1. Make it easy and pleasurable for the customer to do business with us. This is something we work toward day in and day out. We understand that to do a really good job for the customer, we have to create a positive long-term relationship.
2. Build a team of dedicated people who are hungry to continually improve things. Of course, technology is key, but people drive technology.
3. Never be satisfied with “good.” Follow up on every single compliment and award to find out how it can be replicated, or better yet, improved upon.
4. Anticipate customers’ needs, and then provide solutions that go even farther. In effect, this prevents problems before they start and helps customers understand how important they are to us.
5. Establish an incredibly efficient network. Finding that sweet spot in our LTL hub-and-spoke system with neither too many or too few terminal locations helps us maximize speed and minimize handling.
6. Don’t overextend the organization financially. Fiscal responsibility enables us to capitalize on opportunities when they arrive and remain flexible when other carriers are not able to.

A lot of these lessons seem obvious, but the longevity of our company can be directly attributed to paying attention to each of them. There is one more lesson, though, and I’ve saved the best for last:

7. Take the time to thank our loyal customers for choosing Estes as their carrier of choice. We know that we would not exist if it weren’t for each and every one. So my genuine thanks go out to you for your continued business.