Our Strategy for Growth
The company generally does not own its own trucks, ships or planes; instead we use a network of relationships with ground, ocean and air carriers to find the best transportation solutions for our customers. This allows capital to be invested primarily in expanding the company’s workforce of talented people who are adept in the critical areas of competitive selling, price negotiation, carrier relations and customer service.
Following a significant investment in the company by Jacobs Private Equity, LLC in September 2011, the company began to implement a growth strategy that will leverage its strengths – including management expertise, substantial liquidity and potential access to additional capital – in pursuit of profitable growth. Our strategy anticipates that this will be facilitated by a highly experienced executive team recently put in place, and by new technology that will integrate the company’s operations on a shared platform for cross-company benchmarking and analysis.
Our growth strategy focuses on the following three key areas:
Targeted acquisitions. The company intends to make selective acquisitions of non-asset based logistics truck brokerage businesses that would benefit from our greater scale and potential access to capital, and may make similar acquisitions of freight forwarding, expedited and intermodal service businesses, among others. We believe that the company is in a position to make the first phase of acquisitions by using existing cash balances, together with the funds expected to be generated from operations and funds available under our revolving credit facility, and potentially by expanding our credit facilities.
Organic growth. The company is planning to add a significant number of new truck brokerage offices throughout North America, and is actively recruiting managers with a track record of building successful broker operations. We expect the new brokerage offices to generate revenue growth by developing customer and carrier relationships in new territories.
Optimized operations. The company intends to accelerate the earnings performance of its existing operations, acquired companies and greenfield locations by investing in an expanded sales and service workforce, implementing an advanced IT infrastructure, incorporating industry best practices, and leveraging scale to share capacity more efficiently and increase buying power.
Our growth strategy for Express-1 is based on:
- Targeted investments to expand the sales and service workforce, in order to capture key opportunities in specialized areas (e.g., refrigeration and defense);
- An increased focus on carrier recruitment and retention, as well as improved utilization of the current carrier fleet;
- Technology upgrades to improve efficiency in sales and carrier procurement; and
- Selective acquisitions of non-asset based expedited businesses that would benefit from our scale and potential access to capital.
- Plans to open new offices in key U.S. markets, which will consist of both company-owned and independently operated stations;
- Increased international growth, with a focus on Asia and Latin America;
- Technology upgrades to improve efficiency in sales and carrier procurement; and
- Selective acquisitions of complementary, non-asset based freight forwarding businesses.
- Investment in an expanded sales and service workforce;
- Technology upgrades to improve efficiency in sales and carrier procurement; and
- The integration of industry best practices, with a specific focus on better leveraging our scale and lowering administrative overhead.
- Selective acquisitions of non-asset based truck brokerage firms that would benefit from our scale and potential access to capital;
- The opening of a significant number of new truck brokerage offices in the U.S.; and
- Investments in an expanded sales and service workforce, supported by sophisticated technology for sales, freight tracking and carrier procurement.