FreightWaves.com went live in March 2017 and since then, it has quickly become the number one provider of news specifically dedicated to transportation and logistics, globally. This isn’t a niche market, either. The $9.6 trillion dollar global logistics business is one of the largest industries on the planet, representing about 12% of the global economy. It’s even bigger than financial services and insurance, combined.
Our editorial team of forty full-time reporters cover all aspects of transportation, regardless of mode. We created the hashtag #freightallkinds that we believe represents our expansive future. Our goal is to create the world’s go-to source for transportation and logistics insights, commentary, and data across all modes. Most importantly, we aim to provide our data, insights and context faster than anyone else.
Speed is important. With most routing decisions in freight made within 48 hours, having access to the most up to date information is critical.
We have journalists that cover breaking news and publish analysis around the global logistics space, across all modes. The team includes deep experts on trucking, rail, air, and ocean freight.
FreightWaves has an additional group of reporters that exclusively focus on tech and startups in freight and mobility. The logistics industry is receiving record amounts of venture capital funding, making it one of the top industries for tech investing. In 2018, FreightTech received $10.8 billion in venture funding, smaller than FinTech, but growing much faster. Recently, the company appointed its first on-demand mobility reporter to cover the emerging delivery space that Uber Eats and Doordash occupy.
In the past month, FreightWaves has delivered around 100,000 pageviews a day to readers, covering everything from breaking news, technology, mergers and acquisitions, policy, weather, regulations, the economy, and market commentary. The daily pageview count is up 500% year-over-year.
The secret of FreightWaves’ news site success is hiring exceptional story tellers and immersing them in a team of experienced freight market experts. Our experts usually come from senior positions at some of the largest transportation companies in their mode. This is critical to our success, because unlike most freight media outlets, we can interpret how an event, regulation or market movement will impact the participants in the sector, often before anyone else is even aware.
Our analysis is centered on one goal – to understand how these trends and issues of the day are going to impact the economics (both short- and long-term) of the freight market.
We combine this insight with the world’s fastest freight data from over 1,000 sources, representing hundreds of billions of dollars in freight transactions, across all modes.
Our business model is inspired by two major global data and media outlets – Bloomberg and ESPN.
I often say that if you want to understand the FreightWaves business model, go read Bloomberg by Bloomberg. FreightWaves provides the fastest data in the freight market, before anyone else has it. We inform this data with context written by our journalists and team of analysts, much the same that Bloomberg does in the financial markets.
Our journalists and analysts refer to our SaaS product, SONAR, to inform their view of the market and interpret what is happening. It is a dashboard product that enables participants to visualize and model massive amounts of data across the global logistics industry. If there is a dataset that will better prepare them in interpreting the freight market, our data acquisition team will go out and source it.
This brings enormous value to our SONAR subscribers, because they get access to the same data with high quality context without having to pay extra every time we add a new data series or market analysis.
We also love the ESPN of freight analogy because we respect the fun energy and competitiveness of the ESPN team and brand. Our team of analysts, Market Experts and FreightCasters (these are FreightWaves’ version of “sportscasters”) have come from the industry. Think of them as the retired coaches, linemen, quarterbacks and pitchers that are available for breaking down a story in a first person way, leveraging our content distribution which includes podcasts, editorial, radio and TV products.
We will soon launch FreightWaves TV, the first over the top streaming TV network dedicated to freight news and content, all of which will be produced from our studios in Chattanooga. Our team of anchors and commentators come from our team of Market Experts, FreightCasters, and journalists.
Even our events are badass. The speed, quality, content, and energy of the events we host feel more like a tech release party than a freight conference. The only difference is we are hosting dozens of freight companies that are releasing their tech and apps, but at the same time and on the same stage!
We are located in Chattanooga and are the highest paying employer in the city. Our investors tell us that our compensation and benefits packages are competitive with companies in Silicon Valley. We consider this a tremendous advantage. Tennessee has no income tax and one of the lowest costs of living in the entire country. This enables us to get more money in the hands of those that make FreightWaves special – our employees. The best part is that all of our full-time employees participate in our stock option program, which gives them equity in the company.
Photo taken from Elder Mountain, TN, about five miles west of downtown Chattanooga.
Plus, Chattanooga is one of the most beautiful cities in the entire country. With rolling hills, lakes, rivers, and hiking trails, Outside Magazine named Chattanooga Best Town Ever two years in a row. Don’t for a second think that Chattanooga is a town full of hillbillies that don’t understand technology or have an appreciation for progressive ideals. The city offers the fastest internet in the country and access to some of the nation’s premier sustainable energy sources (even the airport is the first in the country to run 100% on solar) and research with Oak Ridge Labs about 90 minutes north of the city.
We are huge fans of sustainable growth. We buy carbon offsets to mitigate our carbon footprint and are actively finding ways to use our data and editorial coverage to educate the freight industry on ways to lesson the environmental impact of freight movement.
The word is getting out. Out of the 150 employees of FreightWaves, 130 live and work in Chattanooga. Of those, over a third have relocated from another city, most within the past year.
Our future is very bright. Every company in the next decade that produces, sells, distributes or wholesales a product will be making significant investments in their logistics operations just to stay competitive.
In the past two years, we have been selected as CNBC Upstart 100, a winner of Rise of the Rest, FIA Innovator of the Year, winner of numerous AzBee’s for excellence in journalism, and chosen to be on the FOLIO:100, a list that recognizes the leading innovators and entrepreneurs in the publishing industry.
We are growing very fast, both in revenues and in team members and are looking to expand our team of Market Experts, journalists, data scientists, customer success and sales staff. If you have expertise across any mode of transportation and logistics, including trucking, on-demand mobility, rail, air, warehousing, maritime, break-bulk and inland maritime shipping, this could be the spot for you. To learn more, check out our career page.
Even if a career change isn’t right for you, we would love to connect with you on your visit to Chattanooga. Freight Alley, our 7,000-square foot bar, is open to members of the logistics community. If you can make it to Chattanooga, be sure to look us up at one of our events, FreightWaves LIVE. Give us a shout.