Carrier Profiles
CEO Focus: Ben Bauman of Bolt Express
By Jeff Jensen, Editor
Sep 4, 2007 - 9:54:00 AM

Someday, when a journalist compiles the history of the expedited trucking business, he will have to include the success story of the Toledo, Ohio-based Bolt Express.  This  modestly-sized fast freight carrier has, in the six years since its founding, grown to become one of the industry's first-call companies.

Ben Bauman, the founder and President of Bolt Express says, "We have a philosophy or pledge at Bolt Express:"  We commit to satisfying your expectations. We pledge to be responsive and to follow through on all commitments. We desire to be predictable, reliable, trustworthy, safety minded, willing to go the extra mile for something we believe in and to be the best at what we do.
 
Originally from Toledo, Ohio, Bauman (44) is one of nine children.  His father was a lawyer with his own legal firm.  Bauman says that his parents instilled the children with traditional family values and "taught us all to work hard."   Of the nine siblings, eight became entrepreneurs with their own businesses.

Bauman and his wife Libby, have been married 23 years and have three children, aged 18, 17 and 15.  He lists his personal interests as riding his Harley-Davidson and travel.  He recently enjoyed a three-week trip to Europe to watch his 15-year old son collect two gold medals in the Taekwondo World Championships in Birmingham, England.

His industry beginnings
"I graduated from Davis Business College 1982 and moved to Akron, Ohio to attend the University of Akron transportation program," says Bauman.  "While attending the University of Akron, I was hired by Roberts Express in 1984 as a part-time customer service agent." 

"Roberts was growing so fast in the early 80’s, that I was full-time within two weeks.  From there I was promoted to the Marketing Department where I worked trade shows and helped develop their Inside Sales program. Within a short time I was promoted to outside sales in Detroit, Michigan, handling the automotive market."

He continues, "In 1992 I had the opportunity to became President of World Logistics Group, a holding company that owned and managed Pronto Emergency Freight, Roco Courier and Delivery Service and two Airborne station contracts in Toledo, Ohio and Denver, Colorado."

A new enterprise
"In 2001, I started Bolt Express," Bauman relates. "I recruited a team of professionals with experience in the expedite market."

"Together we developed a business plan, which has not changed as of today, and our goal as a team was to build a company based on providing legendary customer service, a strong partnership with our Owner-Operators and an aggressive growth strategy."

Bauman says that in the beginning, it was a tremendous task to get the whole Bolt operation up and running:
"Our people were very good but we only had eleven trucks - nine cargo vans, one small straight truck and one larger straight truck." 

"We sold freight faster than we could cover it and out of frustration with that situation, we started Bolt Logisitics in 2002.  We now have a group of some 300 trucking companies across the U.S. that we partner with.  This has allowed us to grow and cover the freight that our sales brought in."

Growth
Bolt Express started in a 1600 sq. ft. office suite but within several months, the organization had to expand into additional space. As the company grew, it was faced with the problem of hiring Owner-Operators fast enough to handle the volume of business.

Bauman explains, "In 2005, we built a new 12,000 square foot headquarters just off I-75 in Toledo, Ohio. This allowed us to expand our staffing and to handle the volume of Owner-Operators that needed to be hired." 

"With the growth over the last two years however, we find ourselves out of space and doubling up in offices. Therefore, we have plans to break ground in March 2008 on a new 12,000 square foot expansion here at the headquarters, which will house our new state of the art Operations and Call Center and Corporate offices."

He adds, "Over the last three years we have been presented as one of the “Fastest Growing Expedite Companies in North America” by GPS Technologies. Our growth history, year-over-year for the last five years, has actually exceeded the growth percentages of the large expedite companies in the early 1980’s."

The company atmosphere
Bolt's president tells us, "The team here at Bolt Express not only applies the Bolt philosophy stated earlier to the Customers and Owner-Operators, but they have taken it to heart and apply this to their fellow team mates."

Bauman states, "I have the rare opportunity to work with a group of people at Bolt Express that motivate me everyday and at the same time, make me laugh." 

"At a 'normal' company, the CEO is the person that sets the pace or atmosphere, but at Bolt Express we have a team of people that are not only the hardest working group I have worked with, but also a team that makes work fun each and every day.  I look forward to coming to the office each day, it’s a lot of fun to see what is going to happen today."

Technology
Bauman says that one of the founding principles of the company is to always stay on the cutting edge with technology.  He realized early on that the company truly provides “information management” for its customers.  Many times the customer never even sees the truck, but the customer can always see information about his shipments.

"Some of the technology that has helped us obtain and maintain the growth and profitability for the last five years are related to our ability to analyze information from our systems and make quick changes when necessary."

"Our financial systems are also very advanced, giving us the ability to provide the Owner-Operator with information that helps assist them in running their business in a more profitable manner. We can show our owner-operators their settlements a week in advance of the actual pay date."

"Another example of our information management is in our XML interface technology that provides our customers with a shipment update automatically; we don't have to call or send information any longer, it's done through the Qualcomm.  This results in lower staffing requirements and greater efficiency."

Drivers/Owner Operators
Bauman says that from the very beginning of Bolt Express, the philosophy has been to provide the Owner-Operator with great service:  "Early on in the business, we established a Driver Relations Department, long before we really needed it.  However, we realized that without an excellent and fair relationship with the Owner-Operators we would never obtain the growth that we had projected."

"I don’t think anyone has ever perfected a system of working with the Owner-Operators.  That's mainly because they are individuals and have unique needs and requirements. We've spent a lot of time listening and working to help improve the relationship between Owner-Operators and the company, which has created value for the customers."

Bauman continues, "We have found that giving the Owner-Operator a venue to vent and share their thoughts and ideas with the company has helped develop stronger relationships with our fleet.  After our implementation of this program, we have seen our average turnover percentage for the last three years remain below 80%, which is well below the industry average."

"We have a very excellent group of Owner-Operators and a large percentage of them have been with our company for many years. We truly value what they do each and every day on the road for the company."

Looking forward
"Building our fleet and improving services to our Owner Operators is the top priority in the near future," says the Bolt Express chief executive.  "We understand that we can't always make everyone happy, but we intend to do our best at developing a strong partnership with our fleet."

"As for our continued growth, we are currently working on a new sales structure to expand and increase our already strong customer base.  To keep up with our current growth rate, we are working hard to develop and maintain added value to our customer relationships."

An overview
"I still see the expedite business growing, at least for Bolt Express. We are still taking market share.  I've been in this industry for 22 years now and I think that expedite has become a norm in transportation and industry has finally accepted it as part of supply chain management.  With that, I think people accept using it a little more as a way to control inventory."

"I think it's growing still and there's room for very strong service companies.  There seem to be three or four top carriers then there's this huge gap between the players that are in the other group.  As a result, there's a lot of room in this industry for a company that provides real strong service and good rates; they will enjoy real growth.

Bauman adds, "Expedite has moved from the traditional manufacturing into retail, pharmaceuticals, etc.  Temperature-control and specialized handling has definitely grown and there's more rush, critical flatbed freight than before.  We're not really into the flatbed freight but we've been watching that market."  

"As I said before, expedite has become accepted and other industries have looked at it and realized that they can use it to save time and money."

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