortunately really uncommon, um, and when they gave
us a bill, the bill was what they said it was going to be
again, which is unfortunately really uncommon.
So we just kind of snowballed from there.
We got a couple, we got a handful of one shots and they
really grew and our business also grew alongside with a lot
of our clients.
So we scaled as they scaled, but persistence, like anything,
persistence is key, likeability is key and I think for us, a
huge selling point is that we've we've been there and we get it
and we know, um, we're not calling on companies like your
regular freight shop who just wants to move a load.
For me to be like we can assimilate with these people
because we've been there, like like the story with the olive
oil, everyone maybe not olive oil, but like everyone's been in
that crappy situation, um, and we can speak to it from being on
the other side on the in the client shoes, versus some guy in
an office in Chicago who's screaming at a carrier on the
phone and it's like why is it olive oil Right?
So it's like I know what it a carrier on the phone.
It's like olive oil, right.
It's like I know what it's like on the other side.
Um, and I can lead with empathy in that, and I'm not, I'm going
to sit here and be a straight shooter Like things are going to
happen.
This is logistics.
This is not perfection.
Like we can do, we can cross our T's and dot our I's as much
as we possibly can.
Something's going to happen, yeah, and you communicate that
right, like you can't communicate.
Nobody's perfect, whether it's logistics, it's finance, it's
technology.
It's a podcast, although Nate you're pretty perfect, but
something's going to happen always, right.
So as long as we communicate that on the front end it sucks
while it's happening, but people will understand.
And then when you do the recap at the end of the year and
you're saying, you know, hey, our failure rate was one and a
half percent or whatever it is, um, they're like cool, that's
pretty good, but it sure as hell sucked in the moment.
Nate Shutes: Yeah, I'm sure when people hear what you do for a
living, they immediately go, oh, that's so cool and they get
stars in their eyes about.
You must brush shoulders with famous people occasionally and
get to be backstage and see all sorts of cool things, but I like
how you shared.
99% of what you do is the 3 am incident or, you know, a
forklift in the mud, and yet I've got to be honest, I'm still
super curious about the cool parts.
Josh Klebanoff: So you said, yeah, the cool parts are great,
right, like, it's definitely.
It's sexy.
Right Like if you work for or work at a different logistics
company and I don't know say the Gap is your biggest client
you're picking up a container of sweaters at the port and you're
rushing to get them delivered to a DC so they don't give you a
charge back.
Our people are so excited and motivated by what they do every
day because we are delivering happiness and joy to hundreds of
thousands of people every single day, directly or
indirectly, right, and that's what is sexy and cool and
exciting and keeps us going.
And that's why we want to go find four tons of mulch to put
under the forklift so that we can deliver the joy to those
people.
And it's not just us, it's not just people in the office.
We have people on the road that are traveling and making sure
stuff's going okay with our drivers, and it's also the
drivers, right?
So we are asset-based in brokerage.
Our asset-based guys know and get it, and then on the broker
side, these guys know and get it , and then on the broker side,
um, we really drive in the buy-in from drivers and carriers
, whether we're using them once or they're a common carrier for
us.
Right, like these poor guys are so used to just bumping docks
and delivering, you know, a truckload of pasta or whatever
it might be.
It's not exciting.
We kind of pride ourselves on paying our carriers and our
drivers really well and letting them know what they're doing.
Like, hey man, you're delivering a part of the stage
for Luke Combs.
And then it's like, oh my God, I love Luke Combs, that's cool,
this is great.
And they're excited.
And if something happens and they got to sit on site for five
hours, you're not dealing with, I need detention, blah, blah.
It's like they're excited because they're delivering for
luke combs and and that's their guy, they love that song they're
gonna go down the road 1100 miles and they're gonna blare
luke combs the whole way and then they're gonna tell their
kids about it.
A hundred percent and that and like.
For us that brings joy.
Yeah, cause you're making a difference in in so many
people's lives.
Nate Shutes: Have you been starstruck?
Josh Klebanoff: Yeah, any times like yes, I mean I, I don't go
to every single show, yeah, or even tons right, because the,
the phones and the computer need to be working yeah yeah, but I
will say like, when stuff comes through and and we win quotes or
we or we work on tour quotes, or whatever it is, in the
beginning it's like, oh my God, this is insane.
We just moved something for Beyonce or Dave Matthews Band or
Phish or whatever it might be.
Now you become a little jaded.
Sure, sure but there is times where you'll set back and be
like I just sent a massive quote to Post Malone, Like this is
incredible.
Um or a couple of years ago, Swedish house mafia was
headlining at Coachella and we did a ton of trucking for them,
and when we won the job, this is I don two years ago, three
years ago.
So we've been doing this for a long time.
At that point I think I played the same song on repeat on my
desk for like eight hours because I was so excited.
So there's still things that that happen.
Nate Shutes: There's absolutely well, and there's also, you said
, jaded.
The entertainment industry by itself is complicated.
It's a business and there are also creators and artists and
folks that are bringing wonderful things into existence
and sharing it with the world, and that all has to interact
economically in order for it to work.
And then you also get.
I mean, I've been fortunate to spend some time around
professional athletes in my career.
I was able to ship a fire truck to South America for Johan
Santana, who at the time was the number one pitcher in all of
Major League Baseball.
He'd won two Cy Youngs two years in a row and he had a
charity in Venezuela and I was working at CH Robinson at the
time.
We shipped that fire truck down to Venezuela.
I got to go down and spend a week at his house.
I met his family, his kids, his extended family and they had a
festival in town.
And then the year later I went back and we did it again with
supplies for a hospital, and so I got to spend a bunch of time
around famous people.
And at first you're like, oh my goodness, they're heroes,
they're flawless, they're perfect.
And then you realize over time, no, they're human beings and at
a certain point they get tired of the spotlight and they just
want to be left alone and enjoy their time with their families
and live semi-normal lives.
And shifting from being a fan of a person to being I wouldn't
go as far as to say friends, but friendly and to develop a
short-term relationship anyways, was eye-opening for me because
I thought it was something different.
And then you get up close and that was just a couple of
experiences that I had and then you realize even Beyonce, she's
working.
When she's doing a concert, she's at her job and so sure,
her job is cool, but it's also a ton of work.
And you got 20 or 30,000 people that have been saving money for
a couple of months.
Maybe it's their first concert and they're 15 years old.
Josh Klebanoff: Usually 70,000, but yeah 70,000.
Nate Shutes: Okay, I'm in Minneapolis, our biggest stadium
, maybe, I think it's 55.
Josh Klebanoff: Bank's pretty big.
How big is US Bank?
Nate Shutes: Yeah, you're right, us Bank is probably, probably.
Josh Klebanoff: I mean, I should know the answer is probably 70
000.
Yeah, like excel, we actually have a whole job loading into us
bank on saturday um so free tickets.
Nate Shutes: Do I get a hookup?
How does that work?
Josh Klebanoff: I would love to say I'm just kidding, but you
know doing this for so long.
That is the number one question that we get asked oh really
every day.
Hey, can we get tickets?
Can we get tickets?
And it's like first off.
No, like we're.
We're too far removed to get the free tickets ourselves all
the time and we never want to ask that question to yeah,
they're your customer they're a customer.
they're paying us a lot of money like I, if, if I wanted to get
the ticket, like I'll get the ticket.
Um, we, part of our company, and our culture too, is like, we
make sure everyone goes on site at least minimum once a year
during a build or during a loadout, so that they can, like,
get their hands dirty and be on and and learn and see what
happens.
Um, cause it just makes doing your job that much better.
Yeah, um, that's one side of the token.
The other side is, um, as, like a work perk, we give everybody
to free, free tickets to whatever show they want to go to
throughout the year.
Um, and when I say free, they just say, hey, I want to go to
the show, and like, if we have a relationship.
we'll ask, and if we don't, then we buy it.
Nate Shutes: But I do.
I do have to ask, though what's your favorite memory from maybe
the early days when it when you were maybe a bit more
idealistic or you got to listen to a band that meant a lot to
you or something?
Is there a moment that sticks out where it felt maybe pure or
simpler?
Josh Klebanoff: Yeah, so one of our original biggest clients
used to do a music festival in Dover, delaware, and within the
first year we were on had, like these, all access VIP tickets
Myself and my partner at the time.
It was a little, the company was literally just the two of us
and it was very much like, like I said before, fake it till you
make it, and we sounded a lot bigger than we were, but it was
truly just the two of us.
We had an amazing time on site.
I saw Chance the Rapper and it was like the coolest thing ever
because it was like I was involved with this.
Then drove back home at the time, the company was based in
New York city.
We're not anymore.
We drove back home to New York and then two days later, during
load out, get this email and it was like hey, chance needs to
move his motorcycle from chicago to la.
Um, can you guys do this?
It was like absolutely like I am.
I'm so high right now, um on life like this is the coolest
thing ever, um, and things like that happen all the time, but
like this was in the early days, I feel like it was one of the
first like really cool things that we did and it was coming
off of like being at this festival that we really helped
put on Um and that like all.
There's a lot of moments like that, but I feel like that's one
that I'll I'll probably always remember.
Nate Shutes: So how do you hold on to?
Now you're 10 years into your entrepreneurial journey.
You have You've learned a lot of operational lessons.
You've learned, I'm sure, accounting and finance
differently than you did in the beginning.
You've learned people, management and at times it can,
for some, start to feel like a different kind of hamster wheel,
almost Like some people complain about their job and
their career and stuff.
Well, for entrepreneurs, it can reach that same point.
They just can't talk about it because that's their, and you
can't just like, hey, I'm going to change jobs and go do
something different.
No, you are married to this, and so that's why I'm leaning in
a little bit more on your 10 years in.
How do you stay disciplined, how do you stay connected to
your purpose of finding the impact that you have on people,
going to a concert and being able to say, hey, I played a
small part in that.
How do you not stay cynical or anything like that, as just as
an entrepreneur, it's really it's a good question.
Josh Klebanoff: It's really really hard because you can get
jaded really easily.
It's really tough.
So, and there's so many days I'll wake up and sit down at my
desk and be like well, another day of going to battle.
Right, got 300 emails to deal with.
I've got this P&L explosion.
My accountant's screaming at me for this.
This load got lost.
We owe $15,000 for whatever mistake.
This customer hasn't paid their bill in 90 days.
There's a trillion things.
It sounds goofy, but getting up and walking and getting exercise
for me is so important and so helpful in keeping a fresh mind.
My business partner and I have an incredible relationship.
We talk all day, every day, and hardly ever disagree on things
or fight, which is super refreshing, and we are truly
each other's therapists to kind of get through the day, the week
, the month, which is incredible .
We're both really fortunate to have each other.
I don't think that I can do this completely on my own, and
the other thing is go to site every now and then we're loading
in for F1 right now in Miami, and on Tuesday of this week I
went up, shook a couple hands, said hi, got a little tour of
what we brought in and what they're building and you leave
and you're excited and you remember why you did it.
It's very hard to remember.
While you're head down in a spreadsheet or on the phone all
day or leading a team meeting or , like you said, an accounting
problem, an HR problem, you know this person on your team
doesn't get along with this person on your team and you got
to deal with that.
So, listen, those are things about running a business that
just are inevitable.
They have to happen.
But to have the ability to both have a business partner who you
can trust and respect and talk to all the time candidly
incredibly helpful.
And to force yourself to get away and to get on job sites
every now and then and meet with clients also super helpful.
And it gives you that reminder of why you do what you do.
We also now have two warehouses, so to get into our shops and to
see everything that's there, it's like it makes you feel so
much more involved.
Like for the last year we had a massive Lollapalooza sign in
our warehouse in Nashville and every time I'd get up and pace
in between meetings throughout the warehouse.
It's like you just kind of take a step back and you think, like
this is really cool.
Like, what we're doing is really cool.
Um, like there's there's massive Lollapalooza sign on a rack and
then, right next to that, I've got 25 road cases with red hot
chili pepper stickers on them, because for the red hot chili
peppers, um, and it allows you to take a breath, and you're
like I just I can't believe, like I have the chills, like I I
can't believe that this is what's happened.
Um, it's my career.
It's really cool.
Um, but to your point, like taking a step back and getting
away from, like the accounting and the HR and the whatever
mumbo jumbo administrative thing is going on, and to remember
the, that kind of stuff, um is, is is cool and exciting, and
that's that's what keeps me going.
Nate Shutes: I think that's what keeps me going to it in sharing
stories is you're talking about exercise and walking and,
physically, how you take care of yourself.
You've got a co-founder and somebody that you can talk with
to deal with some of the emotional and psychological
challenges of entrepreneurship.
You're not doing it alone, and then you're also connecting that
back to something bigger than yourself.
You've got a version of purpose that works for you, that can be
your kind of reserve fuel tank when the primary one drains 100%
, and so that is a combination, for I don't want to say like
success, but it's a combination for longevity.
10 years is a long time to do anything.
Josh Klebanoff: Longevity is important.
Um, and burnout is 100% a real thing and the two of us, um, my
partner and I have totally gotten to like those points of
physical and mental exhaustion more times that I can count.
But we also hold ourselves accountable and check each other
and when those things happen, force each other to take a trip,
go on vacation, take days off, whatever it is.
But that said, we're both such insane workaholics that we never
really put down the phone or put down your email or whatever
it might be like.
So we really do try to force ourselves, now that we're
fortunate enough to have a big enough team, that that the shop
can run, not fully without us, but without us a little bit.
Um is is immensely helpful so we can try to like reconnect in
our personal relationships, in our personal lives, and not be
fucked in 24-7, 365.
But as a founder you are, because the buck does stop with
you.
Nate Shutes: I think it's helpful for others to hear that
too.
We're talking a little bit about celebrity and the appeal
of being close to that.
Entrepreneurs get some of that too, and I'm admittedly guilty
at times of putting entrepreneurs on a pedestal, but
they're just people too.
I'm inspired and motivated by entrepreneurs myself.
Maybe that's why I get starstruck sometimes hearing
people's stories, because I find it so compelling.
But for others to of just the realities, of what it takes and
the sacrifices that it requires in order for you to get to this
point.
I often talk about inspiring other people to take that leap,
and yet that's an unfair representation sometimes of what
it's really going to be, because the stars are in their
eyes early on.
But the truth is it's going to be four times harder, it's going
to take five times longer and it's not going to go the way you
planned it to never ever, ever go the way that you planned it.
Josh Klebanoff: I can say that with complete and utter
confidence.
Um, both for the good and the bad yeah um, I had never thought
that we'd have almost 20 people working with us, a warehouse in
Vegas, a warehouse in Nashville and all of these things in a
million years.
I wouldn't have thought that Our revenues where they are.
None of these things I would have expected.
On the flip side of the token, I wouldn't have expected a
global pandemic to come through in 2020 and overnight slash our
revenue 70% and somehow still managed to hold on.
So I mean again, like as an entrepreneur, as a founder, the
buck does start with you, right.
So it's like to maintain through something like COVID and
then also be able to successfully scale, because so
many companies, as they're growing, just can't manage the
growth and explode.
Nate Shutes: So we've, over the last 10 years, experienced
complete both sides of the card and it adds a lot of gray hairs
to your head you do have quite a few gray hairs for someone your
age, I'm not gonna lie, I did notice, um, but I also don't
have any hair, and I work in logistics too, so I think we're
a good pair.
Um last kind of personal question about all of this given
where you started 10 years ago and where you are now, when do
you feel like you're at your best nowadays?
Josh Klebanoff: Yeah, like personally, professionally or
Yep, all of it.
Nate Shutes: Like where, where?
Where are you at your best?
Maybe like what, what?
What does a day look like when you are optimizing yourself and
you feel like you're in the pocket and you're dialed in and
you're having fun while doing something at a really high skill
level?
What is that?
Maybe it's mastery.
Like where do you feel like you are the most effective and
enjoying it?
Josh Klebanoff: Yeah, I think for me, so much of logistics is
kind of being a puppet master right, like you're controlling
so many different things in so many different parts of either
the world or the continent, whatever it is, um, and
ultimately like that a puppet master is, is my job right, like
I have to control all of these elements, and a lot of those
elements are things that are kind of out of your control.
But you can get them to be like 75% the way they're, 80%, the
way they're in.
The rest is like well, we'll see what happens.
Um, for me, success is driven by being able to be that puppet
master, um, and have my entire team, every driver, every
warehouse, every load in, every load out, every client, run
without me.
So build systems and processes and have everyone understand
what their role is, what they need to do to continue to
deliver the way the company wants to operate, without having
to call me every six minutes.
If I can get everyone to that level and I'm not the type of
person who would just go, hang out and go away but if I can
manage everyone from afar and make sure everyone knows their
purpose, knows what they're doing and knows how to execute,
that, for me is how I can create success and have the place run
in a way that it should be running, it's efficient, it's
communicative, it's profitable all of those key pillars.
If I can lead that and make sure all of the pieces of the
puzzle are attaching together the right way, that's I guess
you could call it like.
That's my happy place.
Nate Shutes: And that's logistics.
You just nailed it.
I mean getting all of those pieces in place and functioning
properly and working together in concert, no pun intended, is
that's part of what makes this so interesting.
I also know you've got some big news You've just opened a new
facility in Vegas.
So you've got kind of the two entertainment capitals two of
the three maybe, or I guess I don't know how many there are if
you throw in Nashville, new York and Vegas.
But what have you been doing in Vegas lately and what excites
you about the future of Yolk?
Josh Klebanoff: Yeah.
So I think I'll start with Vegas and then go to the future.
So in Vegas, we just closed on a building.
It's 15 minutes south of the strip, so we're in an awesome
location.
It's 10 acres, we have 150 trailer parking spots, all paved
, gated, secured, and almost 40,000 square feet of warehouse.
So, as we talked about right before this, like the puppet
master skills, got to a place where, like people were, people
knew what they were doing within our four walls.
So Rory and I my partner we're just like, okay, what, what's
next?
Right?
Like how can we keep this going ?
Because our day to day needs are not as high as they used to
be to run the transport side of things.
So we invested in this building and the sole purpose is to.
It's called show services and storage.
The sole purpose is to provide services to shows within the
storage space, right?
So for so long, we found a void on the West coast for trailer
parking and short-term storage.
And and if a band is in the in between a tour and they ignore
to stash their gear, they would send it all the way back to the
East coast, to where they know, and then all the way back to the
West coast and spending all this money on trucking.
So there's a ton of opportunity there um to define what the
future of entertainment logistics looks like.
We did the same thing in Nashville, on a much, much, much
smaller scale, and found success in that, and our
building is full.
Not only does it help artists and customers with a direct need
in terms of storage, but it builds a much stickier
relationship between us and them in terms of long-term transport
.
So that's what's going on in Vegas.
We'll also have plans to have a small like onsite mechanic shop
.
Any tour or any really anyone that operates in logistics knows
that equipment goes bad and equipment needs help, whether
it's the tractor, it's the trailer, it's a pallet that fell
apart, whatever it is.
So we're working to outsource an onsite mobile mechanic so he
can service everyone in the yard .
So it's a completely vertically integrated location.
So when there's a trailer in the yard and a driver comes to
hook it up, to bring it to a stadium in LA and says, oh no,
there's a tire that's blown on this trailer because the last
driver just didn't want to deal with it and dropped it and
didn't tell anybody, we can get it fixed on site instead of
having to call around, wait five hours for somebody to show up
and then all of a sudden that trailer's late.
So that's what's going on in Vegas.
As far as the future of Yoke Transport goes, for a long time
we've been on a brokerage only model.
In the last 18 months we've started investing into assets,
both on tractors and in trailers .
We have more trailers right now than we have tractors, but the
idea around that is to build our brand and to do more tours.
We're really successful in what we call the spot freight market
.
Uh, so we do a ton for heavy infrastructure, for events.
That's kind of our sweet spot.
Um, we've done a lot of touring , but with our own assets and
with our own trailers will really help us break more and
more and more into the touring market, um, to win more of those
bids.
So that's that's sort of where we're going next with with our
growth plans on the transportation side.
Nate Shutes: That is all very exciting stuff.
I mean, you, you're on your own rise to fame in this, in this
industry and in this journey, is it's just you know?
Josh Klebanoff: I don't know about that, but we're certainly
trying to make a name for ourselves, um, and, and we've
done that, we've totally done that.
Nate Shutes: What does yoke mean ?
By the way?
Josh Klebanoff: So yoke is um.
It's like a wooden plank between two ox that's carrying.
Nate Shutes: Yeah.
Josh Klebanoff: So we in our office in Nashville we have we
have a giant yoke above the door and when we started the company
in 16, we're like spitballing a million names and a million
logos, and this is where we landed and we liked it because
the two ox are connected and they're carrying something right
.
So, like yoke, what do we do?
We connect people, we connect shippers with carriers, we
connect tours with warehouse space.
So I mean, all we're doing all day is connecting people and
we're hauling stuff.
So we thought that the word yoke was a really good fit.
Nate Shutes: And brings it all together Exactly.
It's also a pretty heavy burden that you have to carry too.
Josh Klebanoff: Thanks for that you're welcome.
Nate Shutes: Um, I'd love the chance to meet your co-founder
at some point.
Uh, the the other half of the, the two horsepower yeah, a lot
of people call us burton, ernie.
Josh Klebanoff: Um, okay, tbd, which one's burton, which one's
ernie, but um, we get, we get that a lot.
So rory is kind of like we're both very personal outgoing
bubbly people but rory's the one who like very much, holds a lot
of like the strong customer relationships and really focuses
on revenue driving stuff um, and I'm the one that kind of
keeps the shop together and moving in the right direction.
Nate Shutes: So hiring numbers forecasts administration, all
the fun, all the non fun stuff for most people.
Josh Klebanoff: Yeah, all the boring stuff, but in a weird way
I like it.
Maybe that's like the original push to like try to force myself
into a finance box, but now I got a little bit of the best of
both worlds.
Finance box, but now I got a little bit of the best of both
worlds.
So I definitely wear a lot of different hats but as we
continue to scale and grow and passing the wand of those hats
to others which is really hard to do, but I'm getting better.
Nate Shutes: Well, this has been .
I knew it was going to be interesting just based on the
subject matter of what you do.
Going to be interesting just based on the subject matter of
what you do.
But you are also very interesting, josh.
You have a neat way of articulating um kind of how you
see the world.
In my opinion, and you recognize, I mean logistics is a
support function in any or.
It's not the main thing, unless it's a freight brokerage or a
trucking company than it is, but other than that, it is there to
to be the plate upon which the entree is served.
And so, on behalf of the concert attending public, I'd
like to say thank you, and on behalf of our listeners and the
other founders that I know um aspiring and active and former
um.
So thank you very much for sharing your story.
This, this is helpful to many, and I just want to let you know
that, like always, we're all rooting for you.
Josh Klebanoff: Cool.
Well, I appreciate it, Nate.
Thank you so much for having me on the show.
This is cool.
This is a great experience.
I appreciate it and looking forward to connecting more.
Nate Shutes: Right on.
Thank you, josh, take care.
Josh Klebanoff: You got it, talk to you.
Nate Shutes: Thanks for listening to another episode of
the Bootstrapper's Guide to Logistics, and a special thank
you to our sponsors and the team behind the scenes who make it
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