Challenger
About Challenger
Challenger is one of Canada’s largest privately owned transportation and logistics companies and offers a full range of transportation, logistics and warehouse services throughout North America. They have always been on the forefront of operational and technological advancements and continually strive to surpass previous standards of quality and performance.
Where Challenger’s Journey Began
Challenger transports a large volume of goods throughout North America and Canada. In order to expand their footprint and bring in new business, however, Challenger needed to find new customers and build direct partnerships with them. This was proving to be a difficult task as small details like product information and drop-off location often slipped through the cracks.
Becoming a Kuebix Community Carrier
Prior to becoming a Community Carrier, Challenger was already leveraging technology from Kuebix’s parent company, Trimble, to save time, money and avoid headaches associated with manual processes. Trimble introduced Challenger to Kuebix in February 2020, and from the beginning it was clear that there were many opportunities for Challenger to earn new business with Kuebix.
Community Load Match connected Challenger with shippers whose spot quote needs match their capacity requirements. When a shipper is looking for coverage in Challenger’s specific area, they are able to directly request a spot quote from Challenger, minimizing time wasted on requests from shippers looking for rates in areas Challenger doesn’t cover.
In addition to the spot opportunities available in Community Load Match, the Kuebix Load Match Group (KLMG) learned about Challenger’s strengths, core competencies and demographics to leverage the Kuebix platform and help facilitate direct connections with shippers whose goals aligned with Challenger’s.
Building on Success
After learning that Challenger was in search of shippers moving products cross-border, KLMG helped connect Challenger with potential matches. Success with spot rates in Community Load Match made it possible for Challenger to start building long-term direct connections.
“Shippers in Community Load Match are able to match their needs up with what we offer, creating an entry point for us. From there, we’ve been able to provide short-term solutions that evolve into long-term partnerships,” said James Brewer, Sales Logistics Executive at Challenger.
Conversations facilitated by KLMG helped Challenger learn details about the freight they were transporting and drop-off locations that wouldn’t have come up in a typical onboarding call. Challenger was then able to offer a solution to issues shippers had run into when working with previous carriers.
“Those conversations turned into Challenger becoming the dedicated carrier on lanes and getting consistent volume,” noted Brewer.
The Bottom Line
Shortly after joining Community Load Match as a Community Carrier, Challenger started seeing success on the spot market and RFP wins on contracted business. After learning of Challenger’s experience with handling automotive parts, a shipper within the community contacted them looking to establish a long-term partnership. Now Challenger does roughly $200,000 in revenue per month with that shipper!
“I always say that when we get a RFP opportunity through Kuebix that we’re probably going to win something, because the Load Match Group only comes to us with the right opportunities,” Brewer adds. “With Kuebix, our success rate is at roughly 90% - that’s the highest it’s ever been!”