This fireside chat recap is from FreightWaves’ Small Fleet & Owner-Operator Summit on Wednesday.
FIRESIDE CHAT TOPIC: A better way to treat small fleets
DETAILS: Freight wouldn’t be able to move in the United States if it weren’t for small trucking companies. But according to one CEO, these fleets often don’t get the love and respect they deserve.
SPEAKERS: Guillermo Garcia, CEO and co-founder of SmartHop, and Kaylee Nix, anchor and senior meteorologist at FreightWaves.
BIO: Garcia co-founded SmartHop, a freight dispatch and software provider that focuses on smaller fleets. Originally from Venezuela, he founded a trucking company there that he grew to 500 employees. After coming to the U.S., he started a local LTL carrier and built it into a 40-truck full-truckload operation.
Watch the chat
KEY QUOTES FROM GARCIA
“[To] the industry but also government agencies, shippers, brokers and everybody that has a relationship or is impacted by those small mom-and-pop, family-owned types of businesses: We need to support them — for them to survive, for them to do well. We are all going to be better off if every single small trucking company out there does well.
“What I think this industry is not good at is recognizing those who are smart and do well.”
“If you bring transparency, I think the industry as a whole will benefit from that.”