Good break, but we're gonna continue on with next up on our day two of our thirty-first annual BofA Transportation Airlines Industrial Conference. For those new to the room, I'm Ken Hoexter, BofA's Air Freight and Surface Transportation and Marine Shipping Analyst. Next up, we welcome intermodal brokerage and logistics carrier Hub Group with Phil Yeager, President, CEO, and Vice Chairman, Kevin Beth, EVP and Chief Financial Officer, joining us here on the stage. Also, in the audience, from Hub Group is Lorna Williams, hiding over on the left side there, who joined as IR this year. So we welcome all three for their first time here at the BofA Transport Conference, Hub Group for the second time.
So very much looking forward, for me to this discussion. With that, Phil and Kevin, let me turn it over to you for thoughts on the state of the market. I know you have a few slides to kick us off with. And then also, as part of your intro, if you can throw in kind of what three key takeaways we should leave here with today.
Yeah, sure. No, thank you very much for having us. We're excited to be here, and really looking forward to the discussion as well. If I think about three takeaways, I hope you know everybody has, is one, Hub Group has really transformed over the last several years, and that's been leading to some much stronger trough-to-trough financial performance, and better returns within the business as well. Second, I would say we also continue to have a rock-solid balance sheet, very strong free cash flow. And third, that's driving our continued investment strategy, which is really focused on organic growth, acquisition-driven growth, and now, which is a little bit newer, a more consistent return of capital to shareholders.
And so we're really excited about how we're positioning the company for the long term, and the aligned strategy that we have. And with that, I'll probably just jump into the slides.
Please. Yeah, please jump in.
Okay. Just a quick safe harbor. But no, I you know we are a supply chain-
Amazing, we all read it, thank you.
Yeah, it was really fast. So we are a supply chain solutions provider. This past year, 2023, $4.2 billion in revenue, a little bit around a 5% operating margin. It was the second-best financial performance that we've had as an organization. 2022 was the next best year. We break ourselves down into two key segments, first being ITS, which you should think of as more of our asset-based solutions. Intermodal is our largest service offering, really what we're known for in the marketplace. We're the second-largest provider in the space. We have 50,000 containers, 2,300 drivers, work with the UP and NS, on an exclusive basis, and really see some nice opportunities for growth there.
We also have a dedicated trucking operation, which is within ITS, high service, long-term contracts, mostly distribution center to store sort of deliveries, about 1,000 drivers, 5,000 pieces of trailing equipment. The other segment, which has been the faster-growing and probably more stable portion of our business, is our logistics segment. Recently, we acquired the final mile business of Forward Air. That moved us into the top five in the big and bulky home delivery business, added a nice appliance capability, as well. We have a large truck brokerage operation, which has refrigerated and LTL capabilities that is helping us be more resilient at this point in time.
Have a great managed transportation business, where we manage over $1 billion of LTL for our customers, and then a great warehousing business as well, that we've grown to 11 million sq ft across the US, mostly LTL consolidation, going inbound into retail. But it's been a great path for us, and we're excited about the future. So where are we going? We set some targets back in 2020 to get to $5.5 billion-$6.5 billion of revenue by 2025, as well as a 4%-5.5% operating margin. We've been operating well within the operating margin target.
Obviously, as I referenced on the prior slide, probably have some work to do to get to the revenue targets, but I think as the cycle continues to improve and we continue to execute on our acquisition strategy, we'll be in great shape. Really have three core focus areas in our capital. First, in investing in the core business, continuing to drive growth in intermodal, as well as improving our technology. We're looking at continuing to grow our non-asset logistics businesses, which helps continue to drive strong free cash flow generation, but also help us deepen our value to our customers, decommoditize our more transactional services like brokerage and intermodal, and then lastly, return capital to shareholders. We have a new leverage target that we've set that we're operating under today.
We did a stock split at the beginning of the year, and we're doing now a cash dividend and more consistent share repurchases. As we think about Hub and why we think we're a good investment, one, we are a leader in the space. We're recognized by our customers, by the industry, for our leadership. We have a great management team. We have a very strong strategic plan and focus, and continue to generate just significant free cash flow, which positions us for continued investment and success for the long term. Really excited about the opportunities we have, and look forward to the discussion.
Oh, wonderful.
Thank you.
So let's talk about, you know, near-term growth, right? You talked about growth being down at ITS, down 16% in January, down 6% in February, a little bit worse in March, and then a huge upswing of 16% in April.
Mm-hmm.
Talk about what you're seeing in the background.
Yeah, so, we. And we referenced this on a prior call, that we probably did not move as quickly as we should have on taking price down. We tried to we, you know, I think everybody thought, hopefully, this isn't as long of a cycle, and pricing for us is a strong driver of earnings power and versus volume. But that, we were kind of coming over the overhang of that, and that was really what we think will be our last quarter of volume declines. As you referenced, April is gonna be up significantly, but I think we also are excited that we've had four months in a row now of sequential volume growth. And I think May is trending to be very strong as well. So, we're winning a significant amount in bid season.
We're well ahead of the targets that we've set by bid. The interesting thing to me has been the amount of business we're winning in shorter-haul segments, like the Local East. That's gonna be a big driver of our growth, a lot of conversion from over the road. In my view, it's a cost differential, but also the strong service product that we're providing is giving our customers more confidence in converting business from over the road back to intermodal, and really utilizing that as a core piece of their supply chain. So we're excited about that.
... So let's dig into that on the intermodal side a bit, right? So you noted load growth was down 10% overall in the Q1 , Transcon down 6%, Local East down 2%, local west down 16%. Maybe you wanna break that down into what's going on, particularly out west, as we now see maybe some of the shift from the East Coast ports to the West Coast ports. We're seeing, you know, maybe better volume growth out there.
Yeah.
Talk about the potential you see out of that.
Yeah, our Transcon longer length-of-haul business has been the most resilient through this down cycle. And so for intermodal, that's really just core lanes for us, and we've done a very nice job in growing that. It's been interesting for me. Typically, when you turn the calendar, we're having to sell actually outbound Southern California capacity, and not having to reposition as many containers in. It's been the inverse of that this year. We've been deficit in Southern California all year, so we are getting to benefit from the import demand. I don't think as much, because there's a lot more running intact IPI, and that's been a little bit more of a competitive set in those longer lengths of haul.
When I think about the short haul, I think, you know, I think there's a good understanding by our customers that the spot market is not gonna be at a trough forever, that they have gotten a significant benefit out of it, so they're looking for more resilience in their supply chain, more resilience in their capacity. And the fact that we have provided such a great service product in those shorter-haul segments, I think, is giving them the confidence to convert that business more permanently. So that's been a really nice indicator of, or at least a good driver of our success in bid season, and, you know, we think it's gonna continue.
So how does... How do you, I guess, compete in that, in those Local West, local East markets, given truck... You know, again, we're talking spot pricing down into the $1.25 range.
Yeah.
Contract rate, not quite at that level, but you're more dealing with kind of those customers that would be dealing with contracts. So how do you compete? Where is the gap now or the discount of truck? How wide is that now versus intermodal, and what would make somebody make that conversion?
I'd say if you look in aggregate, it's probably closer to about 30% would be the contract spread.
Versus normal?
versus truck. And
Right, versus normal. Got it.
You know, when you see conversion, it's normally in that high 20s, low 30s.
Yeah.
So that's, I think, you know, what, what we're seeing right now. If you think about shorter-haul segments, it's probably in the high teens from a differential perspective. And, you know, that, with the consistent service product, that's been enough to convert business. We've done a lot of really good things, though, as a business to better position, from a cost structure perspective as well. So our rail contracts now move both up and down, from a cost perspective. We've insourced a significant amount of our drayage. We've driven down our third-party drayage costs and put in new chassis programs as well that are helping us reduce costs. The other piece with the additional volume is it creates better velocity for us, creates better balance with our drivers, better balance with our containers.
So our empty repositioning costs in the Q1 were down over 20%. Our cost per dray was down 15% in the Q1 , and all of that, I think, was due to we saw sequentially improving volumes, and that, with that trend continuing, it continues to reduce our costs.
I'd just like to add, one of the other things we saw was increase of utilization of our containers, so we were up 8%, versus Q4 as utilization. Again, you know, that was one of the goals during the bid season, was to make sure that those boxes are moving and turning more often.
Your, I guess, peer competitor, J.B. Hunt, noted that they've got 20% excess capacity-
Mm-hmm.
- presumably stored in yards around the country. What... How do you think about your excess capacity right now or stored inventory?
Yeah, we took our stack down about 15% quarter- to- quarter, so Q4 to Q1. So, you know, for, with the sequential volume improvement, we needed to unstack. We're trying to get as much as we can out of the existing containers we have out in the fleet right now-
Right
... and trying to avoid unstacking, 'cause there is cost related to that. But, you know, I think generally we're in a similar sort of position, where, yeah, about 20% is probably the right number. But, we are continuing to unstack, and... but once again, trying to get as much utility as we can while keeping service where it needs to be. I think there's a balance you need to walk.
Maybe we could step back on intermodal. Can you set the stage on kind of market size, dynamics, both revenue, containers in the market?
Yeah, I mean, and obviously, you know, we referenced, you know, we're a strong number two in the market. We're the largest customer of the Union Pacific. We're one of the top five customers of the Norfolk Southern and have the second-most containers, about 50,000. I think, you know, our some of our competitors are quite larger, about double our size, but we have others that, you know, the next closest, the third largest, is about half our size.
Yeah.
So there are some large gaps between size and we think scale and economics come with that. But you know, I think we've done a lot of really good things recently to position the business. You know, I mentioned on the drayage side, on chassis, on our rail contracts, and that's helping us really take on that volume, and I think as we see an inflection in the market, will put us in a really good position from a pricing perspective as well.
You know, the one other thing, Ken, is that in our acquisitions, in our logistics side, that feeds our intermodal business.
Mm-hmm.
One of the things we really do a nice job is cross-selling. Some of these customers never used intermodal before. You know, then when we get them in a consolidation program, or we get them in a managed trans program, we could teach them, and then they are educated on intermodal and the benefits. And then that has been able to also, you know, provide more volume for us that way internally.
Yeah. It's amazing we've been at this for so long, and yet you're still finding customers that have never used it-
Oh, yeah, sure.
or willingness or still so hesitant, 'cause it's so easy to put on a truck and-
Yep
... and run point to point. And yeah, no, I hear you. On 50,000 containers, if J.B. is double, and you've got Schneider half your size, and then even half that size is Knight-
Yeah
... and that's the largest guys out there. You know, is there... You talked about we had mispriced, and we shifted price. What's going on in the market now in terms of the shift from price to volume focus?
Yeah, I think what we've seen is, we did need to close the gap on rate. We've done that. We're converting business. Some, some obviously has to be coming from other intermodal providers, but we think mostly over-the-road, given how short-haul a lot of the wins have been. I think we're now seeing stability in the market. So when we moved, it was around these bids last year, so that's where we feel, okay, our renewals aren't gonna be down really. They're gonna be relatively flattish. And then we'll continue to see that hopefully trend in the right direction as we enter bid season now. As we enter bids going into next year, we're hoping we see that kind of positive inflection in pricing. We haven't seen it get it.
People get, you know, crazy or anything. We've seen it, everybody kind of say, "Hey, this is where the market is, and we can win business at these rates and generate a return." And for us, we need to continue to control what we can control, drive our costs down, and that's where a lot of that velocity comes in that I mentioned. I mean, our repositioning costs continuing to go down, our driver productivity improving, all that helps us continue to compete.
So you don't break out margins by segment, right? It's just one overall margin versus intermodal logistics and the like, right?
We do operating income by segment.
By segment.
Yeah.
So you talked about the 4-5.5 goal. Is that, you know, you've got some that run higher, some run a little bit lower. Is that kind of now on ... Is that market driven? Is it cost, more cost, or is it you've got opportunities on the revenue side?
You know, I think, well, I think we've done a lot of really good things to improve the aggregate operating margins of the company. Kevin referenced on our last call, our trough-to-trough operating income is double, what it was, you know, last down cycle. So we've done, I think, a lot of really good things. Part of that is the diversification of our service offerings, getting, you know, more value-added services into our portfolio, getting stickier with our customers. A lot of it is also a lot of the things I've referenced that we've done better with intermodal, and just taking out cost, managing our headcount very effectively. I think we're doing a lot of those things very well. I think when you start to get into operating margin benchmarking, everybody calculates it a little bit differently.
And so what we really try to focus on is our returns. We run a far more, especially in intermodal, far more asset-light model. We don't own chassis. We outsource somewhere between 25%-30% of our drayage, which is completely non-asset. 30% of our drivers are independent contractors. So you take all that together, if you're, if you actually think about the operating margins, other people also don't include fuel revenue, so I think that inflates operating margins. But all those things taken together, I think, we try to focus on, okay, what's the right return for the business? We don't think going out and buying a bunch of chassis is gonna be a very good return investment for us. It's a little higher expense, but, it's not really gonna generate much of a return on capital.
We really try to focus on that. I'd also just say it helps in our free cash flow profile well, as well. If you think about why we generate so much more free cash flow, it's a lot of that. CapEx is much more limited.
So, Kevin, given the diversity you were talking about, right? Truck brokerage, final mile consolidation, fulfillment, managed trans, how, you know, how do you think about where to focus the incremental dollars?
Yeah. So when we look at our capital, you know, we're always gonna look internally first. You know, are there more equipment that we could be purchasing to make sure that we're positioned to growth? That now includes warehouse equipment as well, as we've expanded that business. But after that, you know, we're certainly continuing to look at tuck-in acquisitions, mostly on that light asset and that logistics. You know, we like to look for scale. We like to look for other services that we don't have an expertise in. And, you know, we think we found that. You know, we always look for cultural fits. We feel that those are best. They, you know, they slide in real easy. We like those opportunities. I had to mention cross-selling earlier.
You know, and that is something that if we feel we can get our services to different customer bases, we're really able to expand, and also expanding our current customers in into other specialties. So yeah, so we're continuously looking for M&A. And then after that, of course, is shareholder returns. You know, we made some changes this year, with the stock splits and the dividends, and, so we... over $33 million returned to the shareholders in this past quarter between the dividends and the share buyback. So, you know, that's sort of our approach. And then, you know, the one thing I didn't mention is technology. You know, we really...
Our technology is a purpose, and it's trying to make not only ourselves more efficient, but bring better service to our customers.
Wonderful. Phil, I want to revisit something you talked about on price. How do we understand your use of price to win volumes versus, you know, kind of the market, right? So, I mean, obviously, we hear a lot about price and competition and … but you kind of threw in there, it's also still rational. Everybody's kind of settled in a bit. How do we-
Yeah
... outsiders kind of take an understanding of what's going on in the market?
Well, and I think what you saw, and I think this is a good example of ITS margins actually improving sequentially, right? And to us, that's a really important indicator of what we're trying to do. We're trying to reduce cost and compete more effectively, maintain our margins where they are, make sure we're being diligent on headcount, taking out, you know, setting up better contractual frameworks around chassis and rail, insourcing more drayage where it makes the most sense, reducing third-party drayage costs. All those things like, are helping us compete with over-the-road. So while, you know, maybe it looks like price is down, we're trying to keep margins in a very kind of neutral to up, sort of rationale. I think the other piece is, as we add that volume in, it further reduces costs through that velocity.
We think about it as a margin-per-load-day model, and, everything we're trying to win, we take every bid, we overlay it with our network. So what might look like an irrational price to somebody else, to me, makes perfect sense because I'm filling in an empty repositioning lane, or I'm going to help get my driver loaded back. You know, those sorts of things that actually help us reduce costs, better serve our customers, improve the existing margins on our business.
... So it's about network balance rather than kind of headlines.
Yeah.
Okay. Pricing, you noted 40% of your annual bid activity was done in the Q1 . Well, no, I guess that's typical, right? March through May, bid season, right?
Mm-hmm
... in terms of the trucking market. But given record-low truck pricing, how does it look so far? You noted expect weak pricing in the first half, maybe flattish in the second half. Maybe-
Yeah
... maybe give a little insight into how that plays out given the-
Yeah
... Bid season.
That's been generally in line with what we've been seeing, and I think we have outperformed. We have, by bid, a tracker and goal for every single, every single bid we participate in, how much growth we're trying to get, what lanes we want, and we have been tracking that pretty diligently, and we're ahead of where we thought we would be at this point in time, which is a great indication of our performance. You know, we're through the vast majority of bids now. We have a few big ones that are left. You know, continue to see similar dynamics, right, to what we experienced earlier.
So at least at this point, we're still feeling confident that we're gonna outperform our expectations, but need to continue to execute through here, through this kind of 35% that's remaining, so yeah.
So let's talk about rail relationships, right? You've got this long-term relationship with UP, number one customer, as you mentioned. Also, Norfolk, we'll talk about in a minute. But UP's been going through an overhaul with the new CEO, Jim Vena, dramatically improving service. What has that done for the, I guess, both the Western and the Transcon business, and your relationship with UP?
You know, we do have a rock solid relationship, and I've really enjoyed working with Jim. I think, you know, they have—they've done, and he has done everything that they've said they were gonna do, whether it's service and safety and productivity. I think they're doing all those things, and it. Our customers are responding very favorably to it. You know, we do work very closely with them, and I think the service levels are, you know. I think what our customers hone in on is when there are disruptions, how fast are you getting back to normal? And so if you think about those winter storms that impacted us at the start of the year, we snapped back to service in about a week.
I mean, it wasn't that would take us a few years ago 5 weeks, right? And now we're back, and we were back within a week to regular service. Gates were all open. Everything was flowing seamlessly. And we try to use those sorts of instances as an indication of the resilience of what we're doing. And so we're very pleased with the service. Our customers are, too, and it's gonna in our view be the catalyst for growth as we think about intermodal. What's always been missing is when you see that positive inflection in volume, you know, our partners and us haven't provided a great service product.
We've struggled to serve our clients, and I think we're in a position now where, as that up cycle comes, service is gonna be maintained, and it leads to share gains over the long term.
Yeah. All right, so you've been king of the hill there for a while. But you were a first mover, right?
I don't know about that.
Well, but I mean, relative... Now you've got, let's call it little sister, little brother, kind of kicking around on the network, too, right?
Sure
... in the same business, where you had, you know, I don't know, priority access and unmatched, kind of, given that you were the first mover there. Has that changed at all in terms of service, or has it enhanced-
Mm
... as they start discovering new lanes, given volumes, or really no difference?
It hasn't been any different, really. I mean, you know, obviously we watch it closely. You know, we did watch it very closely, but I would say competitive dynamics haven't changed. Our service arrangements around priority access have not changed. Our, you know, well, you know, most competitive rates have not changed. All those things are maintained. It is building some more density, so there are some opportunities, especially with UPNS, with the Knight folks, to build some more interline traffic. Not a ton, but I think as you see volumes start to trend in the right direction, I think, you know, there, there's more opportunities for steel wheel versus rubber. So that's another good opportunity.
Perfect. All right, let's jump over to Norfolk, right? So we talk about UP improving service. Took a while to get there. You know, we certainly have, on the rail side, watched that for a long time, and it's great to see Jim executing there. NS has struggled. Just went through a proxy battle where you could have seen even more, I think, upheaval. That seems to be maybe delayed, but now you've got a new COO who seems to be more focused on PSR. Historically, PSR initially has eliminated some unprofitable or many intermodal lanes.
Mm.
Have you... What are your initial discussions here as they've, you know, they, they've changed their plans and, and talked about the maybe potential disruption to your network?
Yeah, I, you know, I, we wrote a public letter of support for Alan and the Norfolk Southern management team. You know, we feel as though the service levels that we have been receiving, I know the public data might not represent this, but the service levels that we have received from UP and NS has been the best we have ever seen. And that's in my 15 years with the company and since we really started tracking on-time performance levels from our rail partners. So, we've been really pleased with the service. The international intermodal lanes, I know they cut some, but we've built a great partnership and feel as though, you know, their focus is on growing domestic intermodal.
And, we're very aligned in executing on that, and you're seeing that show up in our local east volumes continuing to trend so positively. I think a lot of that is the service product that we're getting there. So, no, we're very supportive of the team and excited about what's ahead, so.
And I, I'm just gonna revisit that, right? So local east, down the least amount, right?
Mm-hmm.
With Transcon down and local west down more, which would have to be from improved rail service. I'm kind of surprised, looking at those numbers, just given what we see on-
Mm
... where truck rates are, and that being the most competitive truck market, right?
Yeah.
Just given the matrix and short haul, what is driving that?
Yeah, I think it's service. It's, you know, we've reduced costs, which is allowing us to be even more competitive, convert that business. Once customers see the service that we're able to provide, which is truck competitive, and the savings that they're getting, they want to keep it on intermodal. So, we're not... In the past, a few years back, that would not have been the case. We were losing business to over-the-road every week, you know, and some people were even paying more money just to move it over the road, 'cause our service was not where it needed to be. So, yeah, we've, I think, really turned the corner there, and have a lot of momentum.
You'll see local east for us probably be the strongest growth area for the full year.
Mm.
It's revenue per load-wise not a great mix indicator, but from a margin percentage and from the ability for us to utilize our capacity and get that utility really moving in velocity in the network, it's a really good thing.
Okay, so let's talk about the rail costs, right? 'Cause you talked about rail costs going up or going down. Right now you said they could come down on a year-over-year basis if volumes are coming up. Maybe help me flesh that out, if loads are—if you're talking per load basis and how that's shifting.
Mm-hmm. Yeah, we're talking per load basis. And you know, as each quarter now, the rail contracts are resetting, and you know, this is not something that we're historically seen in my 20 years. The first 18, it was just a question of how much they were going up-
Yep
... not if. So that's really been helping us be more cost competitive when we're pricing out business. And one thing to reiterate, though, rail cost of our total cost of an intermodal move is about 50%.
Right.
You know, while that is a biggest driver, it's not the only driver. And, you know, that's why some of our other programs of our drayage cost and insourcing that and keeping those tractors and truck drivers utilized, as well as our chassis agreement, it is helping us keep those costs under control.
Great. On that cost side, you, Phil, you talked about 77% doing your own drayage. You said it, it's more asset light than peers. What, give me an example. What are peers— How do you compare that versus peers in terms of... And what is your ideal level, is that your ideal level, kind of-
Yeah
... balancing out owned and leased and-
I don't exactly know everybody else's percentages. I do know we're the largest purchaser of third-party drayage in the U.S., and we think that's important for us, 'cause it gives us market pricing power. So, we're able to drive what's the optimal cost structure in a market. We could say, "Hey, you know, in Southern California, it makes sense to be 90% of our own drayage, but in Dallas, it makes sense to be 70%," and that can be us toggling between third party, our own assets, independent contractors. So it's a market-by-market sort of analysis. We're not always... We're never optimal. We're always trying to find, okay, what's the right level to be at? In aggregate, we think through a cycle, it's probably around 80%. I don't, I don't...
You know, I think it's all constantly moving based on what the market's doing, based on our ability to, or our need to to surge with our customers. 'Cause I think that's one of the things we pride ourselves on, is when our customers are surging, because we're such a large buyer of third-party spend, we're able to, to really meet that demand and surge with them and provide great service through it, so.
So within this fleet, 50,000 containers, you've got a fleet of 900 refrigerated containers. I think you mentioned that in kind of your intro as well. Thoughts on density with the reefers and how that differentiates you versus peers, 'cause-
Yeah
... on a yield basis, I imagine that's quite a difference, too.
Oh, yeah, it's been great. Yeah, longer length of haul, typically, you know, a lot of West Coast transcon business. We've really built a nice, dense network within that, though, and really reduced the empty repositioning. I think, when we bought Choptank, which is a large refrigerated broker that really helped us diversify our brokerage, we doubled down on our investment in the refrigerated containers. We had about 400 at the time, upped it to 900, and that sales force has been selling that product really successfully. It is a higher yield, obviously higher CapEx, but a business we really like, a really good value add. When service is really strong, it helps as well, because we're beating or around OTR transits, 'cause you're running on Z trains.
It's been a great add to our fleet, great capability. We plan to continue to invest in it as the market dictates. We don't have any of those stacked right now.
No.
They're all out running, so, you know, we'll likely continue to grow that fleet over time.
So Kevin, you target CapEx $45 million-$65 million for the year. Maybe break that down, tech, tractor fleet, trailers.
Yeah, so, tech is about... We run $15 million-$20 million a year. Again, you know, all our tech is really with a purpose. You know, we're not necessarily splashy and don't have a, you know, a lot of press releases about our tech, but we think we can put it up against the, you know, the rest of the market. Then it's replacement tractors is the other big one. You know, we like to keep our tractor life under three years for the safety and the maintenance benefits that you get with the newer fleet.
Then, as we've been expanding the warehousing, we've been investing in, in our warehouses, whether it's stacking, you know, moving equipment within a warehouse and, and some robotics even within our warehouses that we've been investing in.
So let's talk about Forward Air Final Mile services, right? I mean, you recently bought that adds about almost $300 million in revs, doubles your final mile business, gets you, I guess, maybe $470 million now. You know, we see J.B. Hunt up at $950 million, RXO at about $1 billion. So you're kind of, like you said, top four or five player now in terms of final mile. What was the focus on doing that?
Yeah, I think, one, it was, it was very opportunistic, right? I think, I had been in conversations with Forward Air for several years about purchasing the business, mainly because when we bought Nonstop Delivery in 2020, it was a great addition to our business, but what we lacked was an appliance capability. And for a lot of our customers, that's, one, it's the largest piece of the big and bulky final mile space, but two, it's the most service sensitive and really gets you access at chief supply chain officers sort of levels. And if you're doing a great job, you're gonna continue to grow, and there's a lot more pricing kind of opportunities associated with that as well. Forward Air Minal Mile just a great reputation within the marketplace.
And we felt as though, you know, being able to move quickly due to our balance sheet, being opportunistic when that came around, I think was a great add. We're well ahead of our forecast on cross-selling, in particular. But also the cost synergy side, where we're taking a lot of the Forward Air Final Mile facilities and consolidating existing freight into that to build more density, run more on our own power versus with third parties, and that's been very beneficial to us as well. So it's been a great acquisition, great cultural fit. You know, and we're really excited about it. So it's- I don't know if you wanna add?
Yeah, I would say that, you know, the management team really has slid in well, and in fact, it was really the first one that we actually allowed that management team to start managing our existing business right from the get-go. And it's been, it's been a great fit, as Phil said, and they were really excited to come over and see the investment that we were making in them.
So let's talk about... I mean, you talk about acquisitions, you've been acquisitive lately, right? You know, I've got a mini list, right? You mentioned Choptank, but CaseStack, NSD, TAGG Logistics, and I'd go back, you know, so many different ones in terms of drayage-
Yeah
... that you've bought over the years. What, how, what's your focus and how do you think about returns or focus of the business, leaving just what was intermodal in terms of adding first drayage, then trucking, and then you've added on now final mile. How do you think about what end market you want to hit as we think ahead?
Yeah, I think, you know, going back as far as you did, is certainly, intermodal has always been our core, right?
Yeah.
And the company was started on that. And, you know, I think the drayage acquisitions that we did, going back, many years, has allowed us to quickly pop up to different terminals and expand our scale. And since then, you know, we've been diversifying. And again, you know, we went to our customers years back and asked them: "What other transportation services do you guys like to see that we can help provide the service that you know us for today?" And as we've been doing that, you know, that has brought us to the warehouse and the consolidation that helps our retail customers. You know, on the refrigerated side, that there was brokerage opportunities. You know, I didn't even know that Home Depot moved stuff in refrigerated brokerage, but they do.
So, you know, we've been able to add additional services, and that helps our cross-sell. And, the asset light ones, you know, just really feed that cash flow, and that allows us to go out and buy even more. So, you know, we're gonna continue with that strategy. It's really worked for us, and, you know, that business, that logistics business, is the operating income, too, is that steadier, you know, it doesn't have the ups and downs of cyclical market. So, you know, we think that that's a good base that will allow us to continue the profitability going forward.
So Phil, Kevin, thank you. This is a great rundown for me as well. But I guess if I think about kind of just summing up a little bit, and I want you to add on whatever I leave off. But you mentioned kind of Hub's transformed the last few years, better trough to trough in terms of how you've positioned the company, strong balance sheet, organic growth, you know, in terms of of your core focus.
Revenue target, the multi-year target you set might be tougher to get to that $5.5-$6.5 billion, given the backdrop of the market, but 4%-5.5%, your margins, you're basically there and can continue to focus on the cost side, as you've run through a couple times. You've got about 20% of the fleet stacked, but your focus now is on increasing utilization. It's more costly to take them out, so keep focusing on increasing asset utilization of the fleet. Anything else you'd want to add?
No, I think you, I think you nailed it. I think we're, you know, we're doing the right things to position the company for the long term, and, we're really excited about the opportunities we have ahead, so...
And near term, not really fearful of economy deteriorating? I guess I talked with our consumer team, and they seem. I guess there's a little bit more concern about the consumer lately. Are you seeing any of that, or is it okay? Is it-
You know-
... maybe just stable?
I think with where inventories have come down to, we're not as concerned short term. Certainly, you know, if the, we want the consumer to remain robust and resilient-
Yeah
... but, you know, I think inventories, everybody's in this spot now where they think inventories are in the right position, but they might also need to move very quickly if the consumer actually stays. So I think we're more in the. People are betting that the consumer's weak. If that's not the case, we see a large snapback in some shipping patterns, which could be great.
Wonderful.
Yeah.
Phil, Kevin-
Thank you.
... thank you very much. Appreciate the time.
Thank you.