The Freight Pod
The Freight Pod is a deep dive into the journeys of the transportation and logistics industry’s brightest minds and innovators. The show is hosted by Andrew Silver, former founder and CEO of MoLo Solutions, one of the fastest-growing freight brokerages in the industry. His guests will be CEOs, founders, executives, and leaders from some of the most successful freight brokerages, trucking companies, manufacturers, and technology companies that support this great industry. Andrew will interview his guests with a focus on their life and how they got to where they are today, unlocking the key ingredients that helped them develop into the leaders they are now. He will also bring to light the fascinating stories that helped mold and shape his experiences.
The Freight Pod
Ep. #47: Chad Boblett, Owner-Operator of Boblett Brothers and Creator of Rate Per Mile Masters
For the last episode of 2024, we welcome our first driver to the show: Chad Boblett. He created the longstanding Rate Per Mile Masters Facebook group, which, in its 11 years, has grown to be a vibrant community of close to 37,000 owner-ops, carriers, brokers, and agents.
In this episode, we go back even further — 13 years — to how Chad got started in trucking, when a severe injury caused him to lose just about everything in his life — including his job and his house. He was living in a motel. But he still had his CDL. So with a $35,000 credit limit and a half a tank of gas, Chad bought his first truck and ran his first load. And that's how his trucking company, Boblett Brothers, was born.
In this episode, Chad joined The Freight Pod from his house, on a lake in Lexington, Kentucky, where he talked to Andrew about:
- Building community in trucking
- What he's seeing in the truck market
- His rules of engagement with brokers
- The broker rate transparency debate
- What he thinks about freight AI
- The one thing that irks him about digital brokers
***Episode brought to you by Rapido Solutions Group. I had the pleasure of working with Danny Frisco and Roberto Icaza at Coyote, as well as being a client of theirs more recently at MoLo. Their team does a great job supplying nearshore talent to brokers, carriers, and technology providers to handle any role necessary, be it customer or carrier support, back office, or tech services.***
Follow The Freight Pod and host Andrew Silver on LinkedIn.
*** This episode is brought to you by Rapido Solutions Group. I had the pleasure of working with Danny Frisco and Roberto Icaza at Coyote, as well as being a client of theirs more recently at MoLo. Their team does a great job supplying nearshore talent to brokers, carriers, and technology providers to handle any role necessary, be it customer or carrier support, back office, or tech services. Visit gorapido.com to learn more. ***
A special thanks to our additional sponsors:
- Cargado – Cargado is the first platform that connects logistics companies and trucking companies that move freight into and out of Mexico. Visit cargado.com to learn more.
- Greenscreens.ai – Greenscreens.ai is the AI-powered pricing and market intelligence tool transforming how freight brokers price freight. Visit greenscreens.ai/freightpod today!
- Metafora – Metafora is a technology consulting firm that has delivered value for over a decade to brokers, shippers, carriers, private equity firms, and freight tech companies. Check them out at metafora.net. ***
Hey listeners, before we get started today, I want to give a quick shout out and word to our sponsor, our very first sponsor, rapido Solutions Group, danny Frisco and Roberto Acasa, two longtime friends of mine, guys I've known for 10 plus years, the CEO and COO respectively, and co-founders of Rapido Solutions Group. These guys know what they're doing. I'm excited to be partnering with them to give you a little glimpse into their business. Rapido connects logistics and supply chain organizations in North America with the best near-shore talent to scale efficiently, operate on par with US-based teams and deliver superior customer service. These guys work with businesses from all sides of the industry 3PLs, carriers, logistics, software companies, whatever it may be. They'll build out a team and support whatever roles you need, whether it's customer or carrier, sales support, back office or tech services. These guys know logistics. They know people. It's what sets them apart in this industry. They're driven by an inside knowledge of how to recruit, hire and train within the industry and a passion to build better solutions for success. In the current marketing conditions, where everyone is trying to be more efficient, do more with less near shoring is the latest and greatest tactic that companies are deploying to do so, and Rapido is a tremendous solution for you. So check them out at gorapidocom and thank you again for being a sponsor to our show, a great partner. We look forward to working with you To our listeners. That's it. We look forward to working with you To our listeners. That's it. Let's get the show on the road.
Speaker 1:Welcome back to another episode of Freepod. I've got Chad Boblett on the show today. This is the first time I've had a driver on the show, an owner-operator, and not just any owner-operator. He is arguably the face of trucking for the driver community and we can get into why that is. But, chad, I had him on for two minutes and he had a lot to say and he's like wait, you haven't started recording yet. And uh, so I hit record. We're now live, chad. Welcome, how you doing doing great.
Speaker 2:Uh, here in lexton kentucky weather looks good and the ground was actually covered in snow the first thing this morning, but uh, it's all gone now.
Speaker 1:Uh, anyway, things are going great here in lexton, kentucky for those that are, uh, listening instead of watching, chad's got his background as his beautiful window, with a lot of green grass and a nice lake that he lives on. So the owner-operator world has been good to you, huh.
Speaker 2:Oh great, yes, owner-operator, and we might get lucky and see some deer run back here. That will be our only distraction. And if some geese come back here, I had this green laser, I flash at them and they fly away. So that will be the entertainment in the background if anything happens. I was doing one of these Zoom meetings one time and they liked the view so much that they said is that a picture behind your house in the background? I'm like no, it's my lake. Abraham Lincoln, wife, family, start uh was the owner of this lake actually, but really it's a. Yeah, now it's a reservoir for the, but it's a reservoir, but they have, uh, walleye fish and bass fish in there.
Speaker 1:Catfish very nice. Well, let's, let's start here. Take me back to how'd you, how'd you get into trucking to begin with? Was it something you always wanted to do, or just kind of stumbled into it?
Speaker 2:Well, my father, he wasn't very successful in trucking. He tried, he tried to buy his own truck. I seen that grew up around it and you know, back then I'm going to be my birthday is right around the corner, I'm in my 40s. But back then, happy birthday. Way back then, my dad, when I was a kid, my dad used to come home with this Older truck drivers will know this my dad would come home with what's called the truck paper the website still exists would come home with these with the what's called the truck paper the website still exists.
Speaker 2:But back then it was a, it was a real light, it was a real paper, like, like, like the, the size of a sunday paper, real thick paper with, and it just had all these classifieds of trucks, that of trucks to buy, uh and uh.
Speaker 2:And as a kid I'd go through this paper because I know my dad was in the market to buy a truck and I mean we're talking like seven years old and I'm going through this paper and I'm circling with a highlighter of these trucks that my dad should look at. And then the way I would educate myself like these are the trucks you need to buy, I went and circled through inner and. And then you know, of course, and being that young I would circle the beautiful trucks and the trucks, the big sleeper, my my dad said one day he gave me advice. It's probably the first advice he gave me that I kept with me all my life. He said, son, this really expensive beautiful truck with the nice sleeper on it, it makes the same amount of money as I make with my cab over old piece of junk truck. And I'm like, damn, that's a different way of thinking about it. I need to think it like that.
Speaker 1:You know it's a pretty valuable life lesson, right.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes. So what stuck with me and I've given that advice over and over and over to people, and people have repeated it, I'm like and my dad's the one that gave that advice for my you know, and I and I, I think if he had the tools that we have today, my dad probably would have been successful, you know, and I mean even when I started 11 years, 13 years ago, 2011, when I started in 2011,. It was hard then. I kind of envy these new guys that are getting into trucking because, man, you have so many great tools at your disposal to vet these brokers. You can shop the entire market.
Speaker 2:We didn't have that, you know. They didn't have the Internet, and the Internet was just now coming out. Dat at one time was a TV screen and a truck stop and that was the low board. Spot market was really the spot market was very feared for those guys and even when I got into running the spot market, it was um, uh, so many people said that's not how you make money in trucking is running the spot market, and I, so many people would say that that's just not the way you'd end. So who was my first partnership that I partnered with was DAT.
Speaker 1:I'm cause I was telling people I'm like this was when you were. This was when you started the rate per mile masters group.
Speaker 2:You're saying your first partnership right at the very beginning and, uh, we're hitting 11 years.
Speaker 1:11 years, my authority, 13 years, uh, and rate for mile masters, march will be 11 years and and when you started, did you start as an owner operator or you started as a company driver for, uh yeah, another company?
Speaker 2:I skipped. I skipped the whole. I'm glad you're asking that because that's a good part of my story. Yeah, I skipped the whole. It didn't make sense to me. I went from company driver I worked at and I was working as a company driver for another company, got injured, messed up my knee really bad, had to have neck surgery, knee surgery and had to live on Wait, how did that happen?
Speaker 2:Well, doing 10 years in the marine corps. Uh, I, I kind of you know it's one of those. I lost lexicity in my acl and I had a pinched nerve in my neck, so it wasn't like a one-time injury, it was like I was powering through the injury until I couldn't, until I couldn't and the doctor says you either get this fixed or it's just going to get worse. And I had. I was forced and I'm literally doing a job.
Speaker 2:Mclean is where you're driving a semi and trailer. They pay such good money because you have to offload the entire trailer by hand and you're delivering to these. You're doing like 20 stops a day, 20 stops a day and you're dropping a ramp and offloading the trailer. You've got a cooler and you've got a freezer side and you've off and dropping a ramp and offloading the trailer. You got a cooler and you got a freezer side and you got dry goods and you're going to mom and pop gas stations with a huge semi truck and trailer.
Speaker 2:What I mean? I when I look, when I like telling brokers that story, because now, if you had a quote, a load like that to the spot market, did you know if all the mcclain drivers went on strike and they said, hey, you brokers, y'all need to quote this out. I mean, looking at it, I'll probably. Even if it was a short run from lexington to cincinnati and I had 20 stops to mom and pop gas station had offloaded by hand we're talking five, maybe ten thousand dollars I mean I just wouldn't touch it. It's just that was that brutal, did it for three or four, that's because you know.
Speaker 1:You know how hard that is. Yes, because, like a broker, a broker naturally is going to think like I'll give them 50 bucks to stop, maybe another 50 bucks to unload it, but you're saying that's, that's not going to get it done right, right, yeah, very, yeah, good, well, I wouldn't, it wouldn't be for me, because I just know, I know how hard it is you know you get halfway through it you'd be telling the broker I can't do it, no more, I gotta take a break.
Speaker 2:I gotta get it. You know, I just can't. The p it's kind of reminds me of a food lion dollar, dollar store, dollar store, they, uh, they, um, uh the the warehouse and for dollar store they always send me bids for it's. It's hard for brokers to keep that uh, to keep that contract filled. I'm not I guess the warehouse is like somewhere near here, big, uh, but uh, they give it to these big brokers, big carriers, and they have a hard time keeping drivers on it, which is that's a whole lot of doing the same thing Offloading a trailer and going dollar store. Parking lots are not that big. It's just a lot of hate and discontent with that kind of work.
Speaker 1:Two, part of the reason that those challenges exist and it's hard to keep a carrier on it is as the broker. You know, I'm a broker and I'm sitting in Chicago, whether I'm at my office, like my company office, or I'm sitting at home at my desk, you know, food line or dollar store, or whoever McLean calls me and says, hey, I got this load, your driver's going to have to do a little bit of work, he's just got to bring the. Sometimes they say he's just going to bring the product to the end of the trailer or something like that, and it's not really well described how much work it really is. And then we go to someone like you and say, hey, here, this is what it is, and we pass you the little information we have and then you go and do the load and you're like dude, this is way more work than you said it was going to be. And so you're like I'm doing this once and I'm not coming back.
Speaker 1:I mean that disconnect happens a lot, I feel like in the broker carrier and it creates this kind of animosity because I feel like oftentimes and I'm a member of your group, rate Per Mile Masters, and I've seen 36,000, I think, number of people in that group brokers and carriers and I feel like there's just this in general animosity and it's because people always assume the worst and you always just assume that, like the broker might assume that the carrier is doing something wrong on purpose and the carrier assumes the broker was lying to him on purpose. I'm curious how you think about all of that and if there's a way for us to change that over time.
Speaker 2:Well, we're at about 36,000, 37,000 people back to what you're talking about.
Speaker 2:But take note in the background, this group is again 11 years old and it's extremely heavily moderated. People cannot believe that, that as being in, being a part of social media and or an influencer in social media, your goal is to build up those numbers, you know, at all costs. But I did. I did the direct opposite with that group and what I mean by that at 2,000, it stopped telling me how many people I blocked because I didn't let them in, because they didn't have a reason to be in my group, and plus, literally for 11 years, every single post, every comment that has came to that group. I've read it and I've approved it and said it was good to go. And because it's my passion, that's what I really love doing. It was good to go and because it's my passion, that's what I really love doing, and I try my best to make sure that I get rid of a whole lot of comments when the carriers are speaking, when they speak of ignorance, I guess is a good word for it.
Speaker 1:Again, this is a place.
Speaker 2:I try to create a community where this is what we're doing our networking. We want these people in here, we want the brokers in here because these are people who will save us. Like happened Tony earlier, it happened three times yesterday. The market's picking up, we're going into Christmas and we're all happy with Giddy because it's getting good. And when things like this happens, of course more problems happen. But man, we had three brokers come in, high-level brokers come in and fix some huge problems.
Speaker 1:But anyway. So… Help me understand that. So you told me before the show started recording that you noticed that the market's getting better because there's more activity in your group. There's more posting of issues, and more issues means that the brokers are getting more loads from shippers and they're going out to more carriers and issues just naturally happen. But walk me through an example of like what you mean by someone posted a problem and a big broker came. Or a broker came in and solved it like what, what happened?
Speaker 2:uh, it was a communication issue. Well, one one's a pretty big one ch robson. I like ct robson. Ct robson is a very good broker. Again, I'm not aware of the new, of the new ceo, how he will turn out, but for ct robson has a great history of doing the right thing. And uh, there was some miscommunication there between, uh, a carrier, um, a carrier was given a load from CH Robinson. The carrier has more than one truck, several trucks, and and um, but he, he had a problem with I'm just phrasing it how I remember reading it Uh, the carrier had a problem with. I mean, I'm just phrasing it how I remember reading it uh, the carrier had a problem.
Speaker 2:The carrier had a problem with one of his trucks doing the load, so he switched out another truck because he's going to commit you get, you get. The broker gave me the, the glow. The carrier, now it's my job to make it happen and he also. The carrier also told the broker this is the truck and trailer that's going to be doing it. He had to swap it out. I guess he didn't give good information to the, to the, to zh robinson, that he was doing this, uh and it, that whole, because of technology, that that and the new stuff that zh robinson, the new apps that zh robinson's using, didn't jive with what showed up at the shipper and what delivered the freight and uh, it caused it created a chaos where the broker actually ordered, ordered another truck and that truck showed up and, uh, the load wasn't there because it's already been picked up. And miscommunication, uh, entire communication dilemma between the shipper and the broker that. So see, a troublesome sends another truck but the load's already gone because that truck, that carrier uh covered it like he was supposed to. He just didn't cover it with the same truck and trailer that he was supposed to do it with. And so CH Robinson not a bad thing. Ch Robinson, if I remember, got the story correct, I think was going to try to charge him a tow noof because they had to pay out a tow noof for the other person and he didn't follow directions. Anyway, as soon as I seen it, a high level person at ct robinson said give us a call, give it, give us a load number, we're going to take care of it.
Speaker 2:And I've seen this. The history of my group, 11 years. It's my reward. Why do I do this? People will think I'm psycho, that I spend the all my time into trucking, talking on social media and have and I do the other side job that I love doing is working for like seeking alpha. You get these VCs that want that need to need information. They'll pay me to get an hour of my time. One time I did that. They paid an unbelievable amount of money and I talked to slave for an hour and then seek I think the name of it seeking alpha, seeking alpha. Uh said, and this is for a VC company back when VCs were good. And they said that same lady wants to talk to me again.
Speaker 1:I'm like oh my gosh, what am I going to say to her now? I ran out of. I gave her all the things I had Tell me. So I've seen this in your group, where a carrier has an issue and with a specific broker, and typically oftentimes it's one of a few things, it is a miscommunication from somebody or another, or it's in some cases, it's a bad apple. You know one bad app.
Speaker 1:You know ch robinson coyote all these companies have a lot of really good reps, but every now and then they have a rep who will cut a corner and do something to try to save themselves a hundred bucks and um and I've seen it before, I've actually done it. I used to go into your group to monitor my own company and part of my thought process was I want to get as close to the front lines as possible, not even just talking to my employees, but I'll go into the Facebook group, search Molo and see if there are any loads where someone's complaining about us and if so, I was personally going in and trying to resolve the issue and I think a lot of people have done that. How does that feel for you to know that you've kind of created this community? That's like helping bring brokers and carriers together in a way that I don't think has really been done before.
Speaker 2:It's why I do it. It's why I throw so much energy and passion into it. Of course I'm rewarded. That's a secondary. If you took it all away and all I had left was to go in a truck and an Internet feed, I would still be doing the same thing I'm doing now. It's my passion. I love that. And just like I spoke twice yesterday when brokers came in and saved my people and this type of thing happens more frequently when the market tightens up the way it is we all love it when it's tight like this, where you know we have just enough loads for just enough trucks, but it's the most rewarding feeling I mean when you think about the group. We'll be 11 years in March. I don't want to keep bragging about it, but but I have done this over and over and over and over and I've created that network. I mean Molo, um, I can go back to you. I'm good friends with Ramsey. You know Ramsey out of reliance partners.
Speaker 1:Uh yeah, Ronald Ramsey for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, well, uh, somebody, ronald Ramsey, stepped in one time and uh, and he said he knew you and uh, and he's like, and he's in a situation where, where, where something came up with molo and um, it goes so far back I can't. I can't remember the exact thing situation, but I just remember I mean like, well, there's a good person that knows molo that's going to help one of my people in a legit way. The thing that that I always bring to the picture is ethical. Is the broker being ethical? That's a big word. For me it means a lot. Is the broker being ethical? I mean, like a lot of these carriers come in and they make complaints you know about brokers that well, you know or performance clauses. They complain about situations with performance clauses.
Speaker 2:I like performance clauses. I want brokers to use performance clauses, because I also see when I get into debates with brokers, they always want to throw at me their problems, their arguments, and the first thing, I come at them just like I'm, just as I treat brokers and carriers exactly the same when I talk to them, even in person, and they're like, well, how come I haven't been beaten up yet? I don't know. I keep on getting threatened. It's going to happen, but I can't dodge it. Maybe I'm on, but anyway. But I say the same thing to brokers and carriers and that's the thing that I'm looking for is it being ethical performance clauses? And the thing that I preach to brokers all the time Use these performance clauses.
Speaker 2:When I was out running hard, the thing that I like doing the most was expedited freight, and I did it so much that when a broker brought something to my attention at dark 30 in the middle of the night, I know it's expedited and I would give that broker the confidence they want.
Speaker 2:If it's expedite, the broker all they care about is that load has to be on time and and I'm the type of person what, whatever dht says, the rate is no, I'm probably gonna be 2x, 3x that it's dark 30 in the middle of night and this broker needs me. I'm gonna save the day. This broker is not gonna be mad at me because of my rate and I will also give that broker the warm, fuzzy confidence feeling of telling them look, it's free. If I don't do what I tell you I'm going to do. It's free. I won't charge you now, but this is my rate, this is what you're going to have to pay to get it. So many brokers would jump all over that, and that's how I made great money. Nobody got mad at me for that.
Speaker 1:So I agree with you and when I started my career as a broker, I was actually 16. I was young and I started working at Coyote and I worked as a carrier sales rep. So my job was to work with trucking companies and you could call any carriers you wanted, unless someone already had owned them, meaning they had a relationship with them. And I could have called carriers with 50 trucks, with 100 trucks, with 10 trucks, just somewhat by luck, and then eventually on purpose, I almost only worked with owner operators and I was focused on the southeast. So most of the freight I was covering was for Coca-Cola. They were a really big customer, important customer for us at the time, and the guy running the show, pat Campbell, was like Andrew, I need you to help cover these Coke loads, make sure they're taken care of. So I focused on like Georgia and Florida and the surrounding states and I loved working with owner operators. I mean just for one, like the relationship, the ability to just you know, you get to know someone so much better versus like talking to a dispatcher and then I get 20 different drivers for 20 different loads. But it got to a point where their livelihood was kind of built around my ability to give them loads every week and the money my, the money I made was based on their ability to deliver and execute and I had some kind of simple rules.
Speaker 1:We had some simple rules with each other and I just I'm curious, I'm going to give you my rules and then I want to hear what your rules are for how you engage a broker or how you think carriers should engage a broker.
Speaker 1:But for me there were a couple of things was one was we always had to be honest, no matter what. If there were issues, that's fine, just let me know about them on the front end, don't make any crap up and we'll be OK. Two was when there are issues, we have to be reasonable. We have to understand that like things happen, but like if, if you try to hold my load hostage, you'll win, like I'll pay you what you need but it'll be the last load you ever haul for me. And three was you know I would always be available to them and you know if, if you could call me at any time, I'd give him my cell phone number and if I don't answer it's because I'm busy, but I will call you back as soon as possible. So I'm just curious, like what are some of the rules that you think you know carriers should have with brokers or brokers should have with carriers that make for a really kind of productive relationship?
Speaker 2:Well, I'm going to go back to the other two. I'm going to hit on the last one because it excites me the most, and that's the phone number, the phone number man you talk about. So many problems are solved if the broker can provide that type of communication. Everybody wants to lean toward this digital broker where you do everything online. I started this a long time ago, 2011, working with brokers. I'm still. I want to talk to you If things you know, if you go read the first review that a broker wrote about me on DAT Pete from Tadmore. He says if you want peace and not sleep at night, give it to Chad Bava. I'm only going to call you if things are bad. But what I want in return is I need that confidence that I'm going to be able to get a hold of you.
Speaker 2:I'm going to be able to get a hold of you, because you know I should be able to handle anything and everything that you give me. But this is your customer. This is your customer. I'm representing your company and I'm in front of your customer. You know I'm representing your company and I'm in front of your customer. You know I need you to be able to get hold of it. But so I mean that whole cell phone, I preach that to.
Speaker 2:I give a lot of advice to brokers, but in the group even though it's mostly made up of owner operator carriers because I know I have a pretty big following of brokers in there and I like to give them that advice it just gives so much more confidence. If I can, if I have that direct line of communication where I can talk to you, that means so much, so much to the carrier, so much and so much grief and problems go away. Whenever I can, whenever I can be able to get the broker's going to explain to me what's going on and talk to me. You know integrity, telling me straight up, oh, I would say you know, like you want, you want the driver to tell you hey, I got a blown tire or I'm not feeling good, I'm sick today.
Speaker 2:They should have told you they had a. They had a flat tire. You would you're they. They don't want you to tell you their equipment's breaking down. They would rather tell you they're not feeling good. But but so do it. It would mean more to you if you just knew that. Okay, it's a flat time.
Speaker 1:To me. It's like I want to get to a point where we have a relationship where we know we can be honest with each other, because then you know that you can trust me and I know I can trust you. One of my owner-operators, peter Achukwu, who I still have all my old numbers memorized. I call any one of them today and I'm sure they do a favor for me, just like if they called me I would do a favor for them. And we haven't worked together in 10 years, but I remember I had him come speak to my company once and he literally said he's like, the thing I appreciated most was that you would tell me you'd be honest, no matter what.
Speaker 1:And if you had a coke load that was a crappy load, like you weren't going to tell me that it was a first come, first serve. And if, like if you missed the appointment already, you weren't going to tell me that it was a first come, first serve. And if, like if you missed the appointment already, you weren't going to say it's first come, first serve, you can show up anytime You'd say we missed the appointment. You're going to sit there for a while, but I'll pay a little extra. Go sit there and please take care of it for me and like, when you can have that level of honesty, it just takes away any concern you have, like it diminishes any of the worry or risk of of like nefarious behavior. That is often the case in this industry where people just are constantly doubting each other and second guessing and not trusting.
Speaker 2:Yes, good communication. A broker, broker asking those questions and the carrier to reveal what their thoughts are goes a long ways. Too great to a good story that can. I told a broker ways A good story that I can. I told a broker once he offered me great money and I told the broker man, that's a lot of, that's really good money.
Speaker 2:I was going to Pennsylvania and I told the broker that's really good money and I said, but golly, I don't want to sit there all the way till Monday in a hot park in a truck stop parking lot waiting to get my next load. He's like but I'm giving you this much money and I was like, yeah, but I don't want to feel like I don't want to be sitting in that parking lot. And the broker said this is how creative the broker got it. He said so I found you a Holiday Inn that's got truck parking only 10 minutes away and I'll buy you that hotel all the way up till Monday If you go do my load.
Speaker 2:I'm like shit at the holiday inn indoor pool up in Pennsylvania and I just got to drive up there and you're going to give me all that money. What's the? What's the difference? Sitting here in my house. I don't have no indoor pool at my house. I'll go to the holiday in the Pennsylvania and make money going up there. I'm just that was a creative thing that a broker did for me, uh, that I just. I threw that out there because I like good communication when brokers find find a way to fix problems like that no, I like that.
Speaker 1:The, the creativity goes a long way. I mean, I've bought, I've bought, I've sent pizza to my drivers who were sitting and waiting at uh facilities before.
Speaker 1:Um, just you know things to make someone's day a little bit better. It's, it's, uh, I you know, talk to me a little bit about, like, being a truck driver and the experience of being like. What are the things that brokers don't know, and shippers too, I mean. So my community of people, the audience who will listen to this, is largely brokers and shippers and other people in our industry. You're the first driver I've had on those, so, like, like, you're really kind of the voice of trucking right now, at least for my show, and I just would like if you could kind of walk through, like, what are some of the things that, um, as brokers, as shippers, we don't know about that truck life experience? Um, that might make us more empathetic or might make us better understand why you guys ask for the things you do um, well, when the eld came out that that really the eld mandate and it's more.
Speaker 2:You know, it's in more trucks now than it ever was and it's now almost becoming the way we do things with the LD when I first started with paper logs. My background is in the Marine Corps and mission accomplishment I'm going to. Okay, I might break the rule, the law, okay, big deal, but I will. I mean, it is a big deal to me because I'm all about obeying the law. But what's first to me is my word. I'm going to follow through with my word. If I told the broker I'll be there at eight o'clock in the morning. I've got some good blogs on this. Even DAT wrote a good blog about one of these situations.
Speaker 2:But if I but back then if I told the broker I was going to do something, I just I there's, I'm going to do it. I'm that kind of person, maybe because the Marine Corps instilled that in me and I was able to and I could pull it off with paper logs. Today you've got an ELD right there screaming at you, telling you time to pull over. You're against the law, you're going to go to jail. You know it's not telling all that, but that's what you're thinking in your head, anyway. So back then, you know people like me, if we gave you the word, we could do it. Today, you've got to build up that relationship with who you're working with. They might not be able to because they need to understand their log. Are you going to really be able to do this? And they need to be able to give you a good answer. I don't understand that. Things do happen, you know, since Wait, can you explain how?
Speaker 1:how easy is it? How easy is it to to like, do that? Like, is there if, when, let's say, you've got eight hours left on your current shift, um, that that you can legally drive and I offer you a load from where you are, uh say, picking up in louisville, delivering in, uh, detroit, michigan, tomorrow? Like, are there systems that most carriers have that will do the math and say, hey, you have the available hours to make these, this happen? Or are guys kind of guessing or kind of trying to figure it out? Like, how does that work?
Speaker 2:I see a lot of issues with that. I see, and you'll see my smart remark. I sound. I don't mean to be a smart person, a smart acting person whenever I talk to these carriers, but I'm trying to tell them in a very I use that thing to shake their core, to get them to understand. But, like what you're saying, some of these guys, that's another big problem brokers and carriers have the carrier will be offered a load that they really want.
Speaker 2:Maybe it's that load that's going to take them home and it's a Friday, yeah, hell yeah, I'll get there on time, you know, because it's taking me home and you realize you're going to have, if you start doing that, it's math, me home. And uh, you realize you're gonna have, if you start doing that it's math, you know, do you? So how fast are you going to be able to travel from, from uh louisville to detroit? And you only have this amount of time to make it happen to get there in that amount?
Speaker 2:if it, um, if it you know, I came across a situation where I did a load all the way from california that was bringing me to tennessee. I live in lexington and I I did it to the broker but the and it was like man. I timed this so damn close. I should have enough time to get there and that's a long journey. I started losing time. I'm like I'm going to be an hour late. I'm going to be showing up this place on a Friday late and you know what happens when you're late you become a work in I'm like man late. Or you become a work in I'm like man.
Speaker 2:Please, I'll start telling the broker. I'll start telling the broker all the way in arizona, I think, or uh, texas, or somewhere. Uh, starts, I'm. I don't think I'm gonna make it. I still had that much ground to cover and I'm timing it and I'm jacking. I'm jacking up the speed limit. I'm like maybe I can go at seven mile per hour, maybe I can go 72, maybe I can go 73. I mean, I'm doing everything to make it happen. Anyway, to answer your question, a lot of people, all of us, all of us drivers, if you start giving us that load we're looking for and if we, you know, I think it's important for the broker to understand.
Speaker 1:There's a little risk.
Speaker 2:you're saying the broker should understand if the carrier can make it or not, without getting too personal, because the drivers don't like getting too personal. But the driver should know this, should know, am I cutting it too close? These are all the problems that's going to happen if you don't make it in time. And you know, during a rough market like this, carriers are seeing it and they see it all the time. And just like I just made the comment yesterday last night to a guy that was like, oh, the broker's wanting to charge a whole ordeal. The broker charged me this and all this other stuff and what it comes down to, he showed up late. I'm like you didn't do what the broker told you to do. And he's like, oh, and he was complaining that the broker's wanting to charge me all these things. He didn't use the word performance clause, but's a performance clause, the broker's charging this because this is what they wanted from you.
Speaker 2:And I love the idea thinning the herd. Let's get rid of the people that don't need to be here, let's get the people that think like me and let's, let's, that'll be. That'll be the. That'll be who you know, uh, who we. You know who. Who continues to make it in this industry.
Speaker 1:I like what you're saying At least what I'm hearing is we should set expectations for one another and then we should meet those expectations and if we don't, we should be comfortable with whatever the penalties are that we've agreed to. If we didn't agree to a penalty, there shouldn't be a penalty. But if, if there is a performance clause and you agree to it on the front end, then you should abide by it on the back end and I agree with that. I think that you know, I don't have a I don't. You know. I think on some orders it makes sense to say if you missed this delivery that you've agreed to, then you should be penalized. This. But my big thing is just if we've agreed to it, then we should follow it. And if I agreed that you deserve detention, if you're delayed for two hours, then you should deserve the detention or be paid the detention, and I think that the industry could use a little thinning of the herd.
Speaker 1:I mean, that's just a problem on both sides. There are brokers who are bad, there are carriers who are bad. On both sides. I mean, there are brokers who are bad, there are carriers who are bad, and you talk about, like in a slow market. It's the carriers who, you see, tend to lie a little bit more because you know they want that perfect load going back to their house, right and and you know I used to. So I used to move a lot of frozen seafood out of Londonderry, new Hampshire, and I delivered it all over the Midwest. You know Chicago, new Hampshire, and I delivered it all over the Midwest. You know Chicago, even down south of Florida, stuff like that and reefer loads out of the East Coast, like they're not easy to find any time of year.
Speaker 1:I mean, it's just, it's a hot commodity. People want to want the freight if they can get it. But London Dairy is about 45 miles from Boston and this facility closed at 3 pm and these drivers would say that they're going to be empty at 12, 1 o'clock. And then they got to drive through two, three hours of Boston traffic and they would lie in the soft market. They would say, oh, no, no, I'll be empty in the morning and I'll make it just because they know there's not that many other loads for them that they can take. On the flip, flip side, when the market's really hot, it's the brokers who start lying. It's the brokers who start saying like uh, yeah, you can pick up any time. Uh, because they've already missed the appointment code word.
Speaker 2:That's those are code words ever brought you up anytime? Oh, uh, well, uh, you've already. Uh, another code. I didn't mean to interrupt you, but another code word you're good're good. I've done this several times with brokers. I won't be able to do it. Oh, that's a good load, but I won't be able to do it Because I won't be able to show up there at three and the broker so many times, countless.
Speaker 2:Often the broker wants me bad enough. They'll say, oh, we'll get you in, we'll call the shipper and make sure you get in. That means you're going to make me a work in. I know those stories. I've been doing this too long. My dad said you're just like me, you're going to learn things the hard way, and that stuck with me. So whatever things happen to me in a bad way, I remembered I don't want to do what dad told me that you learn things the hard way. I'm going to learn it once and that's going to stick with me. I know what that shipper does. I know what those words when a broker says that, oh yeah, the money sounds good, but no, I'm not going to be working, and I immediately respond with the whole detention thing. Well, this is my detention rate if they don't. And that's the thing.
Speaker 2:Brokers come at me pretty good whenever I use, whenever I talk about detention. But it's, you know, detention. It's not. Brokers don't want to pay detention and the carrier really don't want to get paid detention. Years ago this was like the whole $50 thing after two hours. Where that rate comes from. It's like the broker really doesn't want to have to be put in a situation and the carrier doesn't want to either. But here's a little bit of a compensation to make things better. But the thing that I learned over my years of driving is to bring it up and ask the broker if you're concerned about it, because that brings out the truth in the broker. It's like I do contracts with these other companies, other groups and people, startups that I'm working with and hey, before the conversation starts, we need to be talking about what happens with the detention and that just brings out so much honesty with the broker. When you bring up detention, oh you'll be, loaded within an hour.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I can pay detention after two hours because the broker knows the shipper or the broker knows the receiver and I really you know this industry is so much as fixed with communication, like whenever you know, just throw something out there. Another story I like telling Amazon, amazon's right down the road. When Amazon got kicked off here in Lexington, I made so much money off of brokers that were doing Amazon and off of truck order not used. And the reason why I made so much money from it is because every time a broker would call me and give me an Amazon load, I did power only. That's the thing that I love talking about and that's where I made a lot of money. But whenever a broker would call me up, I got this power only at Amazon. Can you do it for us? I'm like, yes, this is my rate, but I'm also going to charge $500. And for whatever reason, I give you one hour when I show up. If they don't give me this trailer and you can't figure out the problem, I want five hundred dollars.
Speaker 2:Brokers left and right would say, yeah, I'll do it. I'll do it absolutely because they they're giving me this load. I'd show. It was just such a notorious problem that I could. I could make five hundred dollars every time. Brokers. And I told them no, we, we communicated this, we communicated this. You said you would give it to me and I, all I had to do is sit there an hour and I told the reason why I made it five hundred dollars because I knew Amazon was going to do this. They were so backwards at the very beginning. They're a whole lot more efficient now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that makes sense. Well, talk to me about, like, the rising costs of being an owner operator. It seems like every day the cost of doing business goes up and in this market you know rates have not really gone up with that. And like, what kind of advice do you give to to people that want to get into being an owner operator, start their own business, like does it still make financial sense? Or like with insurance, where it is like, talk to me just about that experience. And like how to navigate that as a potential or want to does it still make sense?
Speaker 2:if, uh, if, uh, if I woke up tomorrow and this was all I had was my shirt on my back, I would, I would be right back to where I'm at now. Uh, I would not go and drive for another company. Would I lease on to a? You asked me that question. I never finished it. But would I go lease on to another company? Probably not, because I'm um, yes, insurance is gone.
Speaker 2:That's, that's the thing that's heart knows the most is insurance has gone up. And if you know, if we go back to your about year and a half, as we're coming out of the pandemic and truck truck prices were crazy high. They couldn't get parts for trucks. That caused the trucks were sitting at mechanic shops for just simple parts. That that volvo or all, all trucks were waiting on simple parts and just simple parts. That that volvos or all trucks were waiting on simple parts and would be down for a month and two, uh, and that just caused rates to really skyrocket. Um, uh, and you know, but insurance has gone. That's been the biggest uh, and I'm working with an insurance. I'm, I work, uh, looking a whole lot of research into insurance, maybe being able to help out people with insurance in the future. But yeah, that's been. I mean, when they talk about inflation and all the rise of cost and you're talking about a whole lot of new guys that got into trucks way overpriced because there wasn't very many trucks on the market to buy, even used trucks. So they're a little bit, you know, they're in debt and you're going to see if december's looking beautiful. I love how. I love the vibes of of december. Look, I just love. I love positivity stuff. I hate looking at negative stuff.
Speaker 2:But if we go into january, february and and we still remain at this nasty two dollar average per mile, people are people the carriers will start running up until they can't pay their insurance. I see it so often. This is how bad it is. They won't eat at trucks. They won't go inside and eat at the buffet, eat at McDonald's. They'll start buying canned food and putting that in their truck and eating canned food out of their truck instead of getting a hot meal.
Speaker 2:That in their truck and eating canned food out of their truck instead of getting a hot meal. The last draw to them before they finally wrap it up. Their last load will be their last few loads will be just to get enough money so that they can rapidly send their insurance. I'll cut that ringer off. Can you believe that their last paycheck, their last they'll start knowing that they're running under profit just to make enough money to pay their insurance? Because if their insurance gets canceled, their authority gets canceled. And that's a sad truth about. When people on their last like they, got to keep up with their numbers, they got to know. They got to know what their numbers are, because that will catch up to them if they start running like that.
Speaker 1:So is it even in this? I mean it's been two years of really bad market for the owner operator, right? I mean, like, how are most drivers like surviving, or have a lot of them already gone under?
Speaker 2:a lot has gone under. A whole lot, uh, a whole lot's gone under. The people that are this season yeah well, let's put a puzzle spin to that. The guys that are still with us right now, they've there's never been that I can think of another, another time in history where this group of carriers that you have now that has made it to this point, has ever been through such torment of low rates, of having to scrap for every damn uh profit they can get.
Speaker 2:That's why I'm so. You know, I love seeing the positivity that just happened with the market. This this past week, uh, seeing those numbers the past two weeks, uh, uh, but yeah, that it's uh that these are some strong guys that are. We're here with us now. They've been through a mess.
Speaker 1:The ones that have made it through. How did they make it through? Was it they were smart enough not to spend when, in 2022, they were making money hand over fist and they said I'm going to keep this money and I know, if it's this good now, something bad is coming.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, the people that are with us there probably, uh, a majority of them is going to be seasoned guys that's been through this, that put away, put away for them, put away money for when, the winter time, when, when it gets bad, you know, uh, uh, they, um, but that might a lot of, a lot of them will put money away for three, six months so they can cover the fixed cost. You just said two years, so now you're starting to get into the seasoned guys that's been around for a long time where we're starting to put a hurt on them. Where they they might need to, they feel like they need to park their truck and go actually drive for somebody else that has a contract work and do dedicated work like that. Uh, you know, I have two different ways of making money. Uh, during the spot market you, you've been in this long enough it goes up and down, it's a roller coaster. Whenever it's down like this, I tell guys, you know, and it's the opposite of what other people say but I tell people, your best way to make it during down times like this is to work with only three brokers. Find three brokers and work with them, and work with them only and and and make that really good relationship, because once you do that with that broker, they'll continue to give you good work, uh and it all.
Speaker 2:The only thing it takes to get a good, to get a relationship started I tell us to, I tell us to carries all the time they come back to me and they say it works is to do three consecutive loads with one broker. That's all because they get wrapped around. Well, brokers don't like me because I don't speak English and that's a big part of my community and I help out a whole lot of those guys that don't speak English, that come from different countries. I don't care why you're here. My wife's Japanese. I travel outside the country all the time. If they're here driving and they're my brother, I'm going to tell you, I'm going to take care of them.
Speaker 2:But so a whole lot of them come to me, they, they, they come across situations and I have to explain to them. But, uh, uh, but if you do three consecutive loads, I tell them you know, you know what they don't have. If you just do three consecutive loads with the same broker, the same agent, you have created a relationship. Then that the fourth load, the broker's probably calling you asking you where you're at, and that's what you want. Once that happens, the relationship is created. You've got constant work. Now you just need three of those brokers that you can do that with. You know, maybe he doesn't got what you want.
Speaker 1:Well, you've got another broker that you always go to that does so the flip side of that from the brokerage. So let me just I'll put you in the mind of, as a guy who ran a brokerage that we started to get me and my buddy started like we had rules for carrier reps. You know, a carrier rep, his job or her job was to develop relationships with carriers and book as many loads as possible and at first any carriers available to anyone. So if we were on different teams, we could both call a bunch of carriers and whoever books them first books them. Once you booked them on three loads in a row, they were your carrier and that meant that nobody else could book them and you had to keep booking them over a certain number of time and that kept them in your name.
Speaker 1:But it's the same way. We're thinking about it the same way in terms of getting the relationship. And you're right. Like as soon as you got like one or two going, you wanted to get that guy on another load because that meant he was, he was your relationship and you could book him as much as you wanted put that, what you just said, in a reel and share it to every broker you know, because it uh coyote, coyote, I think, had the same type of model.
Speaker 1:I used to talk to.
Speaker 2:Don Thornton, the VP of DAT. He was old school, he's not there, no more, but he was very knowledgeable and he called what you just said. He called that the Chicago model. And I'm like, well, explain that to me. And it's exactly what you said. And I'm like, man, every single broker should operate like this. Man, every single broker should operate like this. It makes so much sense because once the carrier gets that warm, fuzzy feeling that the broker's on their side, they're working for them. I mean, I did this with CH Robinson when I was out in California. I was starting. It was rough here in Lexington, kentucky, around the Kentucky area, but California was booming and I seen it and I'm like I had a goal in my mind I want to pay off my house. And I told my wife I'm going out to California, going out to the gold, you're going to the gold rush.
Speaker 2:The gold rush. I'm chasing the gold. I'm going to go out to California and I'm not coming when I said a goal going out there and I'm going to make as much money as I can If I stay gone. My problem is when I come home I don't want to leave. So I know if I just go and stay gone I'll keep doing it. I'll run hard and I told my wife I'm going to do this until I get enough money to pay off the house and she's like okay, because we were looking at a big bill to pay off the house.
Speaker 1:How long were you out there?
Speaker 2:I think it was 15 or 16 weeks, I I cheated, though I cheated, I got really depressed. I got really depressed and homesick around, uh, thanksgiving or christmas, and I flew, I was in sacramento and I grabbed an uber I had to spare the moment, I'm like, because I couldn't get no load, and that's the time that, because I was getting too close to the holidays you know what happens near the holidays uh, and I just couldn't get nothing. And I I grabbed an uber, went to sacramento airport and flew home for the weekend, came back and, uh, my damn truck, parking in sacramento costs more than the flight, but uh, it was worth it let me go get that recharge, and I left my truck there, came back, got my truck and started doing it again.
Speaker 2:But it was so great during that time don't know what led what led me into the story, but I made so much money. Oh, back to the broker agent. I got one broker agent with CH Robinson and I made that relationship with me and I just made a ton of money with him. He just kept calling me all the time as soon as he came up with something an expedited type of load in the middle of the night, because he knew that I like running in the middle of the night and I would stay awake throughout the night and do this. And and he like, knew, knew, when my 10 hours was up, because he was calling me like you should be ready now, your time is up. Right, yeah, I'm ready. And he would he's like, he's like, and he would tell me he's like I think we can get this kind of money from this load that Amazon's offering. He's working in my favor. You know, of course he's getting a percent, but that's what you want. That's why we use brokers.
Speaker 2:It's called cheating. I was just on the conversation with someone else the other day uh, another meeting and I said I said I'm different. You know a lot of these guys. They want to work with direct shippers. So not me. Never had I've tried it a few times. I like to cheat and work with brokers because they're doing all their babysitting the shipper. I don't want to do all that stuff babysitting the shipper. Let them take their cut. As long as I'm getting what I want, I'm good. That's why I love doing the spot market it's.
Speaker 1:It's a beautiful thing when a good broker finds a good owner operator oh, it is just, and then they just make magic happen.
Speaker 1:Because, like I, I just love your story. I love hearing it and I love hearing. I don't know all the drivers I used to work with. We were like best friends. I would go down to atlanta and have dinner with them and go to their house and meet their families. And it's just once you hear that, you hear about what they're trying to do, you hear their goals. Someone tells you hey, I am driving out to california and I'm not going home to my wife until I can pay off my house. That would would motivate me, that would make me want to find you good loads. And then, when I know that I'm making money on these loads too, like I'm getting paid, you're getting paid, we're all getting paid, and you're paying off your house. Like that's magic.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh, I give a speech at Matt's every year and that's what I try to include that in every one of my speeches. It's called going the extra mile. I, I try to include that in every one of my speeches. It's called going the extra mile. I try to include that because it means that that's what got me there, that's what helped me out. How did I pay off my house? Well, I went and did stuff like that, and then, you know, it prepares you for the winter, I mean, and during rough times, during the rough times like we're in now, that means so much more. Now, what's your broker audience? I means so much more. Now. What's your broker audience?
Speaker 2:I, I do say things that your broker audience probably wouldn't, doesn't like. But when the market flips, like what? Uh? But when the market flips, uh, I and I know this because I, because brokers, will start, you know, chiming in when I say stuff like this but whenever, uh, whenever the market flips the other way, you know, getting ready to go into christmas, I start doing some crazy stuff, but, but, but, but it's all, it's all, it's all in good nature. You know like uh, and I've taught the other guys to do it, and you know, like it's, uh, it's three days before Christmas.
Speaker 2:I'll put in the comments and I wish we need a better way so that we could communicate with load boards using those comments. But I'll tell them the clients hey, it's Christmas in the comments. Hey, it's christmas. Here I am. I'll go anywhere and haul anything, but this is my five thousand dollar, ten thousand dollar, seven thousand dollar rate that you have to pay me, uh and uh, and it's drastic numbers when I do that, but I taught other people to do it and the guys that do reefer, they took up on it. And shane ferris out of missouri, he did it and and he's gotten, he's, he's had to leave Christmas and go through these loads because he's posted that in the comments.
Speaker 1:I mean, listen, it's transparent, it's honest, it's up front, it's you're setting an expectation that if someone needs a load moved over Christmas, you're happy to do it. It's just, this is the price. I would rather you do that than not put it in the notes. And then I call you and you're like, oh, it's 10 grand. And I'm like, well, I didn't need to call you because I wasn't going to pay that, but somebody is going to have to move a load. That's the beauty of this industry there's always somebody who's got to move a load and there's always somebody who can take it it's. Can you make those two match up and make that magic happen possible? There's always a way to make it work.
Speaker 2:I did a YouTube video. Go look it up sometime. It's called Doing the 3 O'Clock Hustle. You might have to include my name or you'll get some old 70s band playing music, but if you Google my name Doing the 3 O'Clock Hustle it's another. I have a fancy lady that repeat what I tell I've paid for it. It was on Fiverr. Repeat what I tell her I paid for it. It was on Fiverr. It was kind of cool. She goes into talking exactly how I talk about doing the 3 o'clock hustle. 3 o'clock hustle. You know what that is. I'm waiting until 3 o'clock. I know I'm in a market where there's more loads because I read this data. I'm in a market that's got more loads than trucks. I see all the trucks they leave. I'm the last truck sitting in the truck stop. I now post my truck. You're calling me now because I'm the only person here. I know why you're calling me. This is the three o'clock hustle. This is when the real big money's made. Uh, are you empty now? Brokers ask yeah, I mean are you empty now?
Speaker 1:that's. That's when, when the first question this is a lesson, for I guess we're going to give brokers a secret we shouldn't be giving them. But as a driver, if the first question someone asks when they call a driver is are you empty now? Nothing else matters, the price is yours, whatever you want to charge.
Speaker 2:I know this, I know this, I've lived it, I've breathed it. Oh, so have I.
Speaker 1:I've been the guy, I've been the. Are you empty now? And if the answer was yes, I was not letting you off the phone without taking my load. The price didn't matter, you know I've seen those times.
Speaker 2:Uh, I've seen those times many times. Um, man, this is, this is such a fun conversation with it. I don't get to talk to brokers that often. I think they they're intimidated, but I mean they try to talk nice, I'm a nice guy, I just I'm equal you're honest.
Speaker 1:Listen, here's the thing. Because the three o'clock hustle it's not a guarantee, it's a bet. You're making a bet on yourself and sometimes it doesn't pay off. Sometimes the phone doesn't ring and you spend the night without a load, like it's, it's it. It doesn't always work and, um, that's that, that's the game. I mean, that's that's how this works. It makes it fun?
Speaker 2:Oh it does, and I'm hard on myself when it doesn't work. I am so hard. It's only happened to me a few times. Usually I can play it out.
Speaker 2:No, dallas Texas is tricky and I've seen it in Dallas Texas once and I'm like I know, I know there's so many more loads than there are trucks. They should be giving me these rates that I'm throwing at them. And this lady calls me she has automotive parts, she has so many of these automobile parts that has to go. And I'm like, and I try to tell them right at the beginning yes, I'll do it, this is my rate. And this is like one of those situations like right now, the situation we're in now. Brokers are shocked at what carriers are going to start naming the price because they've had a long history where. Hey, why are these carriers acting like this? Because they know, because some of these guys that are following the trend, they know they're in high demand. But I had Texas, the whole world deal and the lady at 1,800, if you ain't got to load by 1,800, that's when I start.
Speaker 2:I'm going to go eat McDonald's. I'm freaking, giving up. I hate this. Get the call from the broker I talked to all that morning and oh, you call me at 6 o'clock. You really do need me now, don't you? I'm on fire. I got this. You know it's going to be fun. I'm going to go make some money and I've seen since. I can talk about situations like that over and over or over, but I did end up spending. I have. I have, you know, I maybe a handful of nights where I was too high, I was too stupid yep, listen, that's the game.
Speaker 1:So let me ask you a question um the the recent. There's a lot of talk right now about broker rate transparency, and I'm curious what your thoughts are on that whole thing. Should that be required or no, it should be required.
Speaker 2:I mean, let's stick with that one. You can ask me more about it. That is a hot topic A lot of people talking about. A lot of my carriers are so for it. I'm trying to educate them. Well, you know, look at the pros and cons of it. What are the pros and cons of it? The pro is, I guess you could say the pro is that it's good for the shipper. The shipper might like it, the consumer might like it, but why would they like it? Because it's going to lower the price. It's going to lower the price that the shipper is going to give the broker to work with.
Speaker 2:I want that broker to work with. I want that broker to make as much money as they possibly can, and that means they, because a lot of times, you brought the brokers. They work with people that need, with carriers that only use brokers for backhauls, so you're able to sometimes that's you know to be on a broker. That's good. That's a good thing, though, because if you can make a whole lot of money there with that backhaul guy, then when I come along and you have more money to give me, it's like redistribution of wealth, right? You're redistributing from those cheap guys that have dedicated customers, to those guys that run the spot market all the time, this will cut away from that. You're not going to have enough money to redistribute to people like me that run the cost spot market all the time. It's just I love Bitcoin because it's numbers. It makes sense. This makes sense to me. You know, if you give transparency like that, I mean I know I would use it to my ability to lower rates as well.
Speaker 2:There's a dedicated shipper that does plastic bottles in Nicholasville and they literally take them to Jim Beam factory that's right on the other side of town. If I knew what that, if I knew, I'd try to bid on it. I used to all the time, not anymore. I used to try to bid on that every year because I can have several trailers over there already preloaded and where they go to. I can have trailers over there. It would just be a money-making operation, especially when that's me living in Lexington.
Speaker 2:I knew what the broker was. What would I do? What would I do? Absolutely I would cut that broker out. I would say, yeah, well, this is my bid. I know what y'all are doing it for, and everybody else that wants that same shipment will do the same thing. That's, that's. That's not the game I want to play. The big money is made. Yeah, I, just I, I'm. I'm against it because I know the outcome and you know how I like to run the spot market. Uh, yeah, you know the people, people that get, people that don't know how to negotiate and they can't sell their service. They like it because it it makes everybody equal. I don't want to be equal, I'm not. I'm not just like everybody else, I'm different.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the more regulation, generally the worst things get. I mean, that's just a rule of law and I'm with you. I've thought about trying to run a brokerage with full, open books, open transparency, because I think it might be an interesting, different way to do it. But I also don't think there's anything to hide. But I also, you know, I don't think it helps. I think, like you said, I think it ultimately just drives down everybody's price. The shippers will want to pay less and when the shippers pay the brokers less, the brokers have to want to pay the carriers less.
Speaker 1:There's like not another way around it. There are not any brokers and you know there are some carriers who just won't believe this. But brokers don't make a ton of money. Like when you look at like the operating margin of a brokerage, it's low, two to three percent, it's not much more than that. So it's like you have to get really big to make, you know, a reasonable amount of money as a company. But even then as a percentage percentage it's a low number and that's just the way of trucking. It's the way of brokerage. You make it up in volume and doing a lot of work, but if we keep hammering down prices, it's. It's not good. It definitely it doesn't get better for the driver oh, I thought it was a broker.
Speaker 2:If I was a broker, uh well, even I'm going to disagree with you on that whole model that you thought, that you thought of. I'm disagreeing with that model. Brokers don't that's broke. Carriers don't need to know what you're getting paid. Look, you're doing something that they cannot do and that's why they're using you. You're handling if I go to Toyota warehouse and I pick up loads, you're probably you and a few other brokers are handling that whole entire operation of hundreds and hundreds of loads in and out of this place. I can't do that, so why would I expect to get paid the same as what you get paid? As long as I'm getting what I want, that's all that matters. I totally disagree with matters. I totally disagree with it. I'm not like the same as other people. I'm not for it.
Speaker 2:It will really hurt the brokers. Talk about hurting brokers. What I mean by that is there will be a way where we can collect If they come out with it. I don't know how it will come out, but if there's a way we can extract that information and we can pinpoint what brokers are doing what, what brokers are cheap and what brokers pay a little bit more. I think that it's going to take away my good brokers, my good agents. It's not going to get, they're not going to have the power that they had before to give me the type of money they've given me before, for a whole lot of different reasons.
Speaker 1:You know what I'm talking about. There's value in doing the hard work of finding the right people and knowing who's good and who's not, and who's honest and who's not, and I think we deserve to reap the rewards of having done years of that work. Um, but that's one of the interesting things about technology actually, so I'm going to pivot a little bit from that rule. There's there's a lot of new technology. It's not just DAT anymore and these load boards are changing. Uh, like the convoy flex port load board, the Uber load board. Um, it's just a different way for carriers to get information, to get loads, for brokers to even use those tools. I'm curious what do you think about the newest technology that's coming into the industry? What do you like, what do you dislike, what do you have issues with?
Speaker 2:I loved technology. I'm really into big technology. If you follow me on Facebook, you know that sitting over in my garage is a Cybertruck. I was the first one.
Speaker 1:I'm a Tesla guy, not a Cybertruck, but I went Tesla guy.
Speaker 2:You'll like the Cybertruck, you'll be a Cybertruck. You get one, you'll like it. It's a tank, it is a beast and I got the. Its name is the beast. Just unbelievable, unbelievable car. I love it to death. So I'm into, uh, I invest in tesla because of the technology. Um, I've done really well with that, especially today, uh, but uh, uh, technology, you know, uh, I'm just being casual talk today, the uh convoy, you know convoy, how they went out of business, that was devastating to me as much as I, you know. I'd give them a hard time around then, uh, where they needed to improve on and but I felt bad about that at that. After all that and seeing them go under because I had such high hopes for convoy and what they were doing, I was one how was?
Speaker 1:how was the technology for you, as like when you tried to use it? Was it good? Was it better than others? Was the experience of hauling for them?
Speaker 2:really good it was. It was, it was, uh, it was state of the art. They invested a lot of money in perfecting it, making it great, uh, and just to see how much money was put into it and how and and the little money they sold it for if I knew it was up for sale looks like that I would have. I would have immediately gone on the phone with every vc I know and try to buy it yeah I. Well, I just interviewed, I would have made I would go ahead.
Speaker 1:I interviewed the guy, the guy who bought it. He I released an episode with him yesterday and he said he's like it was incredible technology, the best technology in the industry, and I bought it, for there was a the price I couldn't refuse. He's like the only reason I was able to buy it is because I was the only one in a position to say yes so quickly, because he's the ceo. And he called the bank and they were like listen, just take it, for you know a very low number and most other companies would have to go to their board, get approval and all that stuff. And he's like no, I'll buy it right now. And it was done just like that and now it's back available. I mean, he's the real winner in this whole thing. Conv Convoy had to spend all the money and he got the benefit of all the great technology and now the carriers I've heard have all come back and are using the platform.
Speaker 2:That's great. They had a huge following. What's the name of that company that bought it? I forgot Flexport. Yeah, flexport. I sent him a message. I'm like man. He never responded to me. He's probably too rich to know who little old Chad is, but I love that one. I want to know about that. And the name of the guy before was Dan. That started at CEO.
Speaker 1:Dan Lewis started Convoy and then Ryan Peterson is the Flexport guy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the number five guy when they first started it. I'm still friends with him. He probably didn't make much money from it. He had a lot of high hopes. The staff, the people that work there. They put so much time and energy into building it and it was awesome. It was phenomenal.
Speaker 2:I was talking about Convoy before Convoy ever came out in blogs and the way we could do it. My first I think one of the best blogs I ever did that got a lot of attention was talking about Uber freight. Talking about Uber freight before Uber freight existed and I posted about it and you know, talk about technology. It even got published in Europe. Europe, I don't think I could read was Uber and Chad Boblett. It was all mixed up in Switzerland language or something I don't know. But but but I mean I even and because I wrote that Uber freight uh, it was auto at the time it was called auto. Uh, it was in their warehouse, their little secret warehouse. Where they were, I had trucks, that was self drive. Uh, they flew me out and had wanted me to talk. Uh, talk about, talk about, uh, my, my, my blog and and the vision of what Uber Freight would be and it was a cool place. It was like lunchtime. They're like you want a beer. They had a keg in the office and a bunch of computer guys and dogs walking around. I mean it was just a really cool setup. But I mean I was really in Convoy. I got some of the first early development of Convoy, the way the app worked. They had some really smart people I'm still friends with today. I would spend a whole day with them talking about it. They did some videos up in Portland with my truck and stuff.
Speaker 2:I really liked the platform. I loved how it attracted Again back to the language barrier. This industry has a lot of guys that doesn't speak English. Convoy made it equal for those people. I know I don't. It's very hard for me as a carrier. You know I'll probably it's very unlikely I would be able to do business with a broker that doesn't that first language isn't English. Yeah, unless they say oh, there's CH Robinson. Okay, okay, let me work with you. Let me try to make sure we understand each other. That's what I'm trying to get at. You know we need good clarity that we understand each other because of that.
Speaker 1:Communication is everything I mean. If you can't communicate, there's such a higher chance that there's going to be an issue and somebody's going to be upset because they didn't understand the expectation that was set on the front end.
Speaker 2:Yes, and Convoy made it equal for all those guys and that's what attracted a lot of their customers. There's a lot of guys, you know they come here for a Whenever someone comes here from another country. A lot of them have left everything to come here to survive and to make it and if they are given the right tools they can do it. They don't want to talk. My wife is Japanese. She speaks English. She speaks good Kentucky English with me. She speaks Kentucky English. Yeah, she uses the word. She uses the word. She uses the word that I use.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I remember at the hospital, uh, she, and when we're not the hospital, but we just gave birth, she just had a baby, and uh, and I used the word s-h-i-t. I don't want to use it and that's uh, and I would say do you take it? And my wife started using that word and she's not the kind of part japanese lady she would start using the same word. I take a. And my wife started using that word and she's not the kind of Japanese lady she would start using the same word. I'm like Megumi, you can't use that word. That's her name. Anyway, it's a funny story. But Convoy took away and I see it my wife. She would rather use the website than talk to anybody and she's gotten really good at using websites to get what she wants convoy done that.
Speaker 2:Uh, not just that. You know there's a lot of guys I that, a lot of guys that don't. Uh, that's what kind of gave me my fame and and that or not fame, but got my following to listen to me. Uh, on social media, uh was negotiating, helping these guys negotiate they, they don't uh, so many of them, what will? Uh? Their first step in negotiation was uh, okay, how much do you?
Speaker 2:pay me how much. You know we'll tell the broker. How much are you going to pay me to do it? No, you're the service provider. Come to them with the might. Have seen it. I put it, I even put it on twitter some of my good stuff. I couldn't believe the amount. It was like 90 voted that hit the carrier names the rate they're going to make more money. I mean that's a very strong evidence that you have to do this. Anyway, a lot of these new guys, they don't know that convoy would show you the rate. Uh, make it pure. All you gotta do is click, click, click. You know you get to build up your profile within Convoy. Convoy had these tools and models to where it kind of reminds me of the old Panther. You remember Panther?
Speaker 1:Yeah. The same company that bought my company bought Panther.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I did a real good blog. I did a good blog about the CEO. I did a good blog about who I thought was going to be the next CEO of CH Robinson and he kind of ties into the Panther because he was the Andy Clark. He was like high up, maybe the CEO of Panther, andy Clark, right who?
Speaker 2:Andy Clark, Andy yeah, andy, I wrote a blog about it. I wrote a blog about it and I've drawn these arrows. He was this, now he's this, and he was at CH Robinson and now he went to here and I'm like the next person, the next CEO of CH Robinson is going to be Andy Clark, and I spelled it out and wrote to everybody whenever it was up in the air who it was going to be.
Speaker 1:Freightwaves liked it and they reposted the same thing.
Speaker 2:I said yeah, I think a lot of people thought a lot of people thought he was going to potentially be next the guy they chose. Dave bozeman, was a surprise for a lot of people. I I wonder if I wouldn't you say that, because you're the first person I've heard say that, except one other person, uh, that actually gave me the lead, but uh, uh, I wonder if I was like one of the first people that got that out, because I, because freight waves was the first people that reported it. Anyways, besides the point, it just I did write it and people were like they were fascinated when I, when I wrote and showed people he's back and he's back, he's going to be in charge of sea, of Trompson. He's a nice guy, by the way. Yeah, yes.
Speaker 2:But back to talking about Panther, the reason why I brought, when you, when you, when brokers like yourself and your audience when you I think it's important you all seem, you know, pioneers never make it Poor convoy. They, you know they had to restart and do what they did. That's just the way they were the pioneers. I say he was the Dan was the pioneer of the digital freight market. But I think it's important for brokers to think in the future somehow or another. And back to Panther. What did Panther do? Their website was so generic, but I was addicted to their website. What made me addicted to their generic website is the status that it would give me If I remember correctly, I think, a tier three, tier two, tier one carrier. They would give you these tier levels of what kind of carrier was and that you could put a bid on a load and their loads always paid until they got bought by whatever damn company owns them. Now, I mean, they went to hell after that, but I mean I probably shouldn't say that you might work it.
Speaker 2:But I mean the same company that bought my company and then fired me you know what I'm getting at and I mean the only reason why I say that is because I was. I love their load board and the amount of money load board.
Speaker 1:That's. That's a nice thing to say about it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a positive and then panther was like one of the first people to come out with this and when he gave me that tier level, it, you know, gave me these tier levels and made me a tier one carrier and you could call them and talk to them and they would show this low pop up. I'm like, and I'm live here in lexington, kentucky what do we have in lexington? I'm like a central hub for automotive parts and expedited. Damn, mercedes needs parts. Uh, they'll, they'll give you whatever rate you want to, especially power. Only, panther was the gateway to this and I just I remember several times talking to panther, getting on the phone with them, because they got to know me. Uh, and I love being that type of person that gets rewarded and makes more money from it because I'm gonna do my damn job. You know I'm, I'm gonna. If I tell you I'm gonna do something, I'm gonna do and uh, anyway, I called panther up and they're like, yeah, your rate's higher but you're probably gonna get it because you're tier one and the other people that's got their bids in are tier twos and tier threes. And I started noticing and I started finding and more conversations. Well, just tell me who is a tier two, tier three provider and they would give me hints.
Speaker 2:He would say it's usually the carrier that brings on more trucks and brings on company drivers or leases on other owner operators. But the owner operators kind of going back to what you said you like working with owner operators, but these owner operators that are dedicated to this, those are the people that make it to the tier one level and they get the job done and they were the first people that would keep track of what care. You know, if you were on time, you did your job, you didn't have problems. Then you got moved up to that level. You got so many loads you got moved up to that tier level, kind of like Coca-Cola you mentioned before at one time Coyote you had to do. You had to have at least three loads with Coyote within the last six months in order to do a Coke load. That was a rule.
Speaker 2:Uh, I love those. I love when broke Panther was the expert at that at one time and whenever the Panther would tell me that on the phone I'm going to do this load, I got selected for it. It just made me very, you know, makes me feel special. I'm making this kind of money because I've got a history doing things with them and I wish I said all that to say this you know, brokers, that needs to be the future. If I had the money and I could have bought Convoy, that's exactly the direction I would have took it into. Let's open up Convoy to all these smaller brokers, to all of them to be able to use the platform to post their loads, and they get to go. A broker A broker does not want to post their load to the entire public. They want to be private, very private about who gets to see their load. And if you could, I think you could have been done with convoy. I'm not.
Speaker 1:I thought that's what they're doing. That's what Flexport's doing, is it Okay? Yeah, they're now using. They're letting brokers post their loads into the platform and the convoy the old convoy carriers that were already signed up are able to take whatever loads they want and flexport charges some some small fee to the broker for it.
Speaker 2:Wow, that's what they're see. I don't even keep up with them. I sent him that one message. You never did contact me.
Speaker 1:Uh, if you're still friends with the love, no I'll text him when we get off and I'll tell him that chad likes his idea and had the same idea. I'll send him this clip so he can see it. Good, good.
Speaker 2:Now I've had some cons to say about him. I'll say just as many pros as cons. I just keep it honest and real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, uber's doing the same thing. I got to be neutral and say Uber opened up something called broker access and I've spoken negatively about it because I think it's weird when they're doing they're also a brokerage and they're opening it to brokers. I don't love that, but regardless, it's the same concept. So you know, carriers, brokers can put their freight there and carriers can grab it from them and it's an interesting. It's an interesting new model of procurement. I mean, this is something that's very interesting to me is a lot is changing because of technology. In the next few years, the brokerage world and the way carriers and brokers talk to each other and work together is probably going to change quite a bit. Have you seen the AI agents, the Happy Robot Company, the Fleetworks Company? Have you engaged with one of these AI bots yet? Have you gotten on the phone with one of the robots?
Speaker 2:I've you know Lodi. Have you heard of Lodi?
Speaker 1:Is that LoadPartner True North yeah.
Speaker 2:True North they created and I want to say it's like an AI, voice-operated bot. It's in the very early stages. They're working on it. Um, I'm very, very interesting how that works. Um, and the reason why I say that is because, uh, um, you know, you got to think what a driver a driver?
Speaker 2:Uh, we, the drivers, have to get away from the phone in their hand and so they're doing things with their headset. You know, you can be in walmart if you see a driver wearing one of those boom mics around the head. You know that's probably a truck driver. Even though we're in walmart, you go to a truck stop. All of them walk around with head mics. Uh, yeah, they just don't take it off right. But so so we can do so much by pressing a button and get, and maybe call, press about, call lodi, and, and it'll call lodi and you can talk to it and you're talking to an ai. But but they uh, smart, I, I'm gonna be in dallas, texas, at this time. Find me some, find me a load that's gonna bring me back to lexington, kentucky, and uh, and, and it'll repeat and start doing a search and then later on it'll let you know, I'll let you know stuff.
Speaker 1:The more they work on that, the more better it's going to be, uh, but yeah, the technology, let's throw do you care, like if you're, if if in two years, instead of having an agent, a carrier rep or someone at robinson, there's just a an ai robot who you're talking to and you're booking loads with, do you care or is that fine?
Speaker 2:if as long as I is. If I can get, I will, I'll, probably won't never, but I won't have enough. I just even as much as love. As if I can get, I will. I'll probably won't never, but I won't have enough. I just even as much as love, convoy and Uber freight. I need that confidence that, uh, I shut up, I'm not talking to you, no more. I want to talk to the real person, but you know, if I cause I feel like I do with my bank, I'm trying to repeat to you.
Speaker 1:Representative representative, representative, representative. And then, when it doesn't get it, you start screaming it at the phone.
Speaker 2:You know you've been listening to me. You know how I treat my back.
Speaker 1:I think we're the same.
Speaker 2:Okay, all right. Well, if I have that confidence, if I have that and Lodi kind of does that, and if anybody that tries to deviate away from that, they will suffer. And I'm old school, I pick up on what. What a broker says broker and a short I've done it. I mean you gotta think. Thousands and thousands of conversations I've had with brokers, I've picked up on conversations, I know what. What. What when a broker says something it's first come, first serve, yeah, it means you're probably not going to pay detention. So let me, let's go into talking about detention. There's cold words, it's in my head, I know it. It triggers me to say something With a robot I can't get that and maybe I don't need it, but I feel safe.
Speaker 2:As long as there's a capability, hey, just go ahead and have a representative, call me. I got some more questions, more questions. I mean I think ai and you can't just turn on ai and say it's going to work, you're going to have, there's going to have to be some transition and convoy did that at the very beginning? I don't know what they did towards the end. It's I'm sure it becomes very costly to them because a lot of carriers will just okay, just give me the operator I found the load I want and convoy the direction they wanted to go in. Which is make sense is they want you to hit the select button and not talk to the people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but let me I want to.
Speaker 2:I want to mention, I want to ask you a technology. What do you, what's your opinion about golly highway? Highwaycom.
Speaker 1:I've always been a fan of highway. I've never been on the other side of it, though, so I'm not sure from a carrier's perspective, but from a broker's perspective it's. It's a better tool than they've had available in the past. I'm curious what your thoughts are. Yeah, it's incredible, I mean okay, good, I thought you were going to say you didn't like it, which would have been fine I've had.
Speaker 2:I've had a lot of people in my audience. My audience is the owner-operator carriers. They do come across problems with it. What kind of problems? Well, the smaller guys, donor-operators, small guys. They tend to do stuff and I would say it's probably 90% of the problems is these small guys tend to have behaviors and do things that big mega carriers don't do. As in, you know, the highway, they get smarter and smarter as they go along. They start fixing bugs. Okay, well, they recognize this. There's little things, but I work with highway. I know I know them.
Speaker 2:I got a rep over there that I can call and say hey, look, you came across the situation we probably. I'm looking for equal. I've taken tests and my personality is not give or take her, I'm an equal type of person. I've taken a, read this book stand out. I think it made me take a test and it does match who I am. I just want things to be equal and I've came across like, for instance, something as simple as this carrier does not have a first name, which is most people was born with a first name, but this guy was not given a first name because he's a refugee. He was a refugee and first name is like unknown, but in North Carolina they didn't put unknown, you and those people not given first name, not given as a, but north carolina issued him a license, uh, with just the last name, and I'm like, and I had to, yeah, yeah, they uh and, and so it's crazy. So he has to go the rest of his life using his driver's license with no first name, you know, because he was born. He was born in a refugee camp and so he was. It was never given the first name, but he has the last name, uh. But in what I call highway, they're like and I got a good contact over there they're saying, well, she has 20 of these cases and they're trying to find a way to to resolve the issue. But anyway, what, um, hi, if you're, if you're, if you do, anyway, the donor operators that have problems, they're usually doing something that the big mega carriers don't do, as in using an IP address from a truck stop.
Speaker 2:Well, there's a whole bunch, or you know a good one. I mean, this is great for the broker. Another one is they track the VIN number. I thought this was so smart. They've given me classes on how this works. Vin number. I thought this was so smart. They've given me classes on how this works Tracking the VIN number from a startup carrier using a VIN number and that same startup carrier. That same VIN number is attached to a carrier. Before that was a scam. Well, chances are he's probably popping up and doing a new scam. So now I have to tell carriers hey, before you buy that used truck, you might want to check the VIN number and that's, that's all new, but it's.
Speaker 2:It makes the guys that are doing good. And I have guys I know, I know people that are making really good money in trucking there every, even during these rough times that we're in now, and they love highway because it's like the good people the P, the good people that's doing things the right way and running their trucking company like a trucking company, keeping up with their interns and all these about you know, doing everything that highways, checking, running and they're they're rewarded, they're awarded. And here's the magic. Here's the magic of highway when we get into a tight mark. And because highways become so popular and so big, so many brokers are using it. Because of that, and I've said this is going to come and I know it's going to come, it will happen. Watch and see.
Speaker 2:So, brokers, whenever there's 10 trucks to every one load, the broker can say okay, they look at their screen. Anybody with any yellow caution check mark, they're gone immediately. They won't even take the time to look at them. Just the people with all these check marks and in the green doing things the right way. That's the only people we're going to call. But when the market tightens up and the brokers have these rules and they have to start, well, we need to start. We have no trucks, those that are doing things right and that are good to go.
Speaker 2:We're going to be able to name our price and brokers will have to start taking a focus on you know, okay, this one here has got a new phone number and you know that might be a discrepancy to a broker. Why is it? You know the broker will? You know highways, just go letting them public. No, they got a new phone number for whatever reason. The broker will start taking their time. Let me find out why they got a new phone number and then a little bit of a conversation from the broker with the carrier will figure that out. But until then, the carriers that are squared away will get rewarded big time. You know it's like getting into micro strategy before. If you that was onestrategy before, I was into micro-strategy before anybody else, were you really? This is about Bitcoin. Good for you.
Speaker 2:The reason why I bought it a long time ago is because I couldn't buy an ETF.
Speaker 1:Because the ETFs weren't out. You're on top of it. I do. I'm into Bitcoin. I got in in in 2021 and I sold like an idiot and when it went down, when it went down, and then I bought back in recently, so I just I don't want to miss out and I'm not touching it again. It's just going to sit there and we'll see it on the moon the house that I paid off.
Speaker 2:I sold my house and because the hell? The new house I bought I used. I got a va loan and I was able to this. You might not use this for your podcast, but anyway I I used the profits from my last house that I paid off. I did this house that I bought. I used the 100 va at a very low interest rate, so I'm not there's no reason to pay this house off because the interest rate's so low. Uh. But the other house, I took all the profits from it and put it in. Put it in the bitcoin good for.
Speaker 2:What am I going to do with the money? I was going to put it into the new house, but because I'm getting 100% financing, why do that? And that was a long time ago. And and because I want I the the. The thing was okay. When the ETFs come out, I'll I'll. So what's the best thing between now and then? Micro strategy and this was a long time ago. I'm like I can't get into micro. I didn't want to play with these exchanges, these other coin, crypto bullshit. I wanted to be into something that's close to 100%. Anyway, go look at the performance of micro strategy.
Speaker 1:I see it every day, so you're doing good. I get why you can stay at home right now and enjoy the soft market from your couch instead of on the road the only other investment that I have uh is tesla and I, and that's done well too those are my two investments.
Speaker 2:Go look at what tesla is doing right now. Look what my strategy is doing right now. I mean, and I don't want you know people, people get envy of me and troll me on that stuff, so I don't like talking too much about it. But but if you know those two companies, well, here's the thing.
Speaker 1:I told you this is unedited, so none of this is getting cut out. Okay, all right, everyone's going to know that you're sitting on a gold mine over there.
Speaker 2:Well, yes, and I'm grateful for that. I need to be very grateful Gratitude, gratitude. You always need to be thankful that way.
Speaker 1:You've worked your ass off from 10 years in the Marine Corps to 11, 13 years now on the road. I think you know you deserve. You deserve a good win.
Speaker 2:Man I appreciate that from my heart. That makes me feel really good and I really felt good seeing, seeing, seeing that activity. It gets boring whenever the market's dead and my group had to come up with ways to keep people active, talk about different stuff, and it's been dead for so long, I mean. That's why I'm kind of excited now is my group starts getting active and people start seeing the rewards of being in my group. You know the three brokers coming in and saving the day. That's huge. Brokers need to do more of that communication. I have a huge audience of brokers but so many of them don't say nothing at all. Man, these guys are eager to learn from from brokers, get in there and communicate with them. Um, I think pete from for pete pete uh, in tadmore logistics. He's very active in the group. He doesn't have to. He doesn't really do a whole lot to have to look for carriers because he's built so many uh good relationships in the group of carriers they trust yeah, well, I'm gonna start posting my episodes in there there.
Speaker 2:There you go, absolutely, I know I will let you, I would promote it. But if you think about Tesla, you know why did I buy the Cybertruck? Well, I'm so much into Tesla because I see the future of trucking, of trucking will be FSD and it will be electric. That's what my car it's coming from him.
Speaker 1:Yes, that will absolutely.
Speaker 2:I my car, it's coming from him. Yes, that will absolutely, no doubt, will happen. I put I'd never. I don't even drive my car no more. I literally pull out of the garage and I hit the FSD mode the button and it drives me to the gym, it drives me to the Costco, it drives me across town and I get to do other things.
Speaker 1:I wouldn't buy a car that doesn't have fsd. The the electric truck thing is going to be interesting because there's not enough energy today to to to power all all the trucks that they would need to make this work. But the fsd is 100 a thing. I mean that I'm very curious. This is going to be an interesting industry in 20 years. Where autonomous driving, autonomous trucks goes. I don't know what that's going to look like. What do you think?
Speaker 2:My prediction. You can come out and correct me if I'm wrong. I know the electric truck. I mean, well, think about it. The brokers, they have to compete with the mega carriers and the mega carriers are going to be the first ones they get electric semis. They're going to be the first pepsico. You know they're the first. Uh, my excuse, meyers, they're the. These are the people that are getting the first electric trucks.
Speaker 2:Now, if you can operate, if you're, if you're able to get those trucks, uh, and start running your fleet off of electric, uh, the pepsico they're, because they're able to. One truck was able to get a thousand miles in one day. Of course they're swapping seats with another driver doing type local, type stuff, uh. But if the big, if it brokers as owner operators, carriers, small guys, fleets of five trucks or less, if we have to start competing with the mega fleets and it will happen if we have to start competing with the mega fleets, and it will happen if we have to start competing with the mega fleets that have electric trucks, because the, what are they? What will they do? They want market share and they will see that they've cut, that the electric semis is dramatically cutting their price, they're cutting their costs and that allows them to cut prices even lower.
Speaker 2:And and then we, us, with the mission trucks. Well, uh, with the mission semis, my audience we'll have, we'll, uh, we're gonna have to compete against that. So it's going to be a big deal. Not 10, not 20 years, we're talking about five years, bro, as bad yeah, but there there's, there's not enough.
Speaker 1:There's still not. Like california tried to require this. California, gavin Newsom, made a rule that every car and truck had to be electric by sometime soon. And even if they made every car and truck electric, it's not possible to power them. There's not enough energy. They would have to buy energy. They would have to bring energy in from other states and they already don't have enough energy. They have rolling blackouts in california. So like they're I get, like I get why, like intellectually it makes sense, but like practically it's it's. It's going to be a lot harder to execute and get to a place where you have the infrastructure to support it. So I don't know. We'll see. We'll you and I'll have to have you back on in in a few years and we'll see what it looks like and we can talk about it then. But I think we're just about out of time. If you've got any parting words or any parting thoughts for the audience, I've really enjoyed having you on the show.
Speaker 2:Well, let's do it more often. I like talking to brokers because I have a lot to say to them, but I think brokers they go against some of the things I say because it doesn't align with what they're doing. I think I'm pretty fair and square on both sides. I'm telling it like it is, but, yeah, I love having these conversations. It was on Raw and you got exactly who I am. This is how I am. Um, uh, anyway, I'm gonna be at bats. I'm gonna be talking on stage, looking forward to that. Um, I'm doing another project where, uh, we're gonna be doing something with uh, veterans and trucking. Um, I, I'm working on some ideas and, um, you know, vc type startup that's gonna be working with veterans. I'd like to be working with veterans. I'd like to be a voice to those guys as well, coming out of the service, getting into trucking. It's kind of like what I did.
Speaker 2:Your first question was why didn't I do like everybody else and go lease on to someone? Well, I seen it at a very early age. I was completely broke. I had that injury, lost everything. I went from uh having a. I worked at a.
Speaker 2:I worked for mclean, had great money, bought a nice house up the road. I had a beautiful japanese wife and two newborn children and this injury. I told my wife I can't. I just can't unload these trailers the more the injury was too much. I had to send my wife and kids to Japan. I got them back. But if I don't, I eventually got them back I had to put my house up for sale. I moved into a pay-per-week motel type place where prostitutes and drugs were in and out and I was going to physical therapy every day and I was living on short-term disability. I'm like man. I went from being on top of the world. The Marine Corps didn't teach me nothing. That's all I knew of my adult life was the Marine Corps. The Marine Corps taught me nothing. Marine Corps taught me nothing about money.
Speaker 1:They taught you the value of your word.
Speaker 2:They didn't teach me. I almost left that word out. It taught me a whole lot, but they didn't teach me nothing about money. That's not their thing teaching you about money. I just do work hard and make money and labor work. Anyway, after going from that and living in this motel, going to physical therapy up and down this road over here behind me, going to physical therapy, going back to my room and on crutches, neck brace, knee brace, all this crazy stuff, anyway, it got to where the short-term disability was running out and I didn't have no money at all in making this fast. I'm going to talk fast. I've said it many times, but everybody likes this story.
Speaker 1:Now you're going to talk fast. You've been talking fast the whole time.
Speaker 2:People aren't even going to have to do the two-time speed because times speed. This is what happens when you get me excited. I hope my face doesn't get red, because when I get excited, oh, it's been red, it's been red baby. Oh, my gosh See, you see how I am. I got that type of energy. I uh, I uh.
Speaker 2:So going from this lost everything. I'm like miserable. I'm depressed man. I had this beautiful wife and kids and everything, and Fendi G35 sold down to nothing to grow back and forth the physical, short-term disability. They called me up and said your short-term disability, uh, you know where you have to be terminated from a claim. We can't bring you back because you've been out of work for so long. Uh, and your short-term disability runs out at the end of next month or whatever. Um, and I'm like well, I gotta go back to work.
Speaker 2:I've lost everything, but I haven't lost my CDL. I still have a CDL. I still know how to drive a truck. I've always wanted to own my own truck. So I go ask the banks how do I get money? I need the money. I've got good credit. I've always had good credit. Because it's back to who I am, I'll follow through with what I'll say. If I take a loan, I'm going to pay it off. So I've always had good credit, but the banks wouldn't give me money to buy a truck because I've never owned a truck. I'm like, well, this sucks. But you, just you gave me this piece of paper that says a coupon to where you're going to give me this type of interest rate If I buy a Humvee. I'm just wanting $35,000.
Speaker 2:Anyway, applied for get those credit card offers says 0% interest. I hacked the system. When I say I hacked the system, I'm like I will get these credit cards. I'm going to apply for every one of them. They keep on sending it to me.
Speaker 2:I went to my storage unit. I went to my storage unit because that's where I was putting all my mail and I was just scared to throw away the credit card offers in case somebody else would take it or whatever. So I'll just put it in a shoe box and put it in my storage unit. I went to that storage and I got this in the middle of the night, went to the storage unit, grabbed all those credit, all those uh envelope you know envelopes of what credit card offers, which one offered 0% for a year. The rest of them throw away. I'm going to apply for these credit cards. Sent it off, sent it off, uh, they came back and I had they. I had like a total of thirty five thousand dollars, so a little bit more than thirty five thousand dollars.
Speaker 2:And why did I go? Why did I skip out on leasing to someone else? I'll take the real. The exact reason is because I, uh I said, well, who does everybody lease onto landstar? Uh, and I looked at landstar. They're going to take 35. You can only work landstar brokers like dang it must. You know that that's pretty rough, you know.
Speaker 2:Then I came across an advertisement for DAT. You get this DAT load board and you only pay $35, and you can work with any broker you want. Well, what's the catch here? You know, this is how new I was to all this. I didn't know nothing. I called DAT up. I'm like, hey, what's the catch, sign up. I'm like, hey, what's the catch, sign me up. This is the route I want to go. And they said we got to have your authority. I'm like, okay, you take credit cards, I got credit cards, do it for me, give me my authority. And whatever it takes, give me my thought like, yeah, we can hook you up with that. They got three weeks. I was a trucking company in three weeks and, uh, but I ain't going.
Speaker 2:When I went to get the truck, when I went to go get the truck, uh, I missed out on talking to that part. When I showed up at the dealership on Nenino Drive and I showed them the truck that I wanted, I said this is the truck that I wanted and I'm going to pay for it with these credit cards and 2011,. This was a bad time. People were saying you'll never make it in trucking. I'm like I ain't got nothing to lose. How am I not going to make it? What are you going, dude, come take my damn truck. I don't think four credit cards are going to come after me. They might ruin my credit, but I've already lost everything. Man, oh man. They gave me that truck. I was able to get my authority put my name and numbers on it.
Speaker 2:The first load I was so broke, so broke. This truck was going to be my home. I didn't have a home. I'm not going to pay the hotel, I'm going to stay in this truck. The first load I did got quick pay from the broker and I had to do that first load based upon a half a tank of fuel. I didn't have a full tank. The truck came with a half tank. I had to do a load that that I had enough fuel to be able to complete it. When that broker gave me that first, gave me quick pay on that first load. The first thing I did filled up the tanks. It was awesome, it was all and the rest was history anyway, that's my story I love it.
Speaker 1:I asked you a question. I asked you a question I asked you a question I asked you a question an hour and 40 minutes ago and you just now answered it.
Speaker 2:As we finish the show you know, this happens often when I, when I work, when I talk to these podcasts. They'll break it up into like three parts we don't do that.
Speaker 1:It's unfiltered, okay, it's raw, as I said. So no, this was great man. I appreciate you. This was great, your energy was great and I just had a lot of fun. So that was 11 years ago that was 11 years ago.
Speaker 2:That 35 000 truck paid it off. In no time got my wife and kids back from that, uh, back from japan, uh, and look at the house I'm in now urge my lake. Look at the lake, beautiful and you know and look at that. Look, look at the goodness that I do with the people, that I'm working with these yeah, I mean you've created a community of nearly 40,000 people who are helping every day.
Speaker 1:So it's pretty spectacular what you're doing and I appreciate it.
Speaker 2:It was great talking to you and let's stay in touch.
Speaker 1:You too. This episode will release right before Christmas, so let's give a Merry Christmas to everyone.
Speaker 2:Yep, Merry Christmas. Good talking to you.
Speaker 1:Thanks everyone, have a good week.
Speaker 2:You too you.
