Came back with a bank window down yelling now money at a day hey oh Got the foot on the gas pedal to the metal when I'm get to the back hey Got the foot on the gas pedal to the metal when the lane moving fast hey Let them all cross if they hate then let them made them make a bigger boss hey.
What is up ladies and gentlemen? We are back. We are live. It is the Freight Coach Podcast, the top podcast in transportation, coming to you guys every single weekday, 8:30am Pacific, 10:30 Central, to break down some industry headlines. But most importantly, you guys provide some actual insight into what you can do with all of this information. If this is your first time tuning in, welcome. This is the real side of freight, ladies and gentlemen. And I say that before every single show.
And what I mean by that is I only speak with transportation professionals because at the end of the day, you guys, I, I want to talk to the right individuals who have done what you're looking to do or who are currently doing what you're trying to achieve, so you can take that information, apply it, utilize it, and see a meaningful difference in your business and your life. Happy Monday, everybody. As I said, the Freight Coach Roadshow is in literal full effect today. And in typical fashion, my normal camera isn't working today. So we're going old school off of the laptop webcam here. But with that being said, you guys, we're going to be talking about the warehousing side of things, right? Right.
This, this individual, I've known this guy for a few years now and you know, he jumped over to a different side of the industry that I haven't really ever discussed in depth on the show. So I figured why not talk about that. So I had Mr. DJ Shirley on the show today. So, DJ, thank you so much for joining me.
Glad to be here, Chris, thanks for taking the time.
No, man, absolutely. And you know, and especially with this side of the industry that you're on, but this isn't the only side of the industry that you've been on, man. So like kind of how I start out of every show. Dude, how'd you get your start in freight? What brought you into transportation?
So it's funny, I was at kind of a crossroads career wise. You know, I never finished school. You know, it just wasn't for me. It wasn't the easiest thing for me and had always had the gift of gab and started out in roofing sales. And you know, after about a three or four months stint in that, I learned real Quickly what I didn't want to do for the rest of my life. So ended up jumping on the freight train with tql. Take that for what it's worth. But I will say TQL has taught me everything that I know about a sales process and everything like that. And from then jumped around to another brokerage or two, tried to start my own brokerage and that didn't pan out. Learned a lot. A lot, a lot.
And then, you know, after that didn't pan out, I found myself at another crossroads and I was turning 33 and you know I was ready to make that career jump. We don't have any kids or anything like that. Luckily I've got a good lady at home, but ended up being jobless for about five to six months until Michael Baker, our owner, good buddy of mine, played golf with him and basically pulled him aside at the club one day and said, please hire me. And now in the rack integrator business.
Okay, so dude, what is that though? Like, the rack integrator? Like, how are you guys out there, you know, developing business and everything else to really like, are you guys going to like direct to like a consumer goods company and then trying to find them warehousing and then just like, because they're looking to expand and grow out their current space.
So a rack integrator is basically a full cycle solution. We distribute RAC through a couple of different vendors. We install, we tear down, we label, we engineer. Most of the times, clients that come to us or that we're reaching out to have already got warehouse spacing. A lot of times we work with general contractors that have clients that have enlisted them to build them a warehouse. At that time, the general contractor will approach a company like us to come in and through an RFP process or just through a relationship that's already established, we'll end up quoting projects, winning them that way. We also, part of my job is I do reach out and cold outreach a good bit. But, you know, it's. That part of the business has been kind of a breath of fresh air.
I mean, Chris, as you know it, I mean, you'll bust out 50, 70 calls on the brokerage side of things. And you know, 75 to 90% of the time you're getting hung up on.
Yeah.
Which it's been a interesting kind of turn of events career wise. Whenever you call these folks and they actually want to talk to you.
Yeah. You know, so, dude, like, let's talk about that Right. Because I think, you know, at least from like a business development standpoint, you know, it's one of those things that I kind of like, embrace the fact that like, the rejection is just such a natural part of every single industry that comes along. So, like, how did cold calling in freight prepare you for doing it in a different industry? Because, like, you know, at the end of the day I always, Yeah, I always say if you made it in freight for six months, you're in it for life. But that's not always the case. Right. So like, what was the main difference between, you know, dialing in as a freight broker trying to develop business, and then now what you're currently doing?
Yeah, and don't get me wrong, I face my fair share of rejection. You know, I really do. You know, we're still dealing with the gatekeepers and getting pushed off the phone now. We're fine right now. We don't like, check back in six months. But, you know, it's a lot like the freight industry. You know, you have your different verticals in the freight industry. You're your drive in your reefer, your flatbed, the whole shebang, which, I mean, we have different verticals here that we can sell to. I still pull up Google Maps and we'll look for warehousing. I still get on LinkedIn trying to find the right point of contacts, but it's just been a breath of fresh air. You know, it's a lucrative industry, just like the freight or just like the freight industry. And you know, there's always something to do.
You know, I mean, we've got protection that, that we sell. You know, whenever you think about forklifts and warehouses and you'll walk into some of these warehouses and these frames are just bent to hell and back from people hitting them. So you just, you continue to sell to the same pain points. Right?
Yeah.
And is your broker sitting in late trucks? Is your, is your, are your forklift drivers being careless in your warehouse? So I mean, the, it's the same exact thing. You just, you just remember to sell to your. And you know, as always, you sell service. Right. Our tactic is the details come standard. So I mean, you just continue to sell yourself and continue to build the relationships just how you would in the freight industry.
So what's been your biggest learning moment, do you think, in kind of switching to that side of the industry? Right.
So my biggest learning curve is not really still knowing enough about the engineering side of things. And I mean, this isn't a knock on anybody in the freight industry. But I mean, I'm having to talk to engineers, I'm having to talk to a lot of people that are a lot smarter than I am and really leaning on our in house designer Alexis and our owner Michael. You know, my Michael always tells me, you know, salespeople aren't the most detailed people. And I am guilty of that through and through. So. Yeah, and freight, you know, a lot of times it's fast paced, which I will say. I, I miss it. I, I miss the, I miss whenever the market's tight. I miss whenever we're trying to find 434, 30 trucks on a Friday and making the margin. But it's slowed down over here.
You know, the RFP processes is totally different. You know, I would get frustrated early on. I'm like, hey, why isn't this quote been sent out? It's been a week and a half to two weeks.
Yeah.
And I mean there's just numerous different hoops to jump through. So slowing down, learning what you don't know has really been a thorn in my side. And it still is.
Yeah, dude, I think that's one of the hardest parts in anything like with business development as a whole, you know. Cause it's like I, I'm a firm believer that speed kills all. You know, like if you're not fast, like speed will kill all deals. You know, in the sense of like, if you do not stay on top of stuff, things will follow the wayside really fast and you have to be organized. But like, then again, man, like I've only. You're like when you're doing like an rfp, for example, yeah, you're putting out pricing and it takes a little bit of time, but you still have a, like a deadline. Like no, here's your rfp. You have three weeks to submit all your pricing, get it in by this date and then we'll give your response within three weeks after the fact.
But for the most part, man, the entirety of freight is transactional. Right? Like there are, there is a, everybody talks about RFP freight all the time, but there is such a small percentage of those opportunities that are out there that a lot of us are in the trenches trying to drive up those, the, the spot market opportunities where it is. And then even with the RFP customers, for the most part, when you, if you onboard with them, you're starting off as a spot Market provider for them before they give you access to anything, rfp. So it's like, I don't know if I could ever switch into that mode where it's like, no, this is a six month process and there's all of this stuff.
Hopefully dj, I'll have somebody to take care of that stuff for me and then just report back because I don't have that ability, man. Like, I am like to a fault, I am more of go, go, run through the wall and then build up, you know, find the soft spot after you run through it.
Yeah, let's figure it out later. Yeah, and to that point, you know, we do have kind of like a spot market over here in the warehousing side of. And that is just like quick fixes, like I said, the bent frames or we have a couple of damaged beams, like, can you help us out here? And you know, we'll just like you guys are us in the freight industry. We will slash our pricing, do the first couple loads at cost, get our foot in the door. You know, I always said, hey, people's freight looks better on my board than it does in anybody else's. Because if it's on somebody else's board, then they're the ones talking to the customer. They're building the relationship, you know. And I mean, I'm just sitting over here on the sidelines waiting for the next opportunity.
So I mean, that's how we got in with one of our newer, bigger clients is we came in, we, I mean, we didn't do it at cost, but I mean we just came in there, killed it on the service side and we're seven projects deep going, coming into Q1 or Q2. So I mean, there's a lot of similarities, but you know, I mean, sales is sales.
Yeah, no, I'm right there with you, man. And I think like it is, you know, like, I mean, and I think like I actually just put a post out there this morning about this. It's just so like we get so caught up in moments that we kind of lose sight of the long term in business development, you know, and then especially with everything current events that are going on right now, everybody's just focused on this exact moment. They're not looking out of what could potentially happen in the next five years, 10 years or anything else. And in my opinion in business you have to keep that mindset going is it's like, dude, you can't look at this one deal. If you lost or whatever, you broke even Maybe you misquoted. It doesn't matter. You got to look at.
All right, this is your audition for the next one. And then, you know, and then the next one and the next one. That's. Dude, that's just my mindset with everything. And I feel like that's what hampers a lot of people is. Is, you know, people have a hard time understanding that they're not always going to win every single time that they step up.
Yeah. And I mean, if they did, everybody would be in the freight industry. Everybody would be in the. The racking industry. You know, I mean, you take your licks and I mean, that's kind of what, what molds you into the type of broker or type of salesperson you want to be, Right? Take your licks and move on, dude.
So what, what is. How are you guys kind of projecting things this year? Right? Like, you. Again, you guys are out there on a different side of the industry. What are you. Are people apprehensive to make any real changes? Or are people like, hey, man, we want to go all in? Especially, you know, dep Kind of the shakeout of a lot of this stuff. I feel like warehouse space could potentially become a premium here very quickly, depending on how a couple of cards fall.
Yeah, exactly. And I wouldn't say they're pulling back on the reins indefinitely, but, you know, there is some apprehension there. You know, on our side of things, a big proponent of. Of this type of stuff is safety. I mean, there is. I mean, it really is. I was kind of. I walked into my first warehouse whenever I started and it was put on. Put on your PPE and all this. And I'm kind of like, okay, like there's not any. There's not even anybody on the floor working right now. We're here during lunch. I don't hear any forklifts. Like, let's, like, let's calm down. But then, you know, after you think about the overhead on the safety side of things, people. People value that. So they're not pulling back on the reins per se. But there is some uncertainty out there.
You know, a lot of the tariffs are on steel is raw goods. You know, with that comes. Comes the shipping side of things. A lot of stuff comes from overseas. You know, I mean, with the freight market being the way that it is, it's. It all. It's almost like a snowball effect, you know. But a lot of what we've been telling customers, there are some ways to. To mitigate that on the Front end. You know, you could order in bulk. If you have the warehouse space to store new goods, you can. If you have the space to sell or not sell to store used goods, you can do it that way. You can order in bulk or you can just pull back on the range.
Like I said, a lot of what we do and a lot of what I've started to see people do is go to the used market whenever it comes to racking. And whenever I say used, you know, it might not be 10 out of 10. You know, we use that sliding 1 out of 10 scale to. To. To look and judge racking. But a lot of people have started to ask about the use side of things.
Yeah. Do you think that's going to drive, you know, obviously having a lot of that in. And then, you know, again, I know that with everything in regards to the steel industry that's happening right now, there's could be. I don't want to call it a lag in production, but, you know, it could get swarmed and then, you know, certain things happen. So do you feel like. Like, how are you guys going out there and sourcing that? If there's any changes in any warehousing kind of. How do you guys source the. The used racking market out there?
So a lot of times, like right now, we're in 8 to 10,000 square feet of warehousing space over here in Kennesaw, Georgia, just north of Atlanta. And we keep a little bit of inventory on site where we can just get a truck and ship a few beams out to some clients. But whenever. So that's another thing. Whenever it comes to the tariffs, we've seen lead times on getting new material shoot through the roof. I mean, new material would be in about eight to 10 weeks. Now it's like 10 to 14. So we've been really trying to push people to the used market because we know that people are trying to save some coin. And not to mention that's going to cut down on. On lead times significantly. You know, I mean, there's no sense in paying a premium for new beams.
Whenever we've got newer ish beams that are in good shape inventory, we can go out, we have partners that will partner with that have a much bigger inventory of used material than we would and ship them straight to the. Straight to the warehouse. And a lot of times they'll install themselves, like all these warehouse workers. I mean, and they're very savvy.
Yeah. So walk me through. Say I'm a. I'm a company. You know, I'm your guys's target prospect here, right? Like, I need a new warehouse space. Dj, I need to come in. We got to find a bigger space. We got to redesign the inside. Walk me through. How does something like that work?
Yeah, so a lot of times we'll ask for the CAD drawing of the building, the existing rack, if they have any ideas in terms of the elevation, meaning, like how tall the rack's gonna be, how many beam levels, meaning how many pallets are gonna sit on each level of the racking system. At that point, I'll bring our in house designer, Alexis on the call and she will literally pull her screen up and share her screen and CAD drawing and we'll troubleshoot it with the client. Hey, how big are your pallets? How heavy is each pallet? What are you trying to accomplish? Are you just trying to gain more pallet positions? Are you trying to make your warehouse flows more seamlessly? What exactly like in the freight industry. Hey, what are your pain points right now? Are your aisles too small?
Is that why your drivers are hitting your frames? Do you, do you have a customer that is what are they trying to accomplish? Right? So at that point, we'll bring our in house designer in design, their racking system, if they need carton flow, which is another vertical palette flow, just, it's all tailored to the customer and what they're trying to accomplish right there is really. Every project is so different, so different. But then after the design aspect of it, at that point, we'll go out to our vendors, we'll put a bill of material together. If we need 3,000 frames and 6,000 beams or whatever the numbers look like, we'll source it, we'll put a quote together. And again, I mean, takes some time. It's not just a spot market quote like that.
I mean, these big projects, I mean, sometimes they'll take months, not months, but a month or a few weeks to get pricing back. And then at that point, we'll bring our project manager on, talk about scheduling, see where our crews are. And a lot of it also has to do with their timeline and how soon that they need it done. This past project that we're finishing up, we had an existing client come to us and say, hey, we need you guys out by the fourth. And we're like, yeah, you know, I mean, and we told him it was going to be probably going to be the seventh or the eighth and you know, they were cool with it, but I mean, that was for a big client of theirs and we were able to somewhat make the target.
But yeah, it's, you know, I'm bringing up a lot of this stuff because I'm, you know, it's kind of funny that you're. That we're talking about this today because I'm in one of my customers, man, they're. This is. We just got. I was talking to him this morning. We're going to do the third site transfer for them, right? So they're. It's all, you know, in. In the city that they're currently stationed in. But like, dude, I'm learning so much about this because, like, we, you know, from a broker standpoint, we found it. It is exponentially easier just to hire multiple trucks on day rates and just have them sitting on site and then we load them up as we go and then we turn and burn and try and get as many things done as possible.
I mean, you know, one of them today, for example, weather delay and everything. So there's a bunch of different factors that come out there. But like, I'm bringing up a lot of this because I don't think any broker should be, should shy away from any potential opportunities like this. When a customer does build out a new facility. Like, man, there is. There's a bunch of stuff that you can do. And then I've actually found from a capacity standpoint, drivers prefer this, like, a lot more than most people would think, right? Like, they're getting their money, they're getting paid for the day. And then, you know, the more turns in. In a day that they can get, the better off, you know, that things go. But I mean, dude, this is a lot more common than you think.
Then I feel like a lot of individuals can, you know, expand out their service offerings and their footprint because, you know, it's not as challenging as it might seem, right? Like when we're talking multiple different pieces, you know, because we have two separate customers that are actually doing this right now, one on the west coast, one on the East Coast. And you know, dude, it's a process, but like, you know, again, things take time like you're talking about and then ask even more questions than you would think to get all of that information out there, because again, you don't want to get the wrong amount of capacity in there. And then, you know, you ended up needing 10 trucks for, you know, hypothetical example, but you only blocked in 8 and stuff like that.
And then again with the property managers and the deadlines that come along with it, like, you know, it might seem like a lot, but dude, I'm telling you, if you just take a slow and steady approach to a lot of this, man, it's a, it's. I honestly almost, I don't want to say I prefer it, but like, I enjoy it because it's like, man, there's the drivers are way more open to it and you know, and that's just another way like for. To add value to your customers that most people won't even attempt to do.
Yeah, exactly. And I mean to that point, you know, I mean a lot of those local. If you're doing local moves, you've got local guys, I mean, they're sitting there, they're getting paid by the hour and they get to sleep in their own bed. And yeah, like to your point, we were up in New Jersey at the beginning of February for a big retail client and they had some fixtures that they were on the fence of whether or not they wanted to order new fixtures for a retail front, which is, I mean it was numerous retail fronts, which I didn't know Charlie did. You know, it's like 500 grand to outfit a retail front with fixtures.
Like fixtures meaning what the actual, like if you go into a Walmart or you go into just any retail front where there's picture frame sitting or silverware sitting to outfit a retail store, it's 500 grand. This particular client had a bunch of used fixtures. I mean, a lot of them were busted up, but they probably had enough to do about five stores and it was going to save them hundreds of hundreds of thousands of dollars. And went up there into this warehouse, we did a quick like Cliff Notes inventory of it. And we're actually planning on building them a mock store and unused warehouse space where they can come in and they can pick and choose what kind of layout that they want in these retail stores. And to say all that is. It's a brand new vertical. We've never done any of that.
Yeah, so it's differentiate differentiating yourself and really being able to be that full turnkey solution.
Dude, it's a science, man. Like the retail. I, I don't know a lot about re so I'm not going to try and sound like I, I do but like, I've read enough books here recently where man, it is a literal Science and what people pay for those shelf spaces and everything that come on like that. So just the design and the layouts of some of these stores, like I'm actually shocked. It's only at 500 for that, man. I would have expected a lot more, especially with, you know, I'm sure they could probably get the cost down exponentially with the amount of build outs and stuff that come along with it.
But yeah man, the premium that comes along and it's like, and this is like, you know, when it comes down to it for me, dj, the fact that somebody out there is going to be able to listen to this conversation now and go to their customers to talk to their customers about this, because it's only a matter of time before this comes up to somebody. Or you know what? Like for me, why I love talking to people from multiple sides of the industry is it's. I've just been doing this long enough to know that eventually a question like this to my table and I'm going to know exactly who to go to now with this. Right? Like, I mean knowing to go to you for this instance. And like I've had Matt Fain with pop capacity on my show numerous times.
You know, he's helped me out in a pinch with a couple of my shippers who need short term warehousing for a week and stuff like that. So it's like, man, to have that, like that network of individuals to reach out to. I don't know if enough like, I wouldn't have appreciated this early on in my career. Now that I'm a business owner, I'm like, dude, knowing somebody everywhere has paid off tenfold for me.
Yep, yep. And I mean that's what I mean. Shoot, dude. I mean were just, we, you and I started out just by double tapping on each other's LinkedIn posts and I would tune into the podcast every week and I mean it's just one of those things, man. I always tell people whenever it comes to LinkedIn, you know, this isn't Instagram or Facebook. Like accept every invitation because, you know, I mean is big as the supply chain industry is. I mean there is different verticals. I mean whether you're a freight broker, whether you're a rack integrator, whether you're a 4PL, whether you're, you're a freight forwarder, you know, I mean it's. But at the same time, it's a very small industry whenever it comes to relationships. Everybody knows everybody, dude.
Straight up, man. I couldn't agree more. Dj, thank you so much for taking the time to join me today. How does anybody reach out to you guys to find out more about what you guys got going on?
Yeah, so it's Baker Brothers Installations. We've been around for about 30 years. Our owner Michael is great. We're a smaller team. On the day to day, it's me and maybe five people in the office. But you can reach me, DJ Shirley, like Shirley Temple@BakerBrothers installations.com Go to our website. We've got a nice new pretty website that we're about to roll out. But yeah, come talk to us. For whatever reason, if we can't help out, we could definitely point you in the right direction. And as always, buddy, I mean, if you ever have any questions or any leads, shoot them over. I'll do the same, dude.
Absolutely, man. Dj, thank you so much for joining me. That is going to be it for today, you guys. We got guests tomorrow and then I'm going to be down in Texas later this week as well for the TIA Capital Ideas Conference. We'll be doing the show for there. But as always, you guys, if you got value in what you heard, subscribe to the show. Ladies and gentlemen, if you're feeling really ambitious after this one, which you should because this is another resource for you guys to tap into your freight network. Rank the show on itunes and Spotify, because if you see value, chances are that's how your network's going to see it as well. I appreciate you guys. I love you guys and we'll be talking to you soon. We don't have any cool outro, dj. We.