Carrier Profiles

A. Blair Enterprises, Inc. – A Better Business Plan – Higher Pay!

A. Blair Enterprises, Inc. – A Better Business Plan – Higher Pay!

Few small carriers can boast about 24 continuous and profitable years in the expedited freight industry. With ten years of experience in sales and management for major freight forwarding companies, Tom Robertson began A. Blair Enterprises in 1984 primarily as an air freight forwarding company. When shipments exceeded the lift capacity of the commercial airlines, they began using trucks to meet the customer’s deadlines. Over the years, Robertson found the changing rules and regulations of the commercial airlines began to erode the certainty of on-time performance for his customers, and made a conversion to ground expedited freight, no longer handling air freight traffic.

For many years this company operated exclusively with company owned vehicles. In September of 2006 A Blair Enterprises, began contracting with owner operators as a trial for possible future expansion. Robertson stated, “our rates what somewhat lower than our competitors, but we had to be certain that we knew what we were doing, and that we could indeed turn a profit within the new business structure.”

What did you learn from the owner operator “business model”?
“ We learned a lot!”...
First and foremost we learned that we can operate on a smaller margin and still remain profitable. We are increasing our owner operator’s pay to $1.20 per mile and paying 100% of the fuel surcharge we obtain for each shipment.
We learned that great drivers may not be good business people
We learned that fleet owners sometimes make poor business decisions that place their trucks and drivers in jeopardy
We learned that those who listen and follow simple guidelines can and do prosper even in these difficult times.

What does the future hold in store for A. Blair Enterprises?

We now have access to more business than ever before. We are properly staffed with well trained and experienced personnel and poised to handle at least 30 more straight trucks. We have assembled the information we learned from our “trial period”, drawn proven conclusions and will be sharing this information with all new owner operators, to assist them in improving their business plans and profitability.

What messages do you have for fleet owners?

Our messages are simplistic, realistic and proven. Many fleet owners are losing as much as 30% of their trucks earning potential, having made one simple agreement with their drivers. We understand their reasoning, and past driver and fleet owner experience would indicate that the decision they made is a proper one. Our business plan nullifies the concerns that caused most fleet owners to choose their present method of business procedures. Following our plan with increase the fleet owners profit, the drivers compensation, and our profit as well. It’s a triple win, and it doesn’t get any better than that.

How do you intend to get your messages to the fleet owners and owner operators?

Steve Orlowski, our general manager, will cover the details with each new owner operator that signs on with us. The plan is not complicated, requires little thought, and does not require a college degree to understand. Additionally, I am making myself available, by appointment, to any fleet owner for a face to face meeting, which will take less than one hour. After hearing what we have to say I am certain that most business minded fleet owners will immediately see the benefits of our plan and be willing to sign a couple of their trucks on with our company for a trial of their own. A fleet owner simply needs to call our office and ask for an appointment.

How do you intend to keep all of these new trucks rolling?

We are presently bidding on less than 10% of the load opportunities that we see on a daily basis. We simply do not have trucks in many of the areas where the loads originate, and yes, we do know where those areas are. By increasing our fleet, and increasing the pay for owners, we will increase the number of shipments we handle on a daily basis. Furthermore, having a fleet of owners that understand and adopt our business plan, everyone involved will operate at higher revenues per truck.

How did you develop this “better business plan”?

This business plan was developed by paying attention to details and applying simplistic time/load/profit per hour logistics. We specialize in long distance expediting. There are many companies that handle inter city and intra-state movements. We simply don’t go there. Our average run exceeds 1000 miles and we plan to keep this average. We feel the plan maximizes the driver’s time and increases the hourly profitability for all owners.

It sounds like you think you have better way of doing business. How can you be so certain that your plan will work?

We have “real world” tested the plan and measured it with trucks and owners unaware of this plan. The results showed that the trucks using our plan over an 18 month period of time earned as much as 30% more than those not using the plan. The average increase in revenue was slightly over 16%.


How do you communicate load offers to your drivers?

We remain old fashioned in this respect that is, if you consider cell phones old fashioned. We like talking with our drivers. We consider them to be our partners, and are interested in their opinions. All of our drivers are on a first name basis with our dispatchers and office personnel. All of us have become a number within our governmental system, and I for one do not like having to identify myself as a number. When an owner operator comes into our company, he meets everyone, not just the recruiter. A business partner should have a face and a name and be able to talk with anyone in our organization. If you want to be invisible, then our company is not for you. We want to share in our driver’s excitement and success.

If you could specify the qualities of potential drivers, which qualities would you find to be the most important?

We have been in business for more than 24 years and there is not a day that goes by that something new about the business cannot be learned. The most important quality would be for our potential drivers to be open minded, and willing to give the new business model a fair try. Who in this or any other business would not want to earn an additional 30%? Obviously everyone would like to increase their revenue, but many question the business plan from the beginning. I assure you that the model works within our company and have seen the results of this plan. I can’t promise everyone a 30% increase, but I can promise a more productive and profitable experience for all involved. Other qualities we look for include honesty, experience, a good work ethic, a positive attitude and a willingness to become a team member of a closely knit, personal and professional organization. Teams are our preference but we also are interested in single straight trucks. We have no openings for Sprinters or Vans at this time.

What else is new at A. Blair Enterprises?

We’ve designed a new web site, and the good folks at Expediters Online are developing and creating the format and details for us. On the site we will be displaying photos of our drivers and trucks, listing many of the companies we have done work for in the past and showing photo’s of our offices and personnel. It should be a really nice looking site, providing a link to our present application page on EO.


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502-339-0648