FreightCasts Weekly Recap (9/14-9/20)

WHAT THE TRUCK?!?

• We are the robots
  • Dooner and The Dude talk about Sarcos warehouse robot exo suits; a bankruptcy that has left truckers holding the bag; and women heroes of the road. We also go inside cargo insurance and find out how to get retweeted by The Rock.
  • Plus, Bad News/Goods News concerning Nikola’s next move, an out-of-control truck in a school zone and Playstation 5 preorders.
  • This episode features Kristi Martindale, chief marketing officer and chief customer officer for Sarcos Robotics; OTR trucker Susie Deridder; Eric Cornelius of Traveloko; and Craig Leinauer, claim manager for Inland Marine at Travelers Insurance.
• Driver Appreciation Week kicks off
  • Dooner and The Dude kick off National Truck Driver Appreciation Week, dive into Nikola’s short seller rebuttal, preview Global Trade Tech, and discuss Amazon’s holiday hiring spree, Tropical Storm Sally, and one widow’s search for answers in a trucker’s senseless murder. Also, XPO discusses the tech behind XPO Connect.
  • This episode features Yoav Amiel, vice president, freight brokerage technology, XPO; and Adam Wingfield, managing director at Innovative Logistics Group LLC.
• WHAT THE TRUCK?!? LIVE from Global Trade Tech Day 1
  • Dooner and The Dude are coming to you live from Global Trade Tech, where they’re talking to David Arsenault, adviser to Blume CEO, Blume Global; George Lorenze, VP of business development, TriumphPay; Doug Schrier, VP of product and innovation, Transflo; and Kendra Phillips, CTO, Ryder System.
• WTT?!? LIVE from Global Trade Tech featuring Anheuser-Busch, Port of Long Beach, more
  • Dooner and The Dude are live from Global Trade Tech Day 2, and they’re talking about global supply chain sustainability, do-it-yourself projects propping up freight, how to go from minor league baseball to fixing the communication gap, and how the Port of Long Beach has reacted to COVID.
  • This episode features Angie Slaughter, VP of sustainability, logistics, SVC and capabilities procurement for Anheuser-Busch InBev, North America; “Mr. Supply Chain” Daniel Stanton; Noel Hacegaba, deputy executive director at the Port of Long Beach; and Andrew Berger, VP Global Sales, FrontApp.

Global Trade Tech Summit

• Keynote: Gene Seroka, executive director, Port of LA
  • With his workplace, the Port of Los Angeles, providing the backdrop, Gene Seroka kicked off American Shipper’s Global Trade Tech summit Wednesday by calling for “bold steps” in the digital transformation of the maritime industry. “Today’s challenges have introduced widespread uncertainty, created erratic trade flow and further spotlighted the need to reassess strategies. Indeed we are in the midst of challenging times. This pandemic has wreaked havoc on economies around the globe,” said Seroka, executive director of the largest container port in the Western Hemisphere.
• Freight Forecasting LIVE from Global Trade Tech – Collaboration, Transparency and Integrity in Supply Chain resiliency
  • On today’s Freight Forecasting Michael Vincent is joined by Jeff D’angelo, Founder of Turvo, in a discussion about the need to re-think collaboration, transparency, and data.
• Keller uses benchmarking to elevate its game: Technologies in action
  • Five years ago, Thomas E. Keller Trucking, a unit of Defiance, Ohio-based Keller Logistics, was dissatisfied with its carrier benchmarking efforts and found itself in the lower quadrant of carriers in terms of measuring its performance. That changed when Keller joined the carrier benchmarking initiative of the Truckload Carriers Association’s (TCA) Profitability Program (TPP), said Jonathan Wolfrum, the unit’s president. Today, the unit is growing its top line, and is doing so quite profitably, Wolfrum told Todd Davis, FreightWaves’ vice president of customer success and benchmarking, during the second day of the FreightWaves Carrier Summit. Much of the turnaround, Wolfrum said, can be attributed to superior benchmarking processes built out through Keller’s participation in the TPP program. FreightWaves supports the program through ownership and support of its inGauge online benchmarking platform.
• Using tech to cope with COVID: Technologies in action
  • Technology was already a huge timesaver for trucking carriers. Then came the coronavirus. The outbreak created more market volatility and simultaneously forced trucking to operate in a different — socially distanced — manner. All of which makes trucking technology even more important. How Nashville, Tennessee-based C&N Deliveries uses the technology solutions of Bloom Global is a case in point. C&N CEO and founder Nicole Clemons spoke with FreightWaves Director of Market Intelligence Zach Strickland in a “Technology in Action” talk during the FreightWaves Carrier Summit.
• Boosting your bottom line: Technologies in action
  • Every decision can impact the bottom line, says Terri Lucas, vice president of sales at SkyBitz Inc. “Customers want to be sure their return on investment (ROI) is there before moving forward,” Lucas said. “We are working every day to provide the right data set so that they can derive those ROIs. “Lucas, along with Debbie Sackman, SkyBitz’s senior product manager, took part in a “Technology in Action” talk during the FreightWaves Carrier Summit.
• Technology in action: Pivoting during a pandemic
  • Chris Hummer, president of Don Hummer Trucking, says that his company was able to successfully pivot to a remote work environment in mid-March because it already had a strong technology infrastructure in place, including its partnership with companies like McLeod Software, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Hummer shared his insight on how his company was able to operate and thrive during the pandemic with Heidi Boggs, director of customer care and support for McLeod Software, in a virtual technology talk at the FreightWaves Carrier Summit.

Put That Coffee Down

• Where’s my freight? Selling visibility
  • Dooner and Hill are talking about the most common question in supply chain: Where’s my freight? In a world where disparate systems spread across the globe, visibility hasn’t just become a need — it’s a requirement. But how do you sell these new systems, and who is the buyer?
  • This episode features Robin Jaacks, chief commercial officer, Ocean Insights.
  • Plus, listener feedback, advice and community building!

Freightnonomics

• Leading the way
  • Anthony and Zach host Dr. Matt Waller, dean of Sam M. Walton College of Business, professor of supply chain management at Arkansas, to discuss the importance of leadership in transportation, as well as how supply chains are evolving as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Presented by Amazon Freight.

Fuller Speed Ahead

• EVP of North America Enterprise at Salesforce Larry Shurtz
  • FreightWaves founder and CEO Craig Fuller discusses the Salesforce CRM platform and the importance of cloud-based applications with Larry Shurtz, EVP of North America Enterprise at Salesforce.

Drilling Deep

• New drivers aren’t coming out of CDL schools and that’s a problem
  • Jeremy Reymer is the founder and CEO of DriverReach, but he’s also a member of the research advisory committee for ATRI, the research arm of the American Trucking Associations.
  • He’s the guest this week on Drilling Deep, and he’s got a good perspective on one of the reasons why the driver market is so tight: CDL schools aren’t pumping out ready-to-drive candidates like they used to, all because of the pandemic.
  • Reymer also talks with host John Kingston about the upcoming ATRI survey covering the biggest issues in the industry. There’s a new candidate this year: COVID-19. How will that end up in the closely watched poll?
  • Kingston also will talk about a quirky bit of diesel data that came out this week and what it says about demand.

On The Spot

• Was Labor Day the peak? – On the Spot
  • JP Hampstead and Zach Strickland talk about what’s happening with the movement of freight over the last week.

FreightWaves Morning Minute

• Monday-Friday
  • The fastest minute in freight.

The top headlines from FreightWaves.com every weekday morning. Available on FreightWaves.com/podcasts, your favorite podcasts player and Alexa by adding the skill “FreightWaves.”