Here at Pilot we are continuing to grow and expand as a company, and our Raleigh station is no exception. The station is ringing in the New Year in a brand new updated location. The new space is located adjacent to the Raleigh-Durham International Airport, in the heart of the Triangle region. Our Raleigh team will now have roughly 25,000 square feet of office and warehouse space, nearly doubling the size of the previous station.

This expansion allows the Raleigh team to continue providing excellent service to its customers, as well as add to their arsenal of services. Raleigh will now be able to offer inventory management to its customer base, which includes technology, furniture, medical, electronics, and manufacturing companies, and we couldn’t be happier. We are very excited to see what new opportunities the station’s new and improved space will bring in the New Year!

Congratulations to the team in Raleigh on the big move and continued growth!

I want to take a moment to congratulate and thank everyone on the Pilot team for their hard work over the holiday season and in the months leading up to it. Not only did we handle a record number of shipments this year, but we did so while achieving an extremely impressive on-time performance.

This year’s holiday delivery rush was our best ever, delivering more than 40,000 televisions and other large items to consumers in the month of December. There’s no doubt that the new technology solutions we launched this year aided in making our network more efficient and error-free. But it’s also important to note that our success this holiday season — and through the year — would not be possible without our team of dedicated employees.

There is still large numbers of orders coming in after the holidays, but we anticipate that when the numbers are all in, our home delivery on-time performance rate will be well over 99 percent for the month of December, which is an incredible achievement during a notoriously difficult delivery season. Once again, thanks to the staff and Pilot community for making that possible!

Over the past several years, we have continued to add more services to our arsenal in our quest to provide the best possible service to our customers. To that end, we have just announced the launch of Pilot Customs Brokerage (PCB). PCB is now processing and handling the customs clearance of imports for Pilot customers everywhere in the U.S. We are also offering customs brokerage as a stand-alone service for companies who are not current customers, allowing us to broaden our reach and bring in new business.

Ilyse Dawicki, managing director of customs brokerage, is spearheading the new PCB operation. Ilyse has over 20 years of experience in customs brokerage and has undoubtedly been a great asset to our team.

With the help of Ilyse and this new service we are able to better serve our customers and eliminate the use of third party brokers. PCB not only adds to our growing list of customer services, but to our overall growth as a company. Congratulations to everyone involved in putting PCB into action!

Supply & Demand Chain Executive recently asked me to share my thoughts on the technology advances that are helping propel our industry into a paperless environment. In an article that was published this week, I discussed not only what the industry is doing as a whole, but how Pilot’s use of technology is allowing us to really level the playing field and compete with the big guys.

Let’s be honest, our industry has not historically been the most tech savvy. However, in the past few years we have taken major leaps forward that have changed our business for the better. We have streamlined the process of delivery, allowing our customers to close the communication gap and ultimately solidify sales. With the introduction of Compass, we now have the tools and base we need to adapt and create more apps or add-ons that will continue to give us an advantage within the industry.

To read the full article, check out Supply & Demand Chain Executive’s website. And if you have any questions on the topic, feel free to leave a comment and I’ll be happy to get back to you.

For a number of years, our San Diego station has worked with Isle Surf & SUP, a company that sells stand up paddleboards (SUPs) and surfboards. Pilot handles all SUP imports and nationwide home deliveries. I recently spoke with Marc Miller, the co-founder of Isle Surf & SUP, about how Pilot has been able to help his business.

The SUP industry presents a shipping challenge, as these boards are oversize and can be easily damaged. Marc told me that with his previous domestic shipping partner, they were seeing damage rates of roughly 20 percent. Pilot has been able to work with Isle to improve their boxing and has brought their damage rates down to the two to three percent range. This improvement has meant happier customers and a reduction in the man hours normally spent dealing with customers who have received damaged products or delayed shipments.

In online retail, shipping rates can make or break a sale. And in an industry selling large items that need special treatment, shipping costs for consumers can be exorbitant. However, we were able to work out competitive rates for Isle that—along with a lower damage rate—has allowed them to offer free shipping to its customers. This is a MAJOR competitive advantage, and part of the reason that Isle has been able to take advantage of the recent SUP boom and has seen overall sales growth of roughly 100 percent this year.

The shipping and handling of paddleboards has the potential to be one huge headache, but our team in San Diego has proven that it doesn’t have to be. Congratulations to Marc and team on such impressive growth this year!

In 2011, a team of Pilot employees set out for Europe and opened a now-thriving station in Amsterdam, our first full-service location outside of North America. Since that time, we’ve seen the Amsterdam station have great success in serving our customers who move freight both into and out of Europe, and everyone has seen the advantages of having Pilot employees overseas.

This year, we’re continuing to expand our presence in Europe and I’m excited to announce that we have opened a new station in A Coruña, an important port city in Spain. The station is already up and running, and has gotten started with shipments of iPads to the Middle East and textiles to Russia. As you can read in the press release that we issued this week (see below), we expect that the A Coruña station will do a lot of work with textiles and ecommerce goods en route to destinations including the European Union, China and the Americas.

And because we see so much potential in Spain, we plan to open to additional locations later in the year in Barcelona and Madrid. Stay tuned for more information on those stations.

Congratulations to everyone involved in getting Pilot Spain off the ground!

LIMA, Pa.—June 18, 2013—Pilot Freight Services, a worldwide provider of transportation and logistics services, announced today that it has expanded its European footprint with a newly opened station in A Coruña, Spain, a port city in the Northwest of the country.

This announcement comes on the heels of Pilot reaching a $500 million revenue milestone in 2012. The company, which opened its first European station in Amsterdam in 2011, plans to open additional locations in Barcelona and Madrid within the year.

“We’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback from the opening of our station in Amsterdam, as our customers have really seen the benefit of having Pilot employees on the ground in Europe. Our plan has always been to expand further within the continent, and Spain was a natural next step,” said Richard Phillips, CEO of Pilot Freight Services. “Our team in A Coruña is already handling shipments of textiles and ecommerce goods, and we expect these commodities to be a mainstay for Pilot Spain.”

The A Coruña station offers a full suite of transportation and logistics services, including air, ocean, ground and logistics capabilities, and will handle freight en route to the European Union, China, the United States and South America. The station is being run by Javier Torrens and Eduardo Sanjuro, who will be responsible for all sales and operations.

At our National Meeting in Philadelphia two years ago, I stood up in front of 300 Pilot employees and announced my goal to reach $500 million in revenue in 2012. I could not be more proud to say that we have reached that goal.

This is an incredible accomplishment, one that truly shows the strength and determination of all Pilot employees. It’s impossible to give this credit to any one person or group of people, because our growth has been across the board. From special services to home delivery to government services, our team continues to exceed customer expectations and drive success.

I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again – my excitement over this achievement isn’t just because we hit a big number. It’s because we hit a big number by staying true to our core strengths, which lie in heavy-weight expedited freight. We don’t take every piece of business that comes our way. And in fact, in the past year we’ve chosen to walk away from some very attractive, big revenue accounts in order to go after the business that positions Pilot for long-term, sustainable growth. As a result of this strategy, I am confident that Pilot will continue to hit huge milestones in the years to come.

This will be another exciting year for us, as we continue to expand our footprint with new locations internationally, and many of our domestic stations moving to larger facilities to accommodate their rapid growth. Along with this expansion comes great opportunity for the Pilot community, and we are excited to see where 2013 will take us.

A big thanks and congratulations go out to all members of the Pilot family!

LIMA, Pa.—February 14, 2013—Pilot Freight Services, a worldwide provider of transportation and logistics services, announced today that it has hit the $500 million revenue mark for the first time, with $500.6 million in revenue for 2012. The company shipped more than 640 million pounds over the year, a nearly 8 percent increase from 2011.

“Two years ago we set a lofty goal of reaching $500 million in revenue for 2012, despite being in the midst of trying economic times. Thanks to the hard work and dedication of everyone in the Pilot organization, we achieved that goal,” said Richard Phillips, chief executive officer of Pilot.

Phillips continued, “While the numbers themselves are exciting, I’m even happier about how we got here. In the last few years, we’ve really focused on our core strength: heavy-weight, expedited freight. To this end, our strategy has included walking away from some very attractive-looking, big revenue accounts. Instead, we’ve gone after business that has made Pilot a stronger company and positioned ourselves for long-term, sustainable growth.”

Pilot saw strong year-over-year growth in several of its business units in 2012, including special services (up 40 percent), home delivery (up 21 percent), national accounts (up 12 percent) and government services (up 11 percent). After opening its first European station in 2011, Pilot expanded its footprint into Canada, establishing a station in Toronto in early 2012. The company expects to continue its international expansion by opening a station in Spain in the first half of 2013.

ABOUT PILOT FREIGHT SERVICES

Pilot Freight Services, Inc. is a full-service transportation and logistics provider with over 75 locations throughout North America and a recently opened station in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The company’s freight forwarding services encompasses every mode of transportation, including air, ground and ocean, serving all corners of the globe. Pilot’s logistics programs offer a complete line of expedited and time-definite services, international shipping solutions, product warehousing and inventory management. In addition, Pilot’s online shipment navigator, CoPilot, makes online shipping fast, convenient and secure. Learn more about Pilot Freight Services at www.PilotDelivers.com.

PRESS RESOURCES

Press contact(s): Jessica@GregoryFCA.com
Website: https://www.pilotdelivers.com/
Blog: https://www.pilotdelivers.com/category/blog
Press room: https://www.pilotdelivers.com/category/press-releases

Back in the spring, we featured our customer, Tower Paddle Boards, as they were about to appear on ABC’s “Shark Tank.” Six months later, we’ve got some exciting updates to share. In case you missed the episode, Tower was one of the lucky companies to have a “Shark” decide to take a chance on them. Billionaire investor Mark Cuban agreed to make a $150,000 investment in the business, which has resulted in enormous growth for Tower.

I spoke with Founder Stephan Aarstol this week (in advance of an update on the company scheduled to air on “Shark Tank” tonight) about what’s happened this year, and how Pilot is supporting his company’s growth. Aarstol told me that since the episode featuring Tower Paddle Boards originally aired, the company has seen sales increase more than 800 percent year-over-year, taking them from $250,000 in sales for 2011, to a projected $1.5 million for 2012. And if those numbers weren’t enough, an article in Entrepreneur Magazine recognized Tower as one of the top 10 “Shark Tank” success stories.

Meanwhile, Pilot is continuing to handle all of Tower’s inbound freight from China, as well as domestic delivery of thousands of completed paddle boards a year. When I asked Aarstol how working with Pilot has helped his business, he told me that the paddle board industry is notorious for high incidence of damage during shipping. Before Tower started working Pilot, they had been experiencing a 15 percent damage rate. After working with Pilot to make improvements like double boxing, that rate is down in the five percent range. Additionally, Tower is partnering with Pilot to explore other possibilities for international shipping, including setting up a warehouse in Australia, from which Pilot will facilitate the delivery of paddle boards to consumers who order from Tower’s website.

Our San Diego station has really enjoyed working with the team at Tower Paddle Boards, and is thrilled to see the company thriving. Once again, congratulations to Tower on the huge success — we’re happy to play a small role in making your business run smoothly!

It’s been an exciting first half of the year for everyone at Pilot. Our first quarter marked nine quarters of steady revenue growth and we are happy to say that the second quarter of 2012 has been no different. As a company, we have seen significant and continued growth, increasing our revenue by 12.5 percent from the second quarter of 2011.

The fantastic team at Pilot deserves much of the credit; especially those that helped our special services business grow this quarter—now up 65.5 percent year-over-year, along with our home delivery segment, which is up 37.2 percent over last year. Take a peek below for more about our solid second quarter. In addition, we congratulate Miami and Laredo on breaking the $1 million mark in monthly revenues, and recognize Pilot Seattle for their tremendous growth.

I have every confidence in the world that Pilot will continue to make huge strides and finish out the second half of the year with long-term revenue growth. We are excited about our employees’ hard work and Pilot’s ongoing commitment to exceeding customer expectations.

 

 

LIMA, PA—July 26, 2012—Pilot Freight Services, a worldwide provider of transportation and logistics services, today announced reported revenue of $126.5 million for the second quarter, ending June 30, 2012.  This marks a 12.5 percent increase over the same period in 2011 and a continued strengthening in the momentum of ten consecutive quarters of revenue growth.

In Q2, Pilot saw steady increases in all areas of business with the most significant stemming from their special services business, up 65.5 percent year-over-year and home delivery, up 37.2 percent over last year. This sector growth is attributed to a diversification in home deliveries product shipment including outdoor products as well as home furnishings. The special services division saw growth as a result of their asset recovery and medical equipment businesses.

“We are incredibly excited to see our numbers grow across all industry sectors and our customer base further develop,” said Richard Phillips, chief executive officer of Pilot. “In the third quarter of 2012, we look forward to seeing sustained long term revenue growth as a result of our dedication to exceeding our customers’ needs and expectations while consistently developing our business lines to serve a broader customer base. I am confident that by focusing on our customers’ needs and taking pride in the work that we do, we will continue to foster our long-term company growth.”

ABOUT PILOT FREIGHT SERVICES 

Pilot Freight Services, Inc. is a full-service transportation and logistics provider with over 75 locations throughout North America. Pilot is also a founding member of the World Freight Alliance (WFA), operating in more than 190 countries worldwide. The company’s freight forwarding services encompasses every mode of transportation, including air, ground, and ocean, serving all corners of the globe. Pilot’s logistics programs offer a complete line of expedited and time-definite services, international shipping solutions, product warehousing, and inventory management. In addition, Pilot’s online shipment navigator, CoPilot, makes online shipping fast, convenient, and secure. Learn more about Pilot Freight Services at www.PilotDelivers.com.

Over the past several years, we’ve seen more and more of our competitors scale back their operations, lay off employees, and in some cases, close their doors entirely. But for the ninth consecutive quarter, Pilot has seen year-over-year revenue growth — not a small feat when the economy is still struggling to rebound.