Truck Parking Club and LOST FR8: Alternative Strategies for Logistics Challenges | Episode 32

 Explore creative solutions for logistics challenges in Episode 32  of Banyan Technology's Tire Tracks® podcast.

Evan Shelley, co-founder of Truck Parking Club, and Reed Loustalot, co-founder of LOST FR8 and CMO of Truck Parking Club, discuss their unique approaches to advancing the logistics industry. Gain insight into how their platforms not only improve operational efficiencies but also support truck drivers with practical solutions like the innovative Truck Parking Club system. Providing a comprehensive network of truck parking facilities, the platform helps drivers quickly locate and reserve parking spots, in turn reducing delays and increasing reliability for Shippers. 

Learn from their experiences and insights on how simple, effective solutions can solve complex logistics problems and drive the shipping forward. 

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Evan Shelley on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/evan-k-shelley/

Evan Shelley on X: https://x.com/truckparkingguy

Reed Loustalot on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/reedloustalot/

Reed Loustalot on X: https://x.com/lostisreed

Learn more about Truck Parking Club: https://truckparkingclub.com/

Call Truck Parking Club Customer Service: (888) 899-7275

Banyan Technology on ‌LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/banyan-technology
Banyan Technology on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/banyantechnology

Banyan Technology on X: https://twitter.com/BanyanTech
Listen to Tire Tracks on-demand: https://podcast.banyantechnology.com

Listen to Tire Tracks on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/tire-tracks-driving-the-logistics-industry/id1651038809

Listen to Tire Tracks on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3Aiya6qVXFsi

Transcript

Hey, everybody. Welcome to another Banyan Technology's Tire Tracks podcast. I'm your host, Patrick Escolas. And with me today, we have both LOST FR8 and the Co-Founder of Truck – yeah, Truck Parking Club, Evan Shelley, which is something I wasn't aware of before. Looking forward to it. Whereas the LOST FR8, we got Reed Loustalot. Did I just butcher that, by the way, Reed? How do you pronounce that? 

Actually, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be, to be honest. I'm Loustalot, Lost-a-lot, whatever works. I don't care. 

There's a Launcelot. I'm sure you've heard a lot of them over the years there. My last name has been butchered a lot, too. But I feel like yours has a little more variation for fun in it. 

Yeah. There are some fun ones in there. But it's all good.

Thank you, guys, very much for joining me today. I know, normally, I talk to different Industries within the LTL and parcel world. But I know a lot of times, you guys are more focused on at least in the lost freight, on the brokerage, on that truckload side, especially when I'm reading it. But tell me a little bit, Reed, who you are for the few people that haven't seen your name pop up around. And why you have gotten into kind of this logistics, media, communication platform? Because, like I said, most people I talk to are kind of I don't want to say buttoned up, but they're a little – I hate to say it, a little more professional. But you seem to bring a little more of the fun, casual attitude towards it. Doesn't mean you're unprofessional. But it's a different vibe. Where's it all come from? 

Well, it might mean I'm unprofessional. I don't know. We'll let other people make that judgment. But, yeah. No, I mean, I was a freight broker out college. Just doing truckload brokerage. I did that for cumulatively about six or seven years. That's kind of my – and I got into the industry because I needed a job. I mean, that's really just it.

Isn't that the great reason? Some people have passions. I'm like, "I have bills. I would like to not have – I would like pay bills." 

Yeah. I graduated from college with a philosophy degree. And when I was done, I was moving. I was in Wisconsin. And my now wife had moved to Boston and she was like, "Hey, come out to Boston." I was like, "Okay." And I needed a job. And so, my buddy worked at Echo. That's where I started. And he was like, "Hey, you should apply." And I was like, "Okay." That's it.

Did you get any bad jokes about you should philosophize on getting someone to pay you money? Because I just remember, I love the idea of philosophy in college. But then I was like, "All right, how do I get someone to pay me to do this?" I don't know how I worked that one out. 

Yeah. Well, I've figured it out so far. Started with moving freight. And now I'm just posting memes and stuff. So far so good. But, yeah, it's definitely not – you got to choose your own adventure when you do that. It's not very well-defined for you. But I guess that's a bit philosophical, too. Maybe that's – I don't know. I mean, I have my opinions on all that. But you said we weren't going to talk about anything too controversial. I'll leave that for another podcast. 

Well, I've been a liar before. But we'll get to Evan here, who's joining us mobily from the van here. Evan, thanks for joining. With the Truck Parking Club, this is newer to me as we were talking here. Tell me about yourself and a little bit about the Truck Parking Club. 

Yeah. Myself, former real estate guy. Went to school for civil engineering and ended up going into construction, and then development, and then to real estate soon after I graduated. And started flipping houses out of my own. And fortunate to not go rouge doing that and kind of grew that business into flipping large commercial land deals. And through doing some of those deals, I found out about the issue with truck parking. I was working on an industrial land deal and everyone was telling me this is a great area for truck parking. And the municipality said, "We aren't going to support truck parking at this location even though it's zoned industrial." 

Really? 

And so. That's when a light bulb went off. Yeah. Yeah. That's when a light bulb went off in 2021. And I was like, "Something's not right here. If there's not enough truck parking, but these local governments are giving a lot of pushback on anyone who wants to develop it, then what gives? What's going to happen?" 

And from there, over the next six to 12 months, started just talking with a lot of stakeholders in logistics and trying to figure out what's going on. And long story short, ended up starting Truck Parking Club in 2022. And really created it as an Airbnb-type model where we take existing space and turn it into truck parking. Really, our 30-second pitch on Truck Parking Club is that Truck Parking Club helps truckers find truck parking all across the US on our website and mobile app. And we help property owners and businesses monetize their extra space. Whether that's a trucking company, tow truck company, truck repair shop, CDL school, warehouse, truck parking operator. 

And so, we really created this two-sided market place where we connect the two. And now we're at 385 locations across the US. Tens of thousands of bookings. Tens of thousands of drivers coming to our marketplace looking for parking on a weekly basis. And just continuing to scale as quickly as possible.

Now I have a question. And this is more from – I'm much more on the software side as far as freight and dealing with it. Other than with Banyan, I did some seasonal work for UPS. But that's about it. When I'm driving by on the highway and I see all the trucks stopped and fill up the rest stop, is that indicative of the fact that there isn't other good options? And that's where the Truck Parking Club kind of comes in? Or are there differences between just a quick stop and when maybe I need to really get some shut-eye and reset? 

A little bit of both.

Yeah.

It's a little bit of both. Overnight parking, there is a very, very big need. And we work to help with that need. Because, currently, if you can't find any parking, it is parking on the on-ramp or off-ramp and risking public safety, A. And then, B, risking a ticket. 

Oh, is that ticketable sometimes? Just being parked off there? It's really not kind of a beneficial situation in most cases.

Yeah. It's really not. And in a lot of scenarios, um, whether it's a State Trooper or DoT will pull up and say, "You got to keep moving. You can't park here." And, unfortunately, that driver may have a few minutes left on his clock or whatever and they're like figure it out. And it's an interesting dynamic. And then they have to use personal conveyance. And it becomes a whole thing. 

That was a big part of the reason the Truck Parking Club was created. And as we've continued to grow the company, we really get a combination of hourly, daily, weekly, and monthly bookings. 

Okay. 

Really just a pure marketplace that helps drivers, carriers, mega-carriers find parking, whether it's for an hour or if it's for a month. 

Now you talk about that and that being since 2022, have you and Reed known each other through LOST FR8? Or do you guys have a relationship going back further than that? What's the connection there? 

Yeah. Reed and I – if I'm not mistaken, Reed, we randomly met in Cleveland at a freight place conference, right? 

Cleveland? There you go.

Yeah. Last summer. 

Yeah. I think we were just like hanging out. I think I just walked up to you and said what's up or whatever. And then, I don't know, we just kind of stayed in touch ever since.

That's a movie right there. Just filled with plot. You've got tropical Cleveland in the background. I like that. I like everything about that.

Exactly. 

No. As far as that, and we'll get back to that, I want to hit on Reed. You came out with one of my favorite pieces of – I'll call it software fun, freightgong.com. I love the announcements. I use it regularly just for my wins and when I need a gong, because I had a gong in the office. It was small and it was hidden by the other co-workers I have. And then, eventually, it was not brought as we moved offices. 

And though I felt hurt by that, I love the freight gong. And it makes me very happy. And I have to, A, thank you for that. And, B, why was that something you put together? And I know this is – we're going to get on tangents here, because I finally get an opportunity to talk about some of these things that I love.

Yeah. Yeah. Sure. I guess it would have been late October when I made that. But I do. I have this Discord, right? Like a Discord server group with a bunch of people in it, freight people. And then on Tuesday nights, we do a tech meetup. And companies will do demos. And people show products that they're building. And it's just kind of a free-for-all tech-related though. 

There were no more demos during that one Tuesday. And I had – I don't even know how I got the idea. Obviously, everyone on LinkedIn post gongs. Steam is always posting gongs. People are posting gongs all the time. And I was like, "Well –" am I allowed to curse on this podcast?

Yeah. 

All right. Great. Yeah. I'll try not to. But anyway, I don't like cursing that much. Anyway, it was always in my mind. I'd started putting gongs into like memes I was making. And I was just thinking about gongs and I was like, "I like to –" I know enough code to be dangerous. And so, I was just spun up, like, "Oh, what if I just put this gong on the site and just like make it ring when you click it? And that should be easy enough." And I did it. 

And then I demoed it during the Discord meetup. And that night, I made it in like 30 minutes. And then I was like, "Hey, there's no more demos. You guys want to check out this gong I just made?" And so, I did. And then I was like, "Well, I'm gonna put it online. And does anyone want to sponsor it?" And I sold like four sponsor slots during the demo. Right after I demoed. That's what they call the in the startup world product market fit. 

I was going to say, get it on the ground floor. I've got a few comments on that. You're unveiling. What was the event you unveiled it at? Because I can't remember – 

Oh, an F3.

An F3. The clip of it is probably the only clip of a conference I've ever watched more than once. And I wasn't required to get product knowledge. And you buying them being like, "All right, here's the first three minutes of me talking." And you're like, "And I need more time. Because, literally, that's it. That's all I've got." And then you unveiled it and hit the gong. And I have never been – as a person who has to present regularly, has to talk about software and use all of the keywords and the synergies, it made me very happy to see just, "All right, here you go. Here's the gong." 

Well, that's probably why Freightways asked me if I wanted to demo it. But I won't say too much about that. But I did. Unfortunately, I was not considered for best of show. Nobody was allowed to vote for me. 

No. 

Because I think I would have very clearly won that contest. 

I think attendee favorite for sure. Okay. While we're on it – and you might not know, there is a picture, what looks hand-drawn, of a centaur on it that goes through as the vendors. Please tell me where and what that is. Because the more I look at it, the more questions I have. And it's never answered. I just have more storylines in my head.

I don't know. I can't remember what that one links to. But that was a buddy of mine. He's an old Echo colleague of mine. Carlos Fernandez. I think he's like Sector VP of Carrier Sales at Echo. And he hit me up one night. He was like, "Hey, can you put this picture on the gong for me?" And I was like, "Yeah, sure. I don't care." 

His title makes that so much better.

Yeah. Well, if you knew Carlos, he's crazy. But he's a really good dude.

It's a drawing of him as a centaur?

Yeah. Yeah. I think it's like in the office. On the Whiteboard. And he just took a picture of it and sent it to me. Yeah.

And then we'll do the last one on Freight Gong here. As soon as you announced it, I went to my marketing team who does the podcast and like, "We need to have a spot on there." And so from a personal request, all I can ask is will you take money other than a personal Venmo? Because they need to send it to ACH House or something. 

Oh, you guys were the ones. 

Yeah, we're the ones. 

Yeah. You were the ones who tried to sponsor it, but aren't able to Venmo. I don't have any official way to collect the cash. I literally just had people Venmo me. 

To pay for a load moved that doesn't go anywhere, will that – 

We'll work something out after this. We could take this one offline. 

That's great. Because maybe I can get myself drawn as another mythical creature and we can put that up too.

Yeah. Whatever you want. Yeah, just let me know. 

No. Not to leave Evan out here with the parking club – 

Hey, Truck Parking Club is a Freight Gong sponsor, too. 

There it is right there. Go on. Hit the gong. 

There’s your segue.

I like that. I love that. And then with that, and here's the next segue, you guys told me you've got an exciting announcement for this podcast. It'll be first out there. Who knows when this will air? Probably many weeks after you actually announce it. But you're hearing it here first at least live when this was recorded. 

Yeah. You're right. Evan and I, like you said – he said we met in June. I think, basically, in July he called me up, he's like, "Hey, do you want to come work with us?" And at that point I was like, "Uh, no." I don't remember what I said exactly. But I said no. And then fast forward to today, I officially joined Truck Parking Club as a CMO. That is some serious alpha that you're getting here. Patrick is a first person in the big, bad freight world to know that. 

And I love that. Evan, as Reed as your CMO, what do you expect to get from the creator and designer of Freight Gong that the Parking Club can really monetize and blow up bigger than you'd ever viewed possible before? 

Oh, it was always just a play on lifetime membership on freightgong.com. It was just a lifetime play. 

That's all it is. 

It's like solidify, solidify the sponsorship. No. To give like a little bit of background, Reed and I have always bounced things off of each other. Have been talking about marketing and talking about Truck Parking Club and marketing for a long time. Probably since the first time we ever met each other. And it's very clear that we work well together professionally. And, also, just personally, we get along well. 

And as I think everyone would admit he, has a very keen sense on logistics and logistics marketing and what gets people interested. And I think as reed puts it, what's stirring the pot? He's very good at stirring the pot on social. But, also, on top of that, I think the things that people don't know about him is he's extremely good at graphics, and marketing in general, and branding. Obviously, please advise is a good example of that. 

And I think people look at Reed and say it's luck. But, actually, he's just really good at understanding this stuff. And he makes it look like he just like wrote it on a piece of paper and slapped it on a hat, which he did. 

A lot of people slap things on hats all the time. It doesn't mean you get anywhere with it.

Yeah. Yeah. And so, ultimately, I think he aligns extremely well with what Truck Parking Club stands for. And through a lot of conversations between he and I, we thought it was a good fit. And I expect Reed to be himself. That's all I expect. It's not a long laundry list of things. It's just Reed being Reed. And let's just keep getting it, you know? 

Yeah. Well, Patrick, I will say this. Not to say that I've been offered a million CMO jobs. That's not what I want to say. Because that would be false. But I have been – people have talked to me in the past about coming to work for them. And I've never seriously considered anybody really at all. 

And, at first, I didn't even seriously consider going to work with Evan when he first – 

Well, you did say no to begin with. Yeah.

But I just, over time – and I've hung out with these guys a lot more than just Evan. I've hung out with this whole team at various shows. And I've also obviously seen kind of what they're up to. And I'm incredibly – I think they have the perfect team to do exactly what they're trying to do. And I think it's a problem that is not well – it's a simple solution to a huge problem that makes a ton of sense to me intuitively. It takes 20 seconds to understand what they're doing. 

And, basically, everyone else who's like, "Hey, you want to come work with us?" It's like, "What the heck you're doing?" 

You know, you would need a week or a semester of being taught what it is they do.

Exactly. And I think in the industry, especially on the technology side of things in this industry, it's very just – I don't really want to go work for the hundredth TMS provider. You know what I mean? I don't have any interest. I have an interest in doing something new and novel. A model that's been tested in other industries, right? The marketplace model. And it's a great brand. Get in at the ground floor with a team that's already crushing it. They have tons of traction. This is like the best possible thing, I think. 

And I think over the next couple years, we're going to take where we're at now and build on what's been done and just continue to crush it. I think I'm very, very, very bullish on the business and the team. 

And I think it's worth being bullish on. Because kind of as Evan was describing, it feels like a win-win with both, "Hey, I've got the area and the land that I could use some more money just by having." And, sure, pull on up to it. One of the questions that comes up to me, and it kind of goes back to when you were saying when you were in real estate and municipalities were against it, what are some of the obstacles that the Truck Parking Club is coming up against? Whether it's specific to what you're finding in each day. Or it's more of a kind of holistic towards the idea of truck parking places. What are you what are the big in-your-way pieces that are stopping you and Reed from hitting the ground running right now and shouting at the mountain tops and becoming the Airbnb of trucks? 

Yeah. I would just say just education and awareness. A good percentage of – we call them property members, which are property owners that we talk to, are like, "Oh, wow. This is awesome. Sign me up now." It's that way now since we have so much traction. When it was our third property, it was a little harder sell. But now it's a little bit easier having 385 or so of them. Having a lot of case studies and things. 

But just education about what we do and just continuing to expand that awareness. I mean, our goal is 5 to 10,000 properties in the next three years. And I think we're very much putting all the pieces in place for that to happen. We had two to three new locations every single day at this point. And that'll soon be 10 a day. 

And it's really just education awareness. Scaling properly. Building the tech properly. And probably most importantly, continuing to give our customers the trucker – which we call trucker members, the best experience possible every single time like. 

Yeah. 

As long as we continue doing that and we continue scaling out the number of locations rapidly and give the property members a good experience, I mean, that's just all I'm consumed with. And just continuing to execute on that and do it as quickly as possible. I don't know if I really directly answered your question. 

I mean, the push back would just be someone saying I don't want trucks parking on my property or something like that, which happens. 

Does it happen a lot? Now are you – and here's another question. Are you scoping out areas based on popular lanes and going, "This would be a good spot?" Or is it people are becoming aware? How are you lead-generating within the actual spaces? 

Yeah. That's a good question. Wo we can go to certain areas. For example, Baltimore with the bridge collapse, we had some of the federal – like FMCSA. This was written in landline. I guess I can talk about it. The FMCSA reached out was like talking about, "Hey, we have this serious issue." And we're like, "Oh, we'll go find some parking." Within a few days, we found 20 spaces in Baltimore at two different locations just to help alleviate the issue up there. 

Okay. 

That's a situation of we just went and found it in a very constrained area. And then a ton of it's inbound. Because we built the brand out. Reed continuing to build the brand out across social and all the other different platforms that we're marketing on. We get a ton of inbound. I mean, it – 

That's awesome. As anyone who's done ever cold calling in their life, that's the greatest thing you can ever hear. And as a person who's done it in multiple lives, the inbound. It's hard to believe sometimes. Like, "Yeah, I'd like to give you business." Okay. Why? And who's putting you up to this right now? Yeah. 

Yeah. 

Well, I think the one thing that's interesting though about this, about the property members especially, and one thing that I've like realized lately is – I mean, a lot of them are trucking companies just literally with a yard and extra space in their yard. 

That just makes so much sense. 

Yeah, they're literally already parking trucks there. They just have never parked anybody else's truck there. And so, they know exactly what they're dealing with. It's not like some person who's never seen a truck before being like, "Oh, yeah. Sure. Come park here." Although, obviously, there's no rule against that per se. 

Well, that's what I half imagine a driving range going out of business and being like, "Hey, man. You guys can just pull right up here and we'll tell people they can't hit golf clubs while you're here." There's some weird – and I don't want to say weirds. There's probably some unique places that you could probably get to park just on the basis of, "Nobody uses it. I'm not doing anything to this land. Get me a way to turn some money on here." 

Yeah. Exactly. 

Yeah. I mean, it's an interesting problem with like – and there's so many companies that have extra yard space. There just are. And they probably never even considered it like – or if they have considered it as like a potential revenue-generating channel to like park trucks, what are they going to do most of the time? 

Yeah. Are they going to take out their own ad and start putting that out there? 

Yeah. how are they going to they market it? And there are businesses that have done that. There are people who have done that. But, I mean, the marketplace play is just so – it takes – 

Obviously, not successful enough that I would know of it or heard it in a way that is meaningful.

Well, they're all eventually going to come on and become Truck Parking Club property members. 

There you go. 

We're going to post so many memes that they won't even be able to avoid us anymore. Right? 

Now what are the requirements for something like that? Is it just have a certain square footage of just area? Or does have to be lit? I'm curious about what kind of conditions for a member spot that you would have there. 

Yeah. What we say – I mean, the easiest way to say is just any location suitable for truck parking. And, typically, that's going to consist of adequate access, maneuverability in the lot, adequate space to park, adequate space to exit the lot. And after you do so many of these, we really have it down to a science. 

Okay. 

And there are times where we have to say no. But like Reed said, a lot of these are trucking companies that are already taking trucks in and out of the lot. It's a case-by-case basis really. And we have very thorough onboarding process to make sure that the location is adequate. Because our biggest risk is getting a truck on a property that, for whatever reason, they have an issue. right? 

And that essentially never happens. It's extremely rare that something like that happens. And things can happen at any lot. We've simply got it down to where it's our standards are so strict that it's just extremely rare circumstances that anything ever happens. You just learn that through a lot of reps and just a lot of educating ourselves in the beginning on what we needed to look out for. And now, at this point, we just have a thorough, thorough checklist. 

And then with Truck Parking Club, how many employees do you have? What's your team like? 

Yeah. I think we're around 20. I don't have the exact number. It may be 19. It may be 21. Maybe 22. I don't know. I'm not quite sure. I think we're right at 20 though. 

Are you guys cross the nation? Or there are some spots that you guys haven't touched yet? What is your coverage area per se look like? 

We're in a lot of the major cities at this point. 385 locations. LA, Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Chicago. Just outside New York City. Newark. Up the East Coast. We've got most of the major covered. There are still some markets that we want to be even deeper into. But at this point, we have a lot of options for drivers. 

That's awesome. Now back to Reed. What does this mean for the LOST FR8 side of things? Are you just going to drop everything and be full Truck Parking Club all the time? Or is there going to be a kind of balancing act for you? 

I mean, I would say that I've already been pretty – I've been doing a lot of things kind of all over the place. And it's been basically just me. On LOST FR8, I have a business partner, Jake. And he's got a full-time job. We're already both doing a bunch of other stuff. We've got customers in that business that are just using it. It's very much kind of like set it and forget it. From like a maintenance standpoint, we don't really need to do anything. And they're enjoying it. 

That's awesome. 

It's cool. Yeah. I've already been kind of spreading my time in a bunch of different things. And I'm kind of more focused now on – and I also personally was searching for something that I could really sink my teeth into with other people beyond just working with myself. Because I've been – 

Listen to the philosopher looking for meaning in his life. 

I mean, it's been two years since I've worked with anybody. I mean, my last job – straight up. My last job was at Trimble. And I got laid off there two years ago in April. And I've been alone basically ever since. 

Trimble, how could that to Reed? 

Honestly, well, on the anniversary of my firing, or laying off, whatever you want to call it, I did a post and I tagged Trimble. I was like, "Thanks for firing me. Thank you, actually. This is really good for me." 

Genuinely, thank you very much. I would have never had to do any of the things that I'm now enjoying. Oh, that's awesome.

Yeah, exactly. No. No. It's honestly kind of worked out very, very well that this opportunity fell into my lap, because I've been – I've very much wanted to be part of like a team again and a good-size team and a team that is growing rapidly. And, yeah, I mean, I think there's very – I don't think there's any other group that I would have rather joined. I didn't have to go anywhere. I didn't have to do anything. But this makes a lot of sense for a variety of reasons.

Evan was going to drive up and put you in the back of that van one way or the other. And then you were either going to work with him whether you chose to. Or your head popped up in the back of these videos every now. 

Evan's a persistent guy. It wouldn't shock me. That's why I relented. 

It was better to do it on your terms than when he eventually won you over. 

Yeah. Exactly. No. I'm stoked. I mean, I have my Discord. I do that at night, right? There's people in there talking all day. I still sell hats. And to Evan's point earlier, he was like just be you. And he made that very clear from the beginning. He was like – 

That's awesome.

Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't have done it if that meant I couldn't do all the shit that I like to do. I cursed for the first time. 

Yeah. I was just saying, Evan, you sound like a smart guy simply realizing that he was probably going to be him regardless. But now you get credit for allowing him to be him. 

Yeah. But that's the magic, right? That's the magic. Him being himself. And that, I mean, unlocks a ton of creativity in his own life. And it only ultimately works out well for Truck Parking Club just because he gets to be himself. And all that good energy spreads over to Truck Parking Club. And I wouldn't have it any other way. 

You know what's also good though is like, left to my own devices on my own, it's hard to push yourself to learn and do new things, and try new things, and learn new things when you're on your own. And you basically get to do whatever you want, right? 

You get comfortable or you pick and you're like, "I don't really want to risk too much." 

It takes a lot of discipline. And I would say that even the most disciplined person in the world on their own is not going to be as like driven to do things as they would be if they were part of an organization with other people – 

Yeah. Need a little external drive to add on there. 

And so, this opportunity, this is going to force me to do a bunch of stuff and learn a bunch of things, which is already happening, right? Which is already happening.

Yeah. 

Yeah. It's an opportunity to learn a lot about different aspects of marketing that I had never really thought too much about. And it's kind of allowing me to kind of take a step back and learn things from first principles and apply what I've already been doing, but learn new stuff along the way and do it for a brand that I think that I'm bullish on. Yeah, I mean, it's perfect.

And I guess that you've clearly kind of tapped into it. What is different for marketing within logistics and to the truck side specifically? Because I feel like it's a different game. Not just that it's a different industry. But going out, and touching, and reaching your audience in meaningful ways feels tougher in the shipping logistics. Is it just because everybody's more pessimistic the same way that we don't believe a load is actually where it's supposed to be till you see it or have a proof of delivery? Why is that? 

Because I've had other people on the podcast, they've talked about building a narrative and telling a story. But most of the time, yours is almost kind of too true. And it's funny by itself. You barely need to add anything to it without the picture painted around it. Why is that more appealing and why – because you've definitely connected with the community in the industry. What's the difference? 

Well, I mean, I just think that there's a lot of people out there who have – I don't know what it is. I've been trying to unpack the psychology of this industry. But there's a lot of people who I think like to try to make what they do and what their companies do seem more sophisticated than it actually is. There's almost like an inferiority complex that the industry has, where you look at some marketing materials for like – even brokerages and carriers or technology companies – 

There's three paragraphs of what they do. And you're like, "I will move your stuff when and where you want it to." 

I mean, if we're talking about the brokerage side specifically, which again is my history from like the operation side of things. I was a carrier sales rep. Right? I was in a very – like a salesy-type role, operations-type role. I mean, dude, you're on the ground floor in one of these companies, be it a brokerage, or be it a carrier, or a driver, your day-to-day is just like the most stressful thing ever. Everything's going wrong. Everything's screwed up, especially if you're a driver. The shit rolls down the hill and hits you the hardest. Right? 

And then you look at like what the companies are saying and how they're presenting themselves and how they're talking about themselves and you read people's LinkedIn post and they're like – you think that they're doing rocket science. But then the reality is, like, "Dude, we're moving shit from A to B. And it's hell. And everything's going wrong." And these marketing people are like trying to make it look like we're doing rocket science. It makes no sense. It makes no sense. 

And that's why there's a lot of cynicism I think about marketing in general in this space. And it's deserved, because it's just so much – there's so much crap out there. And it doesn't square with the lived experience that all these people have about the industry. I think it's really just about being real. 

People try to use this, "Oh, you're so authentic." It's like, "Dude, that's not even it." Just tell it like it is. This is how stuff is. Your truck breaks down, that sucks. Guys giving back loads. People breaking down. Shady, crazy stuff happening. It is a screwed-up industry. And there's a lot of crap going. But like we got to be able to laugh about it. Or else it'll drive you crazy. 

And I think that's my favorite part is that almost every time you've got something out there, there's comedy. And it's generally a comedy of errors. Or just like you said, the pure and simple situation of it all. Okay. At the end of the day, it's a real simple ask. But there's so much complexity and, like you said, hell to just drop in the middle of it. And then like, "Well, why – but it's just so simple. Why couldn't you do that?" There's no road anymore. What do you want me to do? 

Yeah. It's all fun though. 

And then, Evan, it might be too early to ask you on this, but what are thoughts – other than expanding as far as the different locations with the Parking Club, are there – if it was a software, would there be a bolt-on or an upgrade coming? Is there things you want to do with it more than just having someplace to park? Is there a deeper, bigger picture of it? Or, right now, you're kind of just task-at-hand with getting as many options for your club members and property members as possible? 

Yeah. It's definitely the latter. Just continued focus on adding as many locations that are suitable for truck parking as quickly as possible all across the US while maintaining a great experience for our trucker members. As a CEO, I have to remind myself that and my team that like, "Hey, let's not lose focus on what the actual goal is here. How much of our time are we actually spending on this goal?" 

Okay.

And so, it's just continued focus on that. And as we execute on that and get several thousand locations, we may start peering out into like other things. But we're not there yet. And it's more of just let's just keep cranking away day by day just executing on the mission. 

Nothing wrong with just kind of locking into a good thing and focusing on what you think is important. And making sure you do that the best possible, which is, in my case, as a Cleveland Browns fan, I just tell my coach to run the ball. But they always like to be too clever. 

But that being said, and I know you guys are – Banyan itself, 20 years on the LTL side. Last 5 years went more over the road kind of everything. Whereas I think you guys are more on kind of that truckload by itself. Probably some LTL crossover and all the other modes that have trucks involved. But from a truckload perspective and an industry thought, what do you guys see in the industry right now? Everybody keeps talking about the pendulum coming back and forth. And we've got new technologies. Whether that's in some of the driverless trucks coming out. We've got regulation kind of on the green side of things. And, constantly, I hear – it almost sounds like the owner-operators in the middle. Just from both your perspectives. Reed's going to have one. And then Evan, I think, you might have a slightly different one. What do you both think about where trucking is and where it might be going just as a whole? Because one of the reasons I do this podcast, not only because I'm loud and I like to hear myself talk, is I like to get information about things that I'm not inherently aware of. 

Sure. Yeah. I mean, if we talk about where specifically trucking from like a small carrier and owner-operator's perspective – and that's who I mostly worked with when I was at Echo. I mean, a lot of my like – I'm friends to this day with a lot of guys that move freight for me. 

I know that the environment is very challenging for a lot of small fleets right now especially. I mean, even big fleets. We see a lot of the public trader guys are releasing numbers and they're not doing so well. I think it's just a very challenging market from an economic standpoint. 

I think from like a tech standpoint, there's a lot of demands being made of small fleets right now. Be it tracking. Be it – yeah. I mean, a lot of compliance, hoops to jump through these days for good reason degree, because there's lots of fraud and all that nonsense. But, I mean, it's a very – I think it's just a challenging time. It's easy to kind of stomach all that stuff when you're doing really well and you're making lots of money. 

But when you have Joe Schmoe broker calling you up and offering you a dollar a mile on like a lane that you're getting paid $4 a mile on two years ago, you're going to be not super pleased. It's a tough time for a lot of people. And, yeah. I mean, it's just kind of is what it is. I don't have any idea when that'll change. I mean, people smarter than me can try to conjure up or makeup when they think that it's going to change. But I don't really have any – I have no idea. Who knows? 

But it's also very exciting – I do like to see stuff that's being built from like a tech standpoint specifically for carriers and drivers. Because, especially, when you come from the brokerage world and you're looking at the tech that's for broker – I mean, so much tech is made for brokers, because they're the ones who tend to write the checks to pay for it. And fleets and small carriers especially don't always bring out their checkbook, because they've got a bunch of other expenses. 

But I'm still very – that's another reason why I think truck parking is awesome because it's like it is a very real need for carriers. And it's not something that's like another subscription or like another thing that they have to like – that we're trying to get in between every transaction that they do or anything like that. 

Yeah. They don't have to implement it. It's not like a whole onboarding process. 

And it's simple. It's simple. And so, that's why I'm bullish on us specifically. But, yeah. I mean, I think it's a tough time for carriers. And I am sympathetic to them, because that's who I worked with. And most my friends are in the freight world are carriers. Anyway. Yeah, I've said enough. Evan, go ahead. 

There you go. Yeah. 

Yeah. I think Reed hit on some of the things I was going to say. I think to start it off is we're in a unique situation where we're just rapidly scaling by just bringing awareness to all the drivers that there's another option for you, whether you need to park for an hour or a few days. 

And so, we're continuing to scale rapidly in what appears to be a very weak freight market. We feel very fortunate to be able to provide that to drivers. And they see the value in what we're doing even in a very weak freight market I guess it's the point I'm trying to make. 

Yeah. It's clearly a real need. Even if the money is tight, it's something where you guys have been able to grab some traction on regardless.

Yeah. I think it shows that if scaling at the rate we're scaling in a weak freight market and drivers thanking us that we're giving them more options. I mean, you can just Google us and see what people are saying all across social, and reviews, and stuff. And I would say we kind of see a bit of the – Truck Parking Club specifically, we kind of see less of that. But then on top of that, we do see some interesting things. 

One thing I saw recently was some guy reached out and said, "Hey, can I park all these repo trucks on your lot and sell them?" It's like, "Yikes." You know what I mean? It's like 

Used Truck Parking Club. Used Truck for Sale Parking Club. There you go. 

Yeah. 

Don't ask me how legitimate these trucks are. But they're for sale parking club. Yeah. 

Yeah. Exactly. Just a super – you see stuff like that and you're like, "Man, I just –" you feel horrible for these guys. And another thing on top of that is we go to a lot of truck shows. Sitting in Alabama now – I was in Alabama like four days ago. Went to Chattanooga. Came back to Alabama for Alabama Trucking Association Annual Conference. Was just in Wildwood, Florida six days ago at a truck show. 

Yeah. We like to stay – 

Do the Truck Parking Club ground game? I'm actually convinced that there's not a company that does more shit than this company. I swear to God. 

It's just our culture though. It's just outwork everybody. 

That's awesome. 

You know, whatever it takes. And so, to close out the point is – so we were in Wildwood. And we went to Wildwood last year as well. And Wildwood 75 Chrome Shop Annual Truck Show. Last year, it was bigger than it was this year. And this year, it became very clear that the freight market – it's a tough time out there. Guys just can't afford to even come to the shows. And they can't afford obviously to bring their trucks to the shows. And it's just tough. And it's tough to see. But every market cycle, it goes up and down. Right? But we are seeing it. We're seeing obvious signs of it. And we're just doing everything we can to try to work with drivers to make their job I would say less stressful and more efficient. That's really what we focus on. 

Yeah. And I think that between some of what even LOST FR8 did before you guys mashed up and I think since COVID has become really apparent, at least maybe more on my side, because I'm in the industry as well, even on the software. But seeing the truck drivers through the lens of people and people actually driving these trucks and what they have to go through. Whereas, for so long, I think maybe – and this is through my personal lens, those are just trucks on the road. You take for granted some – there's a person with needs and a family and trying to make a business behind it. It's just something that you see and constantly back and forth. And that we did clearly, during the pandemic, took for granted that that would just continue and always be going back and forth from there. 

It's awesome that you're able to offer something that's a good business fit for you, but also something that, like you said, can make some of those lives easier and make it more palatable as they have to do maybe some close the impossible to get in this tight spot to make the business work. 

Absolutely.

Yeah. No. Coming down to a close here. And I always like to say, I know that Reed probably has a more of a platform than I ever will here. But as you guys are both here, here's an opportunity. Closing remarks. Message. How do I find out more on Truck Parking Club? What's next on for Reed? We heard that he's the CMO. Anything you guys want to talk about is right here with the last five minutes or so. Or even shorter if you don't feel like talking that long. But both of you can have a shot at – final shots on the Banyan Tire Tracks podcast, which is so synonymous with success in all things. 

This is the freight market's biggest stage, I think. That's what you were saying before.

Actually, that's how we put it. 

That's how you convinced us to come on.

That's exactly right. 

Yeah. Evan, you go first. 

That and the two cases of Mountain Dew, right? Yeah. 

Yeah. I would just say you can find Truck Parking Club, obviously, at truckparkingclub.com. You can always call in to our 24/7/365 customer service line 888-899-PARK. That customer service line is only made up of former drivers. So when you call, you’re talking to a former driver.

We should have said that earlier. We need to lead with that, man. 

There it is from the CMO. There's the constructive criticism right there.

That's our take away from this. Yeah. Because I think that'll win us a lot of favors in the long- term. Anyway, go on. Sorry. 

No. No. And those are the two things I want to hit. Reed, you want to tell them what we got going on with all the socials and things of that nature? 

Yeah. I mean, definitely follow us on – I mean, any platform, really. Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube. What else? I mean, did I miss any? Facebook? Did I say Facebook? 

Half of them are all just reposting each other's stuff anyways. 

Yeah. I mean, there's – dude, I mean, we've got a significant ground game like we alluded to earlier, right? Hunter, who Evan talked about, is kind of the stunt man, if you will, for the – or the main character of the social channels. I mean, I think there's a lot of raw material for us to turn into good content that's going to be both entertaining and spread the brand and make Truck Parking Club a household name in the freight industry. Tune in on any of those channels. Obviously, engage, right? 

I think, hopefully, our socials match the personalities kind of of the company and the people who make it up, which I think so far they do, which is great. And, hopefully, they're not boring. And if they're boring, let me know. But I don't think 

Also, engage. Yeah. 

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, just follow us there. Obviously, if you're a driver or a property, we got a little more for you to sink your teeth into. You can go to the website. Download the app. Beyond that, follow me and Evan. We need to get Evan's social game up a little bit. I'm going to be helping him with that, too.

I agree. You got to have like a find the van. Where's Evan? Like a Where's Waldo Tracker, you know? 

It's wild how many people post photos of the van just on [inaudible 00:51:23].

Yeah. 

Yeah. It's pretty wild. 

I like that. That's awesome. 

Yeah, man. Yeah, this was cool though. I appreciate you having us on, Patrick. I'm glad we got to do this. 

I know. I really appreciate it from both of you guys. Like I said, Freight Gong is near and dear to my heart. And hearing about Truck Parking Club. And I'm happy and excited to kind of see what you guys can do with it, especially now that you're officially in the CMO role and it's announced there. But, guys, I really appreciate it. Th thanks for the time and the information. And anybody else here listening, thanks again for tuning in to another successful Banyan Tire Tracks podcast. We'll hit you with some more as we get them. And thanks again. Follow and stay tuned. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it.