Chapter 21

On Tuesday morning, although I was still very tired, I did my push-ups. I then jogged over to the Y and swam. After that, I looked in on the martial arts class and saw Annie kicking the air. She saw me and smiled, but quickly refocused on the teacher. I watched for about ten minutes, and saw that there were people at different levels, and that some were even beginners. In my estimation, there were about twenty people in the class, made up of two-thirds male and one-third female. Before changing into my runners, I waved to her and took the long way back to the hotel, with my backpack on that contained my swimming stuff.

I dressed and met Shawna at nine in the lobby of her firm's building. We used the same room as the day before, started to discuss various committees, and if and how they might or might not affect my company. At some point during the morning, we took a break. As I was coming back from the men's room, I saw Shawna talking with Shelly. When Shelly saw me, she smiled and blushed. I went on through and refilled my coffee before heading back to the conference room.

Shawna arrived and said, "It sounds like you were a statistic after all, one of the three hundred million people."

I just shrugged. "Lola is a very nice girl."

"Are you going out with her again?"

"I don't know, since she said she was busy, but I may call her from time-to-time."

"She had a good time last night according to Shelly."

"I'm glad. I like to make people happy."

"You certainly did that my friend. She was very happy, but a little tired this morning."

"Let's get back to work," I said.

We went back to discussing the business. During lunch, we each grabbed a quick bite and then worked through the rest of the business plan. That evening, I ate alone and went through some reports Beth sent to me at the hotel. On Wednesday, we reviewed and clarified different points that we wanted to make and then on Thursday, we sat down with Mr. Timmons to review the entire project again. He thought we were ready and told me that we'd start at nine on Friday.

I stopped at the tailor, and picked up the rest of my wardrobe before reviewing my notes one last time. On Friday, we met in a larger conference room where there were maybe ten to twelve people representing different departments in the firm. It was necessary for them to understand the new customer and to see how they needed to represent my company to the committees they worked with.

Mr. Timmons started the meeting by saying, "Britt is here today as one of our newest clients. He's with Freedom Trucking. Yesterday, I sat in with him and Shawna, and I'm quite impressed with what they're doing. I think that they'll be a great client and we have already started to look at some new opportunities since he's come on-board. Britt, what I would like you to do, is first of all go through the entire project, and give some insight on what you do and how you believe you're different. Then we can look at various areas that may need more attention due to the potential problems they can cause."

I said hello and then went into a detailed explanation of the main trucking company and the other companies that we created to make the larger plan come together. There were no questions as I spoke, but they all took notes.

When I finished, I looked up and immediately, a hand shot up, so I nodded to the man.

He said, "Chad Solomon. What do you think are the negative impacts that could be brought up, as a result of what you're doing?"

"Initially, it will cause a few companies to go out of business. I also believe that it could cause some of them to default on their bank loans."

He followed up, "Why don't you buy the companies or merge with them if it will help on the public relations side?"

"That's a good question, so let's look at it in more detail. The majority of the companies have a lot of debt and the payment on that debt is one reason that causes them to charge more for their services. If we bought them, we'd have to take on their debt and hard assets like buildings and trucks.

"We don't need the land or the buildings and again, replacing the trucks with our newer models, is one of our competitive advantages. We will hire the drivers and in some cases the owners and their sales people, but by consolidating and using computers, we end up being more efficient and using fewer people."

"So the owners and middle men will get hurt, but we will give the drivers and mechanics the option to transfer to your company?"

"Within reason. We have locations that we work from and some of them could be two hours from where they live. If they're willing to move, they'll have a great chance of working for us."

"The environmentalists hate the truckers," a terse statement came from a lady in the back.

"Is that a question?"

"Sorry, I'm Ruth Williams. I work with the environmental aspect of our clients. What do you think would be the ideal way to deal with them?"

"This is a very tricky area. The federal government, on a global basis, is the largest user of fuel. Truckers are next on the list. When talking about the environment you can look at the rapid consumption of natural resources like oil and gas. You can also look at the amount of pollution created by those products. If you're looking only at numbers then we're going to look bad, but if you accept the fact that for the country to run, that there is a need for trucks to move everything from raw materials to finished goods and everything in between, then the question is what's the ideal way to carry out this tremendous undertaking.

With our approach, depending on how you work the numbers, we're reducing the amount of fuel needed to run the business by thirty to fifty percent. Thirty percent fewer resources used and thirty percent less pollution for the same number of miles driven. That's something that should definitely make them happy. To enhance that aspect, we'll continue to work on other ways to create renewable fuels. To that end, I met with a man in Nashville who is from a national lab and is working on a way to take the truck's exhaust pollution and capture it in a filter. The process then calls for bombarding the filters with a microwave that burns off all the pollution. This is still in trial, but if it even cuts the pollution in half, then we will end up being at thirty-five percent of the amount of pollution created today."

"Those are very impressive numbers. Is there anything else?"

"I would imagine that many of you that travel on the Interstate Highways have seen trucks idling on the side of the road for many hours. One of the biggest problems with truckers is that they sleep in their trucks and typically let them idle while they do that. Besides being an eyesore on the Interstate, it also creates noise and carbon pollution. With our approach, by not stopping to sleep in the trucks, any pollution that the truck creates is for useful purposes, and not for the ability to run a TV, refrigerator or an air conditioner for the driver. We included those savings in the numbers we previously quoted, but it's always good to understand the entire plan."

"Thank you. If I need you to come with me to talk to anyone, will you be free to help out?"

"Just let me know when you need me Ruth. I'm here in town to help in any way I can."

William stepped in and said, "So we have covered the lay-offs, shut downs and the environment. What else will jump out at us?"

"Dave Morris here. Can you tell us anything further about the insurance and banking businesses that you discussed earlier?"

"Of all the businesses, this is an area that may cause the most problems, since we will be self-insured, and we won't be passing any premiums to other insurance companies. We won't be paying sales people or the normal commissions, overhead or profit. This is a big savings for us, and the investigators and claims adjusters will be a smaller work force due to the nature of the business that we're running. We will also be self-insured for health insurance, life insurance and auto insurance for our employees, their families, and ultimately the public. We have offices at all of our truck stops and with all of our minimal overhead, it turns out that we can charge much less and still be more profitable. The outcome is that we'll end up simply taking business away from another company. It's like a new grocery store chain or restaurant opening in town."

"Can I get this insurance?"

"You certainly may. Our agents are now busy working with all of our new employees and their families, so we made an initial decision not to start any advertising, but when things settle down, we will start selling in that new business area. We run our banking the same way. We have set up accounts for all of our employees that want to take part in it and they find that their paychecks show up in their account on payday with the funds cleared and ready to use. They'll also get the pay stub in the mail. If an employee doesn't want to have an account with us then we will mail their check on payday and they can deposit it in their own account when it arrives."

"That saves a lot of time and is a neat idea."

"After we get our employees set up, we will then open it up to the public. The bank's primary role will be to cater to our employees. We set up the bank structure like that of a credit union. We also plan to use the bank to support many other businesses, which will end up making it a top ten bank by the end of year one."

"It sounds like the banks and insurance companies won't be happy, but won't have anything to accuse you of."

"I'm sure they'll come up with something, but again, it makes us money and its set up to run cheaper and more efficient than most other banks and insurance companies. Since our employees work twenty-four hours a day the bank and insurance offices will be open twenty-four hours a day, but closed on the weekends."

"Is there anyone else you plan on putting out of business?"

"Truck manufacturers will find that they will have trouble keeping up with us. We spent a year in engineering and design before spending the last two years retooling and building our new trucks. The first thing you need to understand, is that they aren't for sale, so the competition will have trouble seeing what we're doing with our trucks until it's too late. Our plan then calls for us to step in, buy some of them out, so we can acquire a larger coverage area and give us access to the skilled labor we'll need. This concept goes back to the ship builders and horse carriage builders. Time and technology left them in the dust."

"Again not anything wrong with that. It's just more people losing their jobs. What's the positive of this issue?" asked William.

"Better jobs for those that we do hire. As a result, they can end up being better spouses, parents, and citizens. They can now be home to coach baseball, teach Sunday school, volunteer at a food bank and take care of their property. Overall, it gives the drivers more time with their families and their communities. It will also lower the cost of transportation. We have already dropped the price by ten percent, which is the normal amount of profit that most companies earn in this industry. In spite of that, we're still making a large profit. In three to five years, we'll have saved enough to pay off the investors. At that time, we'll be able to either keep prices stable or possibly lower them even more. Savings in transportation is money back in the consumer's pocket."

"Hi, I'm Ned Samberg with Transportation. This all sounds great, but you're a transportation company. How will you affect transportation and infrastructure?"

"Hi Ned, I've done a significant amount of work on this area and your question. I think that the effect will be minimal. We'll be driving the same number of miles, but, because on average, the trucks will be newer and safer and we also should see fewer trucks due to the elimination of the "no down time for the sleeping driver". With our barcodes and computerization processes, we have all the trips computerized, so the taxes and recording will be much more accurate than a guy keeping a written log will. This also gives us the ability to even track average speed and reroute trucks during construction periods to lessen the congestion. We'll also be using the railroad and boats to take larger loads over longer distances. This will greatly lighten the load on the highways."

"I'm sure I'll have other questions, and like Ruthy said, I'll want you to join me for a few meetings."

"I look forward to it. Are there any other questions?"

There weren't any, so William dismissed the meeting. A few others came up to say hello and introduce themselves. Some wanted to know about their potential use of the new insurance and banks. William took Shawna and me to lunch, and he was all smiles.

"I think that most of the potential fall-out will be around businesses closing and defaulting on loans. Everything else seems to end up being a positive or at least we can present them that way. How long before the impact that you're anticipating becomes a reality?"

"It has already started. Banks are seeing a change in the number of customers based on our employees leaving. It's gradual and it isn't in a central location, so it will take them a while to figure out what's going on. Trucking companies have long-term contracts, so they're seeing it when it comes time to renew them. Again, it's like a slow leak in a tire and not a blowout. Insurance is next and then the trucking companies. The industry tends to buy trucks in a five or ten-year cycle and truck dealers buy months in advance, so the orders haven't yet died off, but as more contracts move to us, there will be fewer trucks bought from other manufacturers."

"Do you plan on going public? I wouldn't mind owning a few shares of this grand scheme."

"I have a few venture capitalists that financed the hard costs and a couple of lines of credit to get us through the start-up period with payroll and people who we hired, trained and started working long before we got paid for the work. It will take a couple of months until we have a positive cash flow and then a couple more to pay off the lines of credit. Then the goal is to save up as much cash as we can and buy out the investors at a predetermined price. We have eight more years to make that happen. After that, we build a nice nest egg for future issues that may come up or programs we may want to set up. We'll expand the benefits for our employees beyond a matching 401k. We can match college savings and other charitable matching accounts. When we figure out where we are at that point, we will adjust our prices down to a profit level below ten percent and pass the savings back to the public.

"I've already agreed to over twenty million here in DC. I think if we budget fifty million that we will be fine. Our intent is not to ask for any government contracts, so there isn't a conflict with what we're doing. Our goal is to run our businesses with as little regulation as possible until we do something that shows that we aren't being responsible on our own."