In this episode, we sit down with Jared Flinn, co-founder of BulkLoads, to discuss the pivotal role of logistics in agriculture. Jared shares the story behind BulkLoads, a platform that bridges the gap between shippers and haulers, addressing key challenges like pricing, reliability, and accessibility. We also dive into how technology is transforming ag freight, the importance of community and education, and Jared’s forward-thinking vision for the industry.Whether you’re a farmer dealing with freight logistics or just curious about the intersection of agriculture and technology, this episode offers a wealth of knowledge and practical takeaways. Don’t miss Jared’s advice for young entrepreneurs and his insights into the future of agricultural freight. Don’t forget to like the podcast on all platforms and leave a review where ever you listen! Website: www.Farm4Profit.comShareable episode link: https://intro-to-farm4profit.simplecast.comEmail address: [email protected]/Text: 515.207.9640Subscribe to YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSR8c1BrCjNDDI_Acku5XqwFollow us on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@farm4profitConnect with us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Farm4ProfitLLC/
Hi, I'm Jared Flynn, co-host of the Bulk Loads podcast. I came on to the show today and we talked everything in bulk freight trucking, everything from how to start a trucking company to finding freight, insurance, and everything that's involved. We'd love for you to listen to the show today. God bless.
There is a podcast in Iowa, thought for profit was named by the face turned up We'll see you next time.
Hey listeners, welcome back to the Farm for Profit podcast. You got Tanner standing here.
We are standing here. We're outstanding in our studio.
We're outstanding in our pod... That was lame.
When you've been here long enough, you gotta just stand up. You gotta go swing at golf club.
It's one of those things like when you get out of the seat of a semi and you take that first step down the step and you realize your legs have... Almost gone to sleep.
Yep. And the older we get, the more dad noises we've got to make.
Well, yep. But you're here for a Farm for Fun episode. This is kind of a neat little crossover. Obviously, we've got another podcaster, but then we're talking about the trucking industry today. So we get to meet Jared and hang out with him. But listeners, we appreciate you as a guest speaker. in our, or hosting us as a guest in your ear. How do you say that?
Thanks for letting us be in your ear hole, in your ear hole or your eyeballs. Cause you watch us on YouTube, social media. Um, so we thank you for all of that. Remember, share this with your friends, family, and enemies. We would appreciate definitely your enemies. all the opportunity to do that, reach out to us, let us know what you're thinking. Somebody that we should talk to.
I don't need to say him. Cause you already know to send a farm for profit, LLC at gmail.com or to send us a text message or call us at 5 1 5 2 0 7 9 6 4 0. Or Corey's home address is no, because then Rick will send me stuff. Oh yeah. Yeah. You got a very nice package on my anniversary. That's very good. Freaking odds. Put that out on our story on our anniversary. But,
Today on the Farm for Fun show, we are heading to a parallel industry. This man is a fellow podcaster. He started at the Kansas City Board of Trade in 2005. That's where he got his start in the grain industry. Then he started his own load board, a company called Bulk Loads in 2011, where he has had several spinoffs, including the Bulk Loads podcast in 2018.
He has one of the best podcast backdrops in the industry. And I am saying that with this in the background. Please welcome from Missouri, Mr. Jared Flynn of Bulk Loads.
Yeah, all right. We're talking nothing but big loads today.
Yeah, I didn't even make a joke about it, but there Tanner goes.
All right, let's jump into that episode right now. And it is our pleasure to bring fellow podcaster. I feel like a lot of podcasters have been connecting lately.
That's good. It's a good time of year to do that. Things have slowed down a little bit in the ag world. Still doesn't seem like a lot, though. So in this week... You're ready to go to the field again. I'm ready to go to the field. We're going to have a tiny little window here to maybe get some anhydrous and maybe some tillage done because...
We were waiting for moisture and temperature to drop after harvest because it was so dry. And we got it and it never stopped.
So we're going to find out what's going on in Jared's neck of the woods. Welcome to the podcast, Mr. Jared Flynn.
Thanks for having me, guys. Appreciate it.
Where are you coming from today? Yeah.
I am coming from Springfield, Missouri, southwest Moe. So we're down in cattle country, not so much crop country. But the southwest Missouri, it's actually – there's a county north of here. It's actually – has the most cow calf production, I think per acre than anywhere else in the country. So pretty interesting. And I never knew I'm a, I'm a Missouri native. I grew up on the West side of St.
Louis rural area. Um, but not, um, we moved down here 15 years ago, but yeah, I didn't realize how, uh, big cattle production was, especially down here in Southwest Missouri. Yeah. That's, that's good country.
I don't know why I thought you were from Colorado.
I love Colorado. I love the mountains, but no, not, uh, yeah.
So I think I sent Tanner a clip of your podcast. Oh gosh. It was a while ago, wasn't it? Yeah.
You've done it multiple times.
Yeah. And what caught me was, Not not just your awesome content, but was your background as one of the coolest backgrounds that I've ever seen in a podcast. And I thought, how freaking cool is that? And so for the people that are just listening, I'm going to describe it to you. It is the back of a what looks like a hopper bottom trailer. I don't know what brand.
Probably he's going to, he's going to tell us, but he's got corn Husker. Okay. And so that, that's cool. Got the rivets, got the reflective tape. I mean, everything, the ladder, it, the detail is perfect. I imagine it came right from the factory.
It did. So we stole this idea. There was a trucking company out in Idaho that some of our guys went out and visited, John Pocock. And he's got a similar replica of this in his office. So when you walk in, if you turn to the left, you see this trailer. So they came back and were like, how do we do that?
So we reached out to a couple of the vendors and Cornhusker was gracious to make this and ship it down to us. So yeah, it's actual like... I mean the right size and they did all the wiring on the back end. And yeah, it's a pretty cool piece. Thank you.
And it's, it's painted. It's not stainless or, you know, not a shiny hiney. So, but that wouldn't probably be best for, for the lights and cameras that you got going.
Yeah, exactly. I thought you were going to say you kept sending it to me because of his strong jawline, you know, it has to do with, he's a good looking dude.
Yeah.
Well, why are you sitting there with a background? You've got a real mic. It's because you host a podcast of your own, right?
Yeah. So we started the Bulk Loads podcast back in 2018. Had the idea. Obviously, we're in the trucking industry, and one thing we realized was – And truckers, out of a lot of people, have a lot of time on the road, a lot of time to spend listening. So why not be a voice out there for them and create really good content, good, clean content for them? So, yeah, we started that back in 2018.
I think in the trucking space, and not to brag, but I think we're somewhere in the top five for trucking podcasts. If you kind of search the trucking space. So, yeah, we're super proud of that. But, yeah, we release an episode every week. It was, I think, two years ago we started doing video along with the audio. And that's really taken off our channel. I think it's actually crazy.
We've seen more growth on our YouTube channel than we have just on the audio side. Sounds oddly familiar.
You said you started it because you're in the trucking business. What's the business look like?
Yeah. So Bulk Loads is, we started Bulk Loads in 2011, myself and another partner, Matt Ferdinand. But Bulk Loads is an online marketplace where we connect grain shippers with brokers and trucking companies all online. So the generic word is a load board. We're a load board and there's others out there for general freight. There's load boards for van freight, refrigerated freight, flatbed freight.
We came along in 2011 and started one specifically for bulk So when I say bulk commodity freight, as a lot of your listeners know, I'm talking about hopper bottom freight in dump walking floors, belt trailers, pneumatics, tankers, all your kind of raw commodity trailer types.
But basically we, we created a website or an app where we're connecting, connecting those companies sometimes for the first time. So someone's looking for a load and we basically match, make them or marry them with that company and, But then also companies is just trying to find, fill in the gaps. So truck may be taking a load of DDG or cottonseed or you name it out somewhere.
We're helping him find that reload coming back. And that's trucking. If anybody knows anything about trucking, it's always changing. I mean, there's a lot of dedicated lanes, but loads fall off, loads got to get diverted. So we're kind of in the middle always, I guess it's, I like to call it organized chaos when you're dealing with trucking. Well, it's logistics, right? Yeah, 100%.
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And what I've learned this year is agriculture and farming, it's just a big logistics problem. Yeah, we talk agronomy and soil and different crops, but at the end of the day, when you're in the heat of the battle... It's trying to figure out how many loads are coming off that field, how long it's going to take them to dump and get them back. How many employees am I going to need?
How much fuel do I need? It's just a big logistical nightmare. And so that's all we're trying to solve. It's a logistics problem.
It's interesting you bring that up. And I've said this, my listeners know this. I've said it a hundred times, but I got started in the grain industry in 2005. Went to go work for a large grain company based in Kansas City, Bartlett Grain Company. And it was my second week on the job. I'm in a in a conference meeting, all the commodity managers, vice president, presidents in this conference room.
Well, we're getting ready to leave. And the vice president comes up to me, introduces himself. He's like, hey, Jared, I'm Jack Moran. And I'm like, oh, good to meet you. And again, I'm fresh, just out of college, coming to this company. And he looks at me, he goes, I just want you to remember one thing while you're here. He goes, we are a logistics company that moves grain. And I was like, what?
And again, I'm brand new. I'm like, what does he mean by, I thought we were a grain company. We have all these grain bins and we're, you know, trading all this grain, but he wanted, he just really instilled that. He's like, just remember we're a logistics company that's moving grain.
And I think that's really what set the tone for me to realize just how valuable transportation is in the grain industry. I mean, it's, I don't know what percent, but it's just a huge amount of the success of grain companies and farmers and anybody in the supply chain.
Right. And, you know, obviously everyone would like to move it with a boat or a rail, but you guys are what picks up the slack in between.
Most times it always, well, it usually always starts and usually ends on a truck. Yeah. So it's a, it's a very integral part of, of the industry.
So would you say most of your loads is longer hauls?
Yeah. Good question. In bulk, it's actually a little, it's interesting. It can be all the above, but, So when you're talking about grains, most of that stuff travels less distant on truck and more on rail just because railroads – one thing we know, railroads, barges, vessels, they love commodities and they especially love grain commodities because they can load it fast. They can ship it fast.
So they will always usually outprice – actual truck freight. So when you get to the raw grains, corn, soybeans, and all that, you're not going to see a lot of it move long distance unless it's specialty, unless it's your organics, something that's going to be specialized, pet food, that type of stuff.
Where we see more of our longer stuff, like I said, yeah, it's going to be your pet food, your fertilizer, stuff that's just a little bit more niche-y. And that's kind of where we kind of, when we come into play. Most companies that interact on our platform, and we deal with all of the above, but it's going to be those
longer hauls where you're not really, you got to find either a reload or something coming back. Some of the stuff, it'll get priced both ways, but typically if it's moving over 250 miles, 300 miles, that trucker's got to find a reload. Otherwise, it's not going to be a profitable run for them.
I've got his website pulled up and I think you undersold it. You have a permitting tab. You've got an insurance tab. You've got a factoring tab. I mean, like this, this is full service.
Yeah. Well, that's one thing we learned early on that. So bulk loads, we started just to be a load, to be a load board. That was the idea in 2011. And our goal was always to get to a thousand members. We just said, man, if we can get to a thousand members and, This will be enough that we can pay the bills, keep running, you know, provide food on the table.
I can't remember the timeframe was within a couple of years, within two years, I think we hit a thousand today. We were proud. We almost have 7,000 on the platform, 7,000 companies that interact on the platform. But I've learned this just business 101. One thing you're always taught is listen to your customers and listen to what they're saying.
So it was within 2012 or 13, one of the biggest problems that we saw after we got these customers on the platform was a lot of them were having trouble getting paid. Companies like ADM, Cargill, I won't go through the list, but usually the bigger the companies, the slower they are on paying their bills. And a lot of times they know they can do that because they have the scale and power to do that.
Well, a lot of the companies we deal with are small trucking companies. These companies, tight cash flow, you know, when they're hauling that load, most times you're talking, it's like, 5% to 10% profit margin. So they got 90% of that cost already wrapped into the fuel, the truck, and all that. So they got to get paid pretty quick.
So 2014, we launched Smart Freight Funding, which is our factoring arm. If people don't know what factoring arm is, we basically were a quick pay or next day pay on these invoices. So instead of that company taking that load that they haul, sending it to ADM, They send it to us. We get them paid next day, usually a small percentage fee. It can range anywhere from 2% to 3% of the load.
But what it does, it gives instant cash flow for the carrier, and then he can keep running, and then we turn around and we do all the back office support and wait whatever the net is, 30, 40 days to get paid. But that was probably the biggest one because I know cash flow is king, and you've got to have the cash to keep the wheels turning.
And the way you get paid is that percentage there, or you know where the loads need to move and you get a percentage of that.
So for us, it's just a percentage of the invoice. So they haul the load, we, we get them paid the invoice minus a, whatever the percentage of that is. So, you know, say it's 3%, if it's a thousand dollar load, $30 would be our commission or percentage that we would take. We pay them the nine 70 in the next day. And that way they don't have to worry about it. And knowing that. Okay.
And then the scope of your customer, is it mom and pop owner operators? Is it the ADMs? Could a farmer call you up and- You know, want to move grain?
Yeah. So most of our customers, and this is trucking in general, when you look at trucking all across the United States, I'll put it this way. When you think of like the big companies, the JB Hunts, Warner, Swifts, put all those. If you take all those big boys with 150, 200 trucks, you put them all together, they still only represent 7%. of the whole trucking industry.
So that other 93%, they are considered small business owners. It's usually five or less trucks. So it's a super spread out fragmented market. That's where our services really come into value because a lot of these small companies, the mom pops, like you said, they don't have secretary, bookkeeper, accountant, finance, all you go through the list.
So they, most times the person that we're dealing with, he's the owner of the truck. He's the driver of the truck. He's the mechanic of the truck. He's making all those decisions. So our goal is really to be the back office or support to help him on those back ones and help him find the load quickly, get paid quickly and
And then we can talk about some of these other business units that we've created along the way. But that's really been the premise. It's it's really focused. Now we deal with we have 20 truck 30. We have some over 100 truck operators.
But I think if you look at the industry as a whole, the heart of the audience that we serve or customers are going to be that five or less trucking trucking size companies. just a lot of similar similarities to farming. I talk about all the time when you talk about this and farming, it just goes back and forth. And the beautiful thing is that we're at the crosshairs of both.
I mean, cause we're dealing with agriculture guys that are trucking and a good percentage. I don't know this exact statistics, but I would say maybe 15 to 20% of our user base are farmers. You typically it's one of the other it's, They have a farming operation. They already got the hopper and truck. So then they get a commercial license to run.
So usually it's another service that they have in addition to the farming operation. So that's another thing we see a lot of.
The insurance tab intrigues me as well. We got five trucks, a bunch of trailers. Can anybody sign up and join the insurance pool?
Yeah. So the insurance, we are an insurance agency or an insurance brokerages. So we don't, we're not the actual insurance company yet, I should say, but we represent, you know, you can go through the list. Trucking gets very specialized. Yeah. There's Progressive and Geico just like on home and auto lines, but there's other niche year, bigger trucking type insurance companies that we represent.
But yeah, that was when we started. We're going on almost year three of that. So yeah, it's another pain point. I don't have to tell you how frustrating insurance can be. So it was another one that we thought that, man, we could get involved, hopefully provide a better service, better options, more affordability, and just better coverage.
And at that time, again, we're already helping the guy with his loads. We're already helping that individual with his cashflow. Why not have this be another part of the business that we can kind of help them offset.
All right. I want to go back to a little Jared. I want to, I want your background. I want to know how you grew up and how you got into what you're doing.
Yeah, yeah. So as I said earlier on the podcast, grew up eastern Missouri, about 50 miles west of St. Louis. High school I went to was Troy, town of Troy. But I grew up on a small, super small farm, 240 acres west of there. Believe it or not, we had all the above. I mean, row crop, pasture, but really grew up in the sawmill. My dad and uncle started a sawmill and did that from –
I mean, I think I was eight, maybe nine years old. I can remember my dad building these stools for us to stand on just so we could operate the machinery. But, yeah, I did that all the way up through high school. I was really big in FFA and went to the University of Missouri, graduated from there with an ag degree, and then that's where I went. Actually, the cool kind of –
God's story, I guess I would say was graduated from Mizzou. That was in 2002. The job market was still pretty rough. You guys, I think you look close to my age, but we all remember nine 11. And, but yeah, job market was, there was nothing. And so I stuck around. Well, Got on as a delivery truck driver for a local company, had my Class A CDL, and started driving a truck.
And this was more on a local basis, so I wasn't over the road. It was a straight truck with a pup, but it was delivering construction materials. But that's where I really learned – a little bit more about logistics and dispatching and trucking. Did that for a couple of years. Met my wife. She was living in Kansas City. Started looking for a job up there. And it was interesting.
I put my resume online and this is way back in the day and not thinking anything of it. But it was I can specifically remember it was one Wednesday afternoon. I was working out on the truck and get this call. And it was from a job recruiter at Bartlett grain company. And he said, Hey, I see you got ag background and some trucking experience. We'd like to talk to you. And, uh, could remember. Yeah.
I can remember that next week driving to Kansas city and, uh, Small farm town kid. My grandma and grandpa bought me this suit for graduating college, my first suit. But I remember wearing it, going and interviewing. It was right at the Kansas City Board of Trade at that time, Bartlett Grain. They were on the top two floors. And I can remember going up there, elevator door opening.
red carpet, mahogany wood. I mean, just, I mean, I just was so out of my realm, but interviewing with the commodity managers. And then a week later they, they offered me the job so that, yeah, that was really my start in the, the grain and logistics business.
That's what we're missing here in the studio. We need red carpet. And mahogany. We've got some good solid wood.
Some rich barn wood back there.
But I think I was going to say what was interesting for me personally when I went to go work at Bartlett. So at that time, I think there was a guy that was doing some trucking stuff. And for whatever reason, they let him go or he had left. And no one was doing trucking. So a lot of the commodity managers, a lot of them, I'd go to talk to them. Well, none of them wanted to do trucking.
I mean, you talked about trucking. I mean, it was a bad word. I mean, it was like a four-letter word. People just didn't want to deal with trucks. It was a pain in the butt. So most of the commodity managers at that time, they were buying everything delivered. They weren't buying an FOB.
And when I started to work there, I just started realizing there was an opportunity to start going out, figuring out freight rates. And it just allowed us to actually buy more grain because of it. So we actually started buying more grain FOB, coordinating the freight, even matching up freight with other freight.
And that's kind of where it all really started and really fell in love with the logistics business.
That's awesome. What year would that have been that you...
Went to the Kansas City Board of Trade. 2005 is when I started, yeah. April 2005. Yeah, you've been in it for a while.
Yeah. Awesome. I got a completely random question. Tanner saw that I drew a picture of it.
Yeah.
Do you guys – so say bulk material. Bulk materials. I see those trailers going down the road that looks like three or four bins with like tubes connecting to the bottom. I think they're a pneumatic trailer.
So pneumatics, it can be a wide variety. So I'll tell you the reason why the pneumatic versus other trailer types – Those tanks are, uh, compressurized. So a lot of times if that product inside has to be blown out, usually blown until like a silo or something else, that's why they have to use those trailers.
So where we see a lot of them, um, and you'll see them locally, a lot of cement haulers, um, run pneumatics. So that powdery cement, a lot of times it's not, it can't get hold in a hopper or an end dump. It's just, it's too, it packs up too much. Um, so it's gotta be compressurized and blown out. Um, Those – the pneumatics got really popular back in the frac sand hauling days.
A lot of the companies were using it to haul frac sand because a lot of these tanks, they deliver those out to a job site and they would blow them into these silos that would then be used in the fracking operations. We also see them in this industry on the food side. So there are – I mean – Man, I think up in Iowa, Foodliner, there's some big companies that do food grade stuff.
But again, the whole premise around it is it's usually dry bulk commodities that have to be pressed or pushed out and blown into something.
Like milk replacer?
Yeah, that would be another one. Yeah, milk replacement would be another really big one. Plastics and resins are another one. Fly ash is another one. Fly ash. That's true. So, yeah, it's usually something that's real, real fine, real, real powdery.
Yeah. So there's a town about 15 miles away and there's a trucker over there that probably has a dozen of those. And I've seen them and I've just never thought to ask, you know, what the heck they were. I figured that was what it was, but they're just a really unique trailer.
Yeah. Yeah. Speaking of trailers, who makes the best hopper bottom trailer?
Well, he's got one right behind him. You think he's going to say anything else?
You can't ask me that question. You can't ask me that question. I can tell you who's got the market share. So if you look, if you break down and I don't know, I don't have the exact math in front of me. Tempe typically has the largest market share of the hopper bottom market. And you'll see more Tempe trailers out there. I think Wilson would be right behind them.
And then I would believe Cornhusker would be trailing as well. But then you get some real specialized. Actually, I was up in Pennsylvania last month, EBIE. If you've ever seen those hoppers, a lot of these have the rivets and all that. EB makes a slick wall hopper bottom, and you'll see it. It doesn't look like the rest of them.
It's actually really cool, but it's a slick-sided one, and that's another one that we see some guys. More in the east, just where they're based out of, not as much in the Midwest.
We're actually seeing EBs around here now because they're making them 20 minutes north of us in Story City.
Oh, nice. Okay.
Yeah, perfect. Pretty sharp truck. I remember seeing the first one down at our state fair, and I think it was all stainless, mirrored. And you could literally just go take a selfie in it. It was kind of cool. Yeah.
It's interesting. The hopper bottom market is really not that old. I mean, I think it wasn't until the 70s or 80s before they actually created the actual hopper flow grain. Before that, a lot of grain was still shipped on flatbeds with side kits.
So a lot of these grain terminals, they had to have the hoist that hoisted the whole trailer, sometimes a truck and trailer up to dump the grain out the back. Or you had to have a dump truck with a hoist to get it out.
Yeah, my dad tells stories about going down to ADM and going up on the hoist. Oh, yeah? Yeah. They would dump the whole truck. That'd be a ride.
So my old company, Bartlett Grain, they had a 70-foot. They still have at their downtown Kansas City one. And back in the day, we would book a lot of dry van trailers. We'd blow wheat in them out in eastern Colorado, western Kansas, and it would lift that whole truck and trailer. I mean, I got pictures, but, I mean, it was every bit of –
Think of how long that would take now with the amount of stuff that we have to move and the extra effort and power and breakdowns, hydraulics, all that.
Well, I just know how good the brakes are on the trucks that I run. You better have me locked into place. I think my brakes ain't holding. Not at 90 or a hundred thousand pounds. They don't even hold it on a flat ground. Yeah. So I'm curious.
We've been obviously staring at your Cornhusker trailer, but you've got a display there behind you where the catwalk is, and it looks like a bunch of children's books. What's that all about?
Yeah, so this was something within the – I guess we've kind of really got this going in the past five years. My kids now are a little bit older. My daughter, she's 15, and then I got a 12-year-old and 10-year-old boy. When the boys were babies, at nighttime, we had a little rocking chair and we had little bookshelves with all the kids' books. You know what I'm talking about.
If you've got kiddos, Pete the Cat and Little Blue Truck, Little Red Truck. You can go through all the different stories. I kept always asking my wife, I was like, can you find any kids' books on trucking? And she'd bring home some that were like, it was like monster machines. So it would have like, like it'd be pictures of big excavators and stuff like that.
But she could never find anything on semi trucks. So I had the idea. And this idea, I guess, was probably eight years ago when they were still little tykes. But why not create a fictional character that's a semi-truck? So just like Thomas the Train, why don't we make a trucking character called Semi-Sam and go through his adventures? So that was kind of the start of it.
I am a little bit – I love art, and I did art when I was in high school. My mom's an artist, and so I just – I started sketching these images and just started to think of kind of cool storylines. So that's really what – what brought out semi Sam. So yeah, we started, I think we released or finally got the first one to copy four years ago, three or four years ago. And yeah, it's just been fun.
We try to release another one every year. We got five books as of today. And so it's everything from semi Sam delivering a tractor to the farm to Semi-Sam going to a truck show. We just released one this fall. Semi-Sam delivers pumpkins. So yeah, it's just a fun storyline. Our goal with these, you can find them on Amazon anywhere. We probably give more out to our customers.
It's just a good piece when our guys go to visit farmers, trucking companies. Most people have a child or grandchild, niece or nephew that that can value these books. So my goal or intent with these books are really to get them in the hands of children, just to really teach the value of trucking number one, but also agriculture. And our goal is to keep doing that.
That's great. I grew up with the Johnny Tractor books. They kind of got a little bit of the same feel. And I know my mom still has them. Those are not something that's ever going to get thrown away themselves. But did I miss it? Did you do the artwork in the books?
So the first sketches, I started sketching together. Then I gave it to a graphic artist that did computer print. Those were the first three books that we did. A gentleman in our office who's our videographer, his wife is an artist, Claire Zegler. And she's actually taken over the illustration. So the newer books are now hand sketched by her and illustrated. And she's done a phenomenal job.
Actually, the newer books now that we do are so much better just because, again, it gives it more that I don't want to say Pete the Cat look, but just that real drawing type look and not just a computer generated image. Is she for hire? I can reach out and ask, but yeah, potentially.
So you know what book series I want to do? What's that? I want to do a John at Stapler Farms book series for kids. He probably has no idea. I know, but our listeners would know. Corey's got an alter ego. He's got the local BTO personality, and that character is John at Stapler Farms. He's the ambulance chaser, the one that's calling the retired farmer's wife.
There's a lot of life lessons for children that could come out of this.
I haven't done a good one for a while. but I thought about the next time that the, you know, we're in here recording. If you hear the sirens fire up and they start going, I was like, Nope, I gotta go. Follow the ambulance.
It's funny. We, uh, so when we talk about this, we will start goofing around, but like you can come up with so many creative characters and storylines, but like real life examples, uh, plugged into characters. So, uh, I, uh, yeah, it's fun just to kind of imagine some of these other characters you can create and, and, and how it relates to real life stories. Yeah.
So what other topics are you covering? Obviously, we're loads, right? But you got one show per week. How do you come up with your content? What are you talking about?
Yeah, I'm sure you guys can relate to this the same, how the shows evolved from the beginning, you know, in our very beginning. And we try to do, you know, bring on actual trucking company members and some of their success stories. But I mean, everything from...
I mean, anything that encompasses trucking, but what I was going to say, what's related, what I've learned more than anything is trucking is a business just like farming is a business, just like banking is a business. You put all this together and there's just a lot of these very similar core principles.
I think that's where, as we've evolved, I've realized, man, these principles are more valuable than, or maybe just as valuable as the specifics. And if we can get the principles down and and teach those principles to our audience, the rest will all kind of come into play.
So instead of talking about why insurance rates are through the roof or bad, why don't we talk about, Hey, how do we get good practices in safety and compliance and stuff like that? So that's kind of, I guess how we've morphed. And I think, and I'll be honest to say this. Yeah.
We always want, we always want to see high viewerships and clickbait type stuff, but I've realized like that's not really valuing our customers. Like, like we should. Like, yeah, when you bring somebody on to trash talk somebody else or whatever, yeah, it creates controversy and stir. But like, are we really serving our client the best way? Are we really giving them something?
I guess that's where I take it to heart. I want to provide content, clean content that people can walk away and be like, wow, I got something from this. I can use this. There's an example here that I can do to better myself.
I think you can get some of that out of the trash talking, too. If you want us to say something bad about someone, we can do that.
There's still that that happens. And again, I'm not like I'm our show is Mr. Perfect and we don't get all that and the debates. But I think for me, I don't search for that as much as I search for, you know, what what can apply to someone's business or life that's going to be that's going to provide a positive impact.
Yeah, and I get that wholeheartedly.
I think what I saw in trucking, and this is where I've really changed. I'm 44 now and, again, started in the industry when I was 25. But it's really changed to where I saw trucking is very cyclical. I mean, and even today, the amount of truckers that get in and out of the market, it's like 110%. I mean, that's how much turnover you get. And, you know, a lot of, you know,
Kind of post-COVID, early on, there's a lot. I mean, a lot of people got into trucking. Everybody thought they'd make money. We've seen a big flush out. But how do we help these guys and create less turnover? And I think that's where early on, I guess the young Jared would say, like, it is what it is. It's going to happen.
I guess the Jared now said like, Hey, I think we can have a positive impact. I think we can help reduce this churn. I think we can help guys find profitable loads. I think we can help guys get better quotes on their insurance. I think we can help guys get their money quicker and be sustainable. And that's kind of where we really changed our shift. So where's it going?
What do you think the future of it looks like?
The future of bulk loads? Yeah, I, I'm, I'm super excited. I'm a, I'm a visionary. I'm a daydreamer. And I think that's where, you know, there's God puts people on earth for different roles and there's, and everybody serves a crucial role for me to be fulfilled.
I always feel like I gotta be creating and I don't know why it's just something like, like there's gotta be something new, something, a new idea that I got a new product. So I think where I see bulk loads going in the future, it's, it's continuing to look at this end to end process from, um, we call it the load life cycle.
So from the very beginning to the load, to the end of the load and everything that's involved in the middle, you know, a couple other things I didn't mention. We have started another industry or another company called bulk permitting, but that's also where we get people set up with their own authorities. So we can get somebody set up with their DOT compliance. We can do all the regulatory stuff.
So like we're starting at the very, very beginning phase of trucking. Like we're actually helping this guy that was a company driver actually get get a company name, get the stickers put on the side of his door. So I see us moving more that direction. I want to get more involved in helping these guys get good loans and financing for their equipment. That's an area that we haven't tackled.
So again, I can go down the hole, but I think for us, for where I dream is where we just continue to kind of create this full ecosystem where you can go through the list, everything that that trucker has to deal with or anything that freight that we can have a hand in that and be involved.
Nice. What's some of the biggest challenges you have in the trucking industry right now?
Challenges in the trucking industry, I'll give you kind of macroly and then I'll talk kind of microly within our specifics. But I think trucking industry as a whole, we got to figure out how to be safer on the roads. These accidents, billboard attorneys, I think.
And again, it was surprising when I found, when we got into the insurance game, I was actually surprised, number one, how much these guys are paying for insurance compared to even 10 years ago. I mean, a lot of these companies, like a one-truck operator, especially a brand new guy, can be paying $40,000, $50,000 a year. That same guy was paying maybe $5,000 to $6,000.
So, I mean, it's went up like 10 times. How do we kind of reverse that cycle? Obviously, we see these nuclear verdicts, billboard attorneys. So, I think that's a big problem that we see in the industry. In this industry, you got these small owner-operators. There's a lot of companies preying on these people. And how do we stop predatorial practices?
Again, we're all accountable for ourselves, but I think sometimes people like to prey on the weak and the vulnerable. How do we reduce predators? that in the industry. I think too, you know, you hear this driver myth thing or driver shortage myth. And again, like I said, it is a myth.
I don't, I think there's plenty of well-capable drivers out there, but I think the industry's got to do a better job of promoting trucking as a good business, sustainable business, trucking, just like farming, just like construction. It's a good reputable job. So I think we as a society or industry have just done a really poor job of promoting the value and the opportunity that there is in trucking
For us, microly or internally, I think, and this will be with any business, but I think for us, how do we keep evolving technology? We're a technology company, bulk loads. So for us, it's just, man, you look at the whole AI industry and kind of what that's come into and everything. You know, some people think it's going to be the save all solve all.
I don't believe that, but I do believe that it's going to, obviously it already is playing an integral role. But for us, the challenges are, how do you, how do you look to see how AI solves a lot of those manual processes? Because I mean, and it's already happening, the digital revolution on trucking. I mean, it was just four years ago.
Most companies were still sending in physical tickets and documentation that today has just been gone. I mean, truckers, I think farmers probably the same way. You're not sending in hard copy tickets to get paid on grain loads or freight bills or anything like that. It's all electronic. So for us, it's really trying to match what the industry is doing in the technology.
That's that's probably our biggest challenge. That's what probably keeps me up at night more than anything is like, how do we keep evolving being a technology company with the technology that's out there?
Are we still short trackers?
The short answer is no. So I think – and again, it's just you guys took ag econ, right? I mean supply and demand. The demand will always fill if there's supply. I think where people – this is a whole bigger topic. There's been this narrative that there's a shortage of drivers, in my opinion, to get more drivers in the industry to flush more drivers out, to cycle them through, to get cheap labor.
So, you know, you can get big companies promoting driver shortage where everybody thinks they're, you know, grass is greener there. I'm going to run to that. They get them through there. These guys, they cycle them out. They don't treat them well. They flush them out. And again, it's just a way to get lower cost labor, in my opinion. That's an interesting take. I've never thought of it that way.
Yeah.
There's some of these companies that the driver turnover, it's just, I mean, in these big mega companies, it's just obscene when you see how many people come through and flush it and they know, and I don't know, I don't know this exact, but they have a mathematical formula that they know that they're going to wash out 50 companies that they're going to have X amount of drivers come in, get them in a truck.
They're going to run for three months and then they'll get new ones in there to get new ones in there. Yeah. It's a, it can be pretty brutal.
And then you brought up technology, so we got to talk it. I mean, there's Teslas out there driving themselves. There's super crews and GM vehicles that's somewhat self-driving. Is that coming in the trucking industry? And is that part of what you think is going to make it safer?
I think we'd be fools to think it's not. I mean, it's going to be in all industries, you know, from even, you know, taxis. I mean, any kind of delivery, trains, planes. I don't think – I mean, it's just a matter of time, and I wish I had a crystal ball to say when. But I think that there's got to be more automation in trucking, and there's going to be more implementation.
I mean, we're already seeing it now. I mean, a lot of these new trucks, they have – lane assist and crash control. So I think we have to keep doing that to even also offset the amount of wrecks and crashes that are happening on these highways. So does Jared see a completely driverless truck in the next five years? I don't think so.
But do you see a truck that's 99% run automated with a driver up there in the next probably five, 10 years? I can see it as a possibility. And it's already happening. I mean, the thing is right now it's already, I mean, there's completely driverless trucks at a lot of these warehouses within confined spaces.
I think, I don't know if it's Amazon or some of these others, but there's trucks that, I mean, they're being run a hundred percent without human interaction, you know, that are moving little trailers and yet in, in small lots. So, I mean, it's in safer confinement environments.
Yeah. I gotta say I've, I've been in the super crews on the GM side of things and Never, I mean, two years ago, I said, why the hell would you need that? And you get in it, and it's like, oh, this is nice. It's not just keeping you between two lines.
It's sensing if someone's next to you, and if someone's slower in front of you, it'll turn your turn signal on and go ahead and pass it, you know, on the interstate. It's nuts. So it's kind of cool. That's awesome.
So I want to know for our listeners, where's the best place to get a good deal on a used truck and trailer? Yeah. Everybody wants to know where the honey hole is.
You know, that's really not my expertise. I don't, I don't get involved on like truck and trailer pricing. I mean, I can tell you where just from on our, we have a forum on our website where people talk and I mean, truckpaper.com. I think a lot of people go there. We do have a for sale classified section on bulk loads that actually gets a lot of attention.
I've actually heard a lot of people that have that have bought and traded on there. But it's really, it's interesting because it depends on where you're at in the U S and then kind of what you're looking for.
There's so many different specs when you're dealing with, with semi trucks and there's guys that still want the old classic, you know, quote long nose trucks that, and there's, that's the reason why a lot of these guys want to be in the industry because they want to be driving the, the, the old really stylish chromed out show rigs. But then there's also, so the guys that want,
You know, more technology, super slick, fuel efficient type vehicles as well. So that's a whole other topic in excess because you can go back and forth on the great debate on the classic trucks versus the newer models.
We all like to see them classic panty droppers coming down. I mean, that's what Tanner drives. He has to because he has to compensate for it. Not being so good looking.
I don't have small hands. I was actually cruising your classifieds page and my only critique is your posters needs to stop saying call for price. Too many of them say call for price. I don't want to do that. Just tell me what it is.
vetting system yeah yeah marketing no it's good yeah i got one more um in agriculture if you don't if you're not born into it it's extremely hard to start i know it's a little bit true if you're owning like a bigger trucking company but you know at the end of the day a guy if you got the knowledge can go out and get a loan hopefully and
buy a truck and pull someone's trailer or buy a trailer maybe too. So what is the best way for someone to get into the trucking industry?
So trucking, we do see a lot of generational companies. So, you know, grandpa started the business, dad ran it. Now the grandson's running the business, very successful ones. I can go through and start naming a bunch of those, but trucking, unlike farming, it doesn't require a, that amount of capital to get into it.
It's actually, I've said this for years, trucking, it's pretty low barriers of entry. So you'll see a lot of companies and this is kind of where you have a little bit of the washout. But typically the way we see it, guy, he's been driving for another company for years and wants to go out on his own, you know, have the American dream. So yeah,
saves us some money, goes to his banker, gets the loan, goes, gets his DOT. Typically those guys, I mean, you can be in business pretty quick. I mean, from, I don't want to say the exact, but I mean, within three to four, six months, if you're doing it all, I mean, you can get the truck trailer, get the authority, get your license, get on the load board and start moving pretty quick.
So the process is relatively pretty simple. I think to counteract that, I think you You have too many people getting into it without any business knowledge, not knowing what pricing is, not knowing what rate per mile they should be hauling. And that's where we're really trying to teach people to make sure that they're not getting into a spot where they can't get out of.
So is that someone that say they did get started, they got the truck, all that, but they don't have the reputation. Is that something you can help them with?
Yeah, absolutely. And in trucking, you got to have a good reputation. You got to do the job, but you're... you're hauling from point A to point B. And there's a lot more, there's service to that. But most companies in the bulk space, and again, I can talk to you when I was a shipper and we hired trucks. For me, it was a matter of like, hey, I got this much to move.
And yeah, I had certain companies that did business with me that I would maybe pick over. But for lack, I mean, it didn't matter whether you were brand new or had 10 years experience. I mean, if you had available truck, you're getting the loads just like everybody else. I mean, because there's just always that much more to move. Nice.
I can see in some industries, if you get more specialized, trying to get in with, there is something with these bigger companies. So if you want to get in hauling for, let's just say Cargill out of a soy processing plant or a DDG plant, there is probably more of a line or wait list that you got to have to get on those. And typically the rule of thumb, you'll probably start off owner operator.
You'll probably be hauling for
a brokerage or some small outfit maybe even another trucking company that they're dispatching you to haul loads until you get your name out there get to know it and then move up where you're hauling more directly or for bigger name type companies good well i only got one question before we wrap up and i saw on your website that you have a conference you got your own conference what uh who does that apply to is that something i should be looking into
Yeah, man, I'm so glad you brought that up. We are super excited. This will be our third year hosting the Bulk Freight Conference. This was something, it was four years ago, we started brainstorming. And one thing we realized, like bulk loads, we created this ecosystem of shippers, brokers, and carriers, and we did it digitally.
why not bring this to life and bring it out, you know, bring people together in person. So that's what started. Yeah. This will be our third year. It'll be this next, it'll be next April, April 16th through the 18th down here in Branson, Missouri. We rented this huge convention center. I'll say this, our first year when we hosted it, obviously you learned so much. We had 200 people come.
It was an awesome conference. Next year, last year, we had 500. This year we're projecting over a thousand. So we'll have, A combination of all different trucking companies, shipping companies, freight brokerages, but then also all vendors. So companies like Cornhusker behind here, they're going to be there. Other trailer manufacturers, truck manufacturers will have show trucks.
But I guess I'll say this too. So if somebody wants to know why, why should I attend? I say this all the time. There is a clear difference. You can meet someone on bulk loads digitally and make that relationship.
But when you're sitting with that person face-to-face, either with a cocktail or appetizer, and you start talking, the relationship that you form and the bond, it's just something naturally, chemically that you will... that you will have. I've talked to so many people that after the conference, they maybe were hauling, I mean, there's two different scenarios.
They maybe were doing work with a company. Well, now that they met them and, and better that relationship, they're doing that much more with them or somebody they just met that they never knew existed out in the industry. So in this industry, you know, I always, I have the saying, you know, your net worth is your network, right?
So the more you network, the better people you're going to find, the more business you're going to get. And that's the industry we're in. I mean, especially trucking and shippers, you can never have enough in your database. You can never know enough trucking companies haul for you. If you're a trucking company, you can never know enough shippers because you never know when there's opportunities.
So yeah, I would love to see people there. It's going to be awesome. Branson cool town. If you've never been, it's right down here, South of Springfield, very family friendly. There's shows, there's the lake, there's golfing. I mean, it's just, it's a really cool spot. So we're super excited to have it down here this year. And yeah, it's going to be an awesome event.
Well, if you need a media company to come and, Document it and curate the event for you. You know who to reach out to. Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
Send us down there. We also, once we hang out, we're going to figure out who that trailer company is that can get us our own fleet.
Yeah. We can't have the back of a hopper. We're going to have something else.
I'd be copying.
You're going to want the front of a hopper? It kind of almost looks the same.
Actually, I just saw it on Facebook today. Someone makes these replicas. It's like the front end of a fridge. That's what you need right there. Open it up, get your bush light or whatever you want out of there. That's what you guys need to do for the backdrop.
They are like four or five grand, but they are badass.
That does sound good. It's a work expense. It's an investment for the backdrop. It's an investment. He tells me that all the time. We're investing in ourselves. We are investing in ourselves.
My wife says that all the time. She says, you tell me, everything's an investment. Anytime you want to buy something, it's always an investment. It should be. Sometimes they're bad investments, but everything's an investment.
What I got is she's throwing it back at me now, and she's like, we need this giant 15-foot inflatable pumpkin for –
for halloween and i was like no it's three hundred dollars that's stupid it's gonna blow away she's like it's an investment it's investing in what yeah and her happiness that's not an investment all right jared uh we appreciate you hanging out with us if our listeners want to follow you or or track along with what you've got going on how best do they do that
Yeah. I mean, you can find us all over the place, but yeah, simply bulkloads.com if you're interested. Even if you're out there and maybe you're a farmer listening to this, thinking about getting commercially licensed, man, reach out. We'd love to talk to you, show you the opportunities. We can give you a sneak underneath the hood if you want to see options and loads in your area.
And again, if you're brand new, not even in trucking, we can help you with all those processes to get started, everything from getting your license to to factoring, insurance, the whole kit and bootle. Or like I said, if you're out there and you're a trucking company and trying to expand your network, man, I would love to talk to you. And yeah, it's just, it's been a fun, fun ride.
So yeah, I would love to, I love talking to people. Events like this, the conference, like we just talked, these things fill me up more than anything. I get super excited about it.
Yeah. Well, thank you. It was our pleasure to have this conversation. And Corey, what do you tell the audience?
Crack a cold one. You deserve it.