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Monthly Recap May 2008
Five months down in 2008 and our strategic plans for the year are beginning to show results. We have been able to achieve revenue growth each month this year by growing and supporting our existing Associates and their customers, by adding top notch new Associates and their customers, and by continued training and development of our top notch employee base in our Tampa office.
As we continue to update and improve our DCI Way of doing business we ask each of you to take the time to think all the way through the new challenges you encounter as we navigate through this difficult economic time. Your efforts to work toward solutions that encompass the big picture for our company, which includes our mission and vision for DCI, along with our goals for this year. Please take the time to share your thoughts and ideas with our team so we can evaluate and document your solutions into the way we do business. Remember, it’s you that is creating the company that we are.
As Joyce will mention later in this recap, we continue to struggle with the many economic challenges that face all of America these days. Your customers are struggling with the same issues we are faced with and the best way you can help them is to create more value in the services you offer. Most of us have been in Transportation for more than a few years and offering your experience to your customers may allow you to keep your prices at current levels or find new revenue sources with each account. Ask if you can evaluate their shipping trends and look for ways to group large LTL shipments into Truck Load partials. Zone skipping became a trend back in the late 80’s where customers would fill up a truck load of regional LTL in one part of the country and deliver to an LTL carrier in another.
As our trucking partners struggle to change the way they do business, you have an opportunity to help them become more efficient by making sure your shipment is ready when they arrive for pick up and help avoid delays on both ends of the load. Proactively work on the consignees of your customers and really try to secure a reload for your carrier which will eliminate dead head miles and waiting time. Ask your drivers if they have found cheaper fuel on the road and pass that information on to your other drivers. It’s time for us all to pull together to help each other so we can prosper on the other side of this down turn.
We are doing a better job in the Tampa office and ready and willing to help you out with any challenge you encounter! Please let us know what’s going on and allow your team to get involved with your business. As we continue to retrain our CSR group in a more pro active approach to doing business The DCI Way, we encourage you to let us know about the future business you’re working on as well as the current business your handling. We will research the lanes your looking to secure and have a core carrier group set up for that business rather than waiting until you secure your first load and then start looking for carriers to handle the new business.
Our goal is to exceed your expectations and we want to hear from you and your customer when we do and when we don’t. We know there is always the opportunity to improve and feedback on the good and the bad are critical ingredients in making that happen. Keep your eye on the prize and try to find the opportunities out there as there will be plenty as our less organized competitors begin to disappear. Thanks for your effort and I look forward to visiting with you and your customers in the very near future.
Danny Mills
Produce season and rising fuel costs have presented challenges over the past month reinforcing the need to expand our carrier base and build stronger relationships with our carriers. With the need for establishing a core carrier base, May was a month full of planning and organizing.
We interviewed a number of candidates to expand our Tampa CSR team. As a result, we have brought on two new CSRs. Ty Botsford and Debbie Sagert both joined the CSR team and have already completed their first week of training. With Ty’s extensive knowledge of the Transportation industry and Debbie’s great customer service background – they will be a strong Carrier Development Team. An organized plan for research and development has been outlined and will begin producing results that will utilize repeat carriers at pre-negotiated rates – protecting margins and streamlining the daily process of covering loads.
A well balanced Tampa team will allow us to continue to work toward our Strategic goal of bringing on 8-10 new associates in 2008. All of our ads, recruiting, and interviewing during May has produced our #3 Associate for 2008 with many more highly qualified sales people interested in joining the DCI Team.
Joyce Lyle
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Monthly Recap April 2008
Well here we go again, its half way through May and we’re just getting our April Month End Recap out. Sorry once again for the delay, but we have too much good news to communicate and we didn’t want to leave anything out.
Our results from April showed that we have a lot of good things going on with our Company. We set another record in Total Revenue, we set another record in Total Load Count, and we set another record in Total Margin during April. We also had a few individual record set by Wendy Mullin in Total Truck Load Revenue, Total Load Count, and Total Gross Margin. Our boys in Fort Myers set all time records in LTL shipments and surpassed all locations in total shipments. Congratulations Wendy – Way to go Guys – thanks for showing it can be done in these tough times.
Our overall performance for April and for the first four months of the year are encouraging with Revenue up over 45% over last year and total margins up almost 30%, but, and I hate the use of that word, our margin percentage has dropped considerably and our cash flow has begun to slow down. Those two negatives are a direct result of our slowing economy and will require us to change the way we are doing business to avoid becoming a Walmart version of 3PL’s. As you all know, our goal is to remain the Macys’ version!
In times of slowing economy, Shipping orders tend to shrink from truck load size to partials or even LTL size shipments while freight payments tend to get stretched out into longer and longer terms. We must be proactive in countering these negative trends to ensure we don’t lose loads that we have handled in the past and ensure that our cash flow remains healthy so we can continue to pay our carriers as quickly as we always have.
While attending the TIA conference in early April, fuel prices and FSC payments were a hot topic. As you have seen from previous emails, there is a big push by the Owner Operators Association of America to regulate our business and force us to pay a FSC regardless of our collecting one or not. As a preemptive measure to this potential legislation, we introduced a new process last week requiring that all new accounts created in our system have a FSC program and that within the next 120 days, all current accounts must be converted to a Fuel plan as we intend to create all invoices with a separate line haul and fuel line expense.
We are growing by design and by strategic plan in 2008 and will hopefully continue to grow throughout the rest of this year, despite the economic conditions of our Country. We have added two new Associates this year and will announce next week a third and forth new Associate who will work out of the Miami area. We are also close to bringing on a small brokerage firm in the Atlanta area and a fairly large brokerage firm in Chicago. As we move forward with these additions, we are also ramping up our CSR group with a couple new additions to be named in the next few weeks.
Our team is focused and we are making great strides in a tough economy that will most likely get worse before it gets better. Our successes should show you and your customers that we have something special in our company and we are doing a few things the right way. Please don’t give into the naysayer’s and stick to your guns by continuing to look for ways to grow your business, get closer to your customers, and tighten up your relationships with your carriers. Let’s continue to buck the trend and grow our business by double digit numbers throughout the rest of this year.
Danny Mills
Monthly Recap March 2008
As we move into the second quarter of 2008 we need to stop and take a breath of air, check our altitude, and make sure our heading is where we planned it to be. The best way to do that is to restate our goals so everyone knows where we are and where we’re headed.
1. Grow our Sales Force by 10 to 12 new associates.
2. Complete the transformation of our CSR group.
3. Add two new shipping modes for our team to sell.
4. Clearly define everyone’s role, how their role effects our Company, and reward those who exceed expectations.
5. Improve our average margin to better than planned while growing our overall business by twenty five percent.
We put these goals together last fall while working with the University of Tampa and now that I look at them, just a few months later, they seem to be more optimistic than when we created them. To date, we have added one new Associate with the second starting April 14th. We also have several excellent candidates in the interview process and we have formed 2 new relationships with recruiters who seem to know their stuff. I would say we are on track to achieve this goal for the year.
The CSR Process is moving along and should be completely implemented by mid May which will bring a better platform for handling business from the Tampa office. We are actually working on three new relationships that will fulfill our third goal as we have already introduced one new partnership this year. Joyce Lyle has been working extremely hard doing the things she does daily while rewriting position descriptions and meeting with everyone 1-on-1 to make sure we know what we should be doing. She has come up with a simple incentive program to ensure our group learns the improved processes that we know you will approve.
Our biggest challenge this year will be to keep our historical margins at the levels they have been in the past and continue to grow our overall business by 25 percent. So far this year, our revenue is up slightly over the same period last year, but our margins have slipped which has us all working harder than last year for less income. We must reverse this trend and with the Carrier environment as it is, the reverse will have to come from our customers in the form of increased rates. A big factor for our squeezed margins still remains with those accounts not willing to pay a fair fuel surcharge!
Some of your people are doing a tremendous job and deserve some recognition! Sid Harden, Terry Knott, Dan Fugatt, Jeff Collins, Grady Ray, and Alan Campbell have all managed to grow either their truck load count, truck load revenue, or truck load profit over last year by some pretty good numbers. The encouraging sign with these guys is that they are doing it “The DCI Way” and with less revenue, some of them are making more money! That’s doing business the smart way! Linda Mora and Shannon Crim are our newest Associates and they are both starting to show good signs of revving up their businesses.
As we move deeper into the challenge of 2008, it’s important that you keep your head up and your eyes wide open! Your competitors are looking at your customers and hoping they can steal them by slashing prices because they are losing their own business the same way. It’s not price that keeps your customers calling you, it’s you and the trust and reliability you have shown them that will keep them customers. Pressure from carriers to pay higher rates will intensify over the foreseeable future and your ability to stay close, show value, and make sure your receiving a fair rate for the business your handling, including the FSC, will help you weather this period.
Good luck out there and don’t forget we’ve got your back! Don’t hesitate to share your challenges and your successes with us in Tampa. We're here to help you grow your business this year and become the Macy’s option for your customer and not the Kmart!
Danny Mills
Month End Recap February 2008
I’m sorry we were not able to get this recap out last week and we’ll do better in the coming months. We are moving into a difficult business environment and it will require that we all work hard to maintain and improve our customer loyalty by getting closer to them this year.
With business volumes dropping as a result of the slowing economy and the lack of new home construction, we are also faced with rising costs in most areas. Diesel Fuel is at an all time high, averaging just over $3.70 a gallon for last week and carriers are struggling to make a profit. I’ve always thought that we were in the perfect business and we were recession proof because we can negotiate our margins each day in real time. I still believe that to be true, but today, we have less freight to haul and less trucks to haul our freight.
OK, with that in mind, we are still in a great position to grow our business and achieve the goals we have set for 2008. Although truckload sales have gotten tougher this year, we are still growing our numbers in truckloads and increasing revenue and gross profit over last year. Our CSR team has been beefed up with the additions of Brian Thomas and Jim Brill and they are hard at work putting our new CSR process in place. We know that your time is your number one asset and by improving our CSR process we can offer you more time to focus on your sales efforts.
The final touches to the CSR process are being completed and you now have a true partner in the Tampa office who will help you grow your business, handle all your operating challenges, and create a more automated process for your business. The true benefit from this process will be the freedom you will gain from having to be in your office to get your work done and the ability to get out and sell the products you have to offer. Please be open- minded to the support we are offering you and your customers and allow us to help you accomplish your goals.
Your customers are looking for true value from the partnership they have established with you and your ability to communicate all the options we have available will determine your success over the next year. I can honestly say to any customer you have that we can offer them a savings of as much as 10% on their total transportation costs in 2008! Your insight and knowledge of your customer’s challenges and concerns as they relate to transporting their products will allow you to offer solutions in every corner of their business. Please don’t hesitate to include your CSR partner or your DCI management team in uncovering the opportunities that your customer may offer.
Our final numbers for February have been completed and our total sales grew by quite a bit over the same month in 2007. Although our Truckload sales increased by a small amount, our LTL sales grew by a larger amount than we expected. We added Christine Chong during the month as our in house LTL and sales assistant to help manage this segment of our business and she is there to help you grow your LTL business with your TL customers. Please take advantage of the support and the products you have available in creating a long lasting, value proposition for your customers.
We plan to add additional Sales Associates and LTL Sales people this year and as you have seen, we improved our incentive package for your benefit when you recommend a new Associate for DCI. The plan will pay you $2500.00 when someone you recommend signs on and another $2500.00 when they complete 90 days. That’s $5,000 bucks for making a phone call! Please take advantage of this easy money by making that call today to someone you know that would be successful in doing what you do and enjoy the quality of life and unlimited income potential you have as a DCI Sales Associate.
Good luck in the coming months, stay close to your customers, and allow your CSR partner the opportunity to help you make more money with less effort by taking over your operation!
Danny
My February was totally different from the other 22 months that I have been with DCI. I spent the month in dispatch. I positioned myself right in the middle of the action to experience the operations first hand. It’s a lot louder than my little office but the experience has been invaluable.
Knowing the challenges that we face – late add-ons – difficult lanes – an AWOL drivers – gives me the insight I need to push the processes we have in place and make the necessary changes to policies and procedures that may not be affective in certain situations. I am convinced, now more than ever, that the CSR/Associate Partnerships will make the daily flow of business more efficient and give everyone more time to focus on growing our business through new customers and introducing existing customers to our LTL program.
To help with the LTL Program, Mike Knight was trained in Chicago and is available to train your customers to input their own loads. The customers enter the pick-up and consignee, items to be shipped with quantity and weight, special instructions, and additional reference numbers. Once complete they can even print their own BOL. This process triggers an e-mail that comes into the Tampa office so Chris can assign and call the carrier. Let the system work for you and you make more money!
What a great way to grow!
Joyce
DCI Monthly Recap January 2008
Wow, what a great start to 2008 for everyone associated with Dedicated Carriers. January has always been a pretty good month for our Company probably because of the mix of freight that our customers have to offer us. This year has been no exception and with the other events we planned into the month, our continued focus on new products to offer, and automating our Company, we’ve had one heck of a month.
Our business levels grew substantially with about 1350 total transactions for the month which represents a new all time high in truck load, LTL, and intermodal shipment count. I thought we were in a recession? Many of our Associates are beginning to see just how easy and profitable our DCI-LTL program is and it’s obvious that they have jumped on the band wagon. Helping push our TL volume up was the rejuvenation of several older customers and that move looks like it will continue for some time.
The first ever 2008 DCI Kick Off gathering, “Grow Your Business, The DCI Way”, turned out to be a big success. We had almost a 100% turnout and we surely had a 100% engagement with everyone who attended! I have to thank Joyce Lyle and her team for putting this fantastic event together and making sure that everything was done in a proactive way and down to the finest of details. I would also like to thank Mike Rooney and Tom Griffin for coming down from Chicago to address our group, although I think it was 3 degrees in Chicago while they were hear. A No Brainer!
Neil “The Coach” Bradley, a very good looking guy, as he put it, was the highlight of the morning as he shared his Systemized Selling process. He was right on target with his approach toward need satisfaction in the sales process which should help everyone to continue to provide value as customers look to cut costs. The only section that might have outpaced Neil was our DCI for Dollars game show. In this section, Kevin Walsh, Fabian Zamora, and Wendy Mullin took their places as idea judges and had control of the cash prizes as our group came up with ideas for exceeding our customers and carriers expectations.
That evening as we pulled away from the dock on our dinner cruise ship the captain announced that we might stay in the channel as we were currently under a tornado watch! That didn’t sit very well with our guests who had a tendency for motion sickness, but we made it through the evening without any fish bait! I knew the weekend was a true success when I received a thank you email from Dan Fugatt, who let me know that over his 35 years of attending these kind of meetings, some that I was with him on, he had never accomplished and enjoyed one more!
My commitment to the Tampa office in 2008 was to get out of the way and let them do their thing! With that in mind, I’ve already traveled to see customers in NC, SC, TN, PA, and quite a few spots in Florida. We’ve signed up two new partnerships allowing us to offer additional modes of transport for our customers and looking forward to roll out of those items in the next few weeks.
We are excited to have added Shannon Crim to our Sales Associate group in Mobile, AL and look forward to some great things from him. During his training, he joined Matt Paisley, Tom Straus, and I on the glass at a Lightning game where he let me know he would be a star! Just thought the rest of the group might want to know that after all the awards and money we handed out at our DCI Kick Off gathering.
I hope those of you who are producing these great numbers in the months to come and for those of you who are not, remember to follow your quote for every shipment with this simple money saving tip, “Plus Fuel”. Good luck and let our Tampa office know what you need and what they can do for you!
Danny Mills
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Solutions.