Expediter Services (ES) currently works with expedited-trucking companies including Panther Premium Logistics, Forward Air, FedEx Custom Critical and XPO Logistics to enhance their capacity solutions and build opportunities through lease-purchase and other buying plans with ownership as the end goal. With a goal of expanding the company’s overall program offerings beyond expediting to the general trucking market under the SuccessInTrucking.com market brand, ES announced that the company has retained the consulting services of the National Transportation Institute (NTI) and the organization’s Chief Operating Officer, Leah Shaver. NTI and Shaver will be providing ES with insightful market analysis focused on truck ownership opportunities for professional drivers and the growing need for owner-operator capacity among carriers.
ES says an increasing number of professional drivers interested in truck ownership are discovering their accessible programs, which provide opportunities that create small businesses run by owner-operators. The general trucking initiatives featured through the Success in Trucking website utilize the same principles that allowed Expediter Services to become a “leading provider of owner-operator capacity within the expedited transportation sector,” the company says, during the past decade.
“As we begin to take the next steps within general trucking,” said ES President Jason Williams, who serves on the Board of Directors of the Women in Trucking association with Shaver, “we are looking forward to working with NTI and Leah. We value the resources and knowledge NTI brings to the table, and we have found that our two organizations share a similar mindset in the desire to place an intense focus on the overall success of professional truck drivers.”
The in-depth process that ES undertakes in examining carriers seeking to become part of the ES Network and to secure the highly-valued, non-asset capacity available through the ES community reminded Shaver of the work NTI does with carriers seeking NTI’s Top Paid Carrier Certification. In Shaver’s view, ES serves as a champion for professional drivers seeking success as small business owners in the trucking industry by in part emphasizing the opposite of what is prevalent in too many lease-purchase plans. “ES provides the opportunity to live the dream and not the facade of a dream that we have seen in the industry with so many lease-purchase programs,” Shaver said. “Many lease-purchase programs are identified as a walk-away lease, which inherently terms it as temporary. … The programs at ES are basically the opposite of what is prevalent with lease-purchase programs. ES offers true ownership of the truck and a strong platform for building a business.”