Global Trade This Week – January 6th, 2023
What’s going on in Global Trade this Week? Today Doug Draper and Trade Geek Pete Mento cover:
4:08 -Chinese / Lunar New Year - Year of the Rabbit
9:45 -CH Robinson Whacks Bob B the CEO - What’s Next?
18:09 -Halftime
28:44 -Airfreight Overcapacity & FedEx’s Latest Move
33:21 -Is the Driver Shortage Over?
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Keenan Brugh
You're watching Global Trade This Week with Pete Mento and Doug Draper.
Pete Mento
Happy New Year everyone. I'm Pete mento. And with me as always, is the brilliant and generally prep of finely dressed Draper. My rider die. Doug, how are you, buddy?
Doug Draper
is first of all, I'm doing great. It's the new year 2023 We're gonna kick ass and take names my friend. So I'm excited.
Pete Mento
I'm all about kicking ass. But do we have to take names?
Doug Draper
Initial flush, take initials down so people can remain anonymous. That's as far as I'll go.
Pete Mento
As the show's compliance guy, I don't think it's a good idea to keep records of who's asked as we whip. So maybe, you know, maybe we could just keep them in mind. Think them through the for the problem that dealt with hanging around me as I was, I was watching a couple of binging shows with Amy or over break and I were watching these the spy shows and I'm just like, you would never you would never do this. She wouldn't. You would never keep records like this. She would never sit to shut up and watch the show. Why do you have to ruin? I said you sound like people I work with. Why do you have to ruin everything? And that's exactly right. I do I ruin everything.
Doug Draper
Yeah. For our audience, we can't see each other this go around. So our, our I'm talking to a black screen right now. So the nuances of communicating visually, as well as audibly, are taken away on the show. So there may be some speaking over each other. So our apologies out of the gate.
Pete Mento
Welcome, everyone to global trade this week. This is the first episode of 2023. I hope you haven't had to write the checks or put dates in anything yet. And get that date right there. Do you have a great holiday, Doug?
Doug Draper
I did. Yeah. The kids came back from college. So that always makes a joyful household. And they came in went quickly my daughter because we had this platform and we like to talk about it. She was selected on the rowing team at University of Kansas to go on a 10 day training trip down into Phoenix, Arizona. She's She's down there right now. Rowing and having a lot of fun. So I'm excited and proud of her for having that accomplishment. But yeah, how about you? How was your holiday?
Pete Mento
That's great. I tried to catch up on sleep. It didn't really work. But I had some great family time. I got some, I got some time without work emails and the such and that was really wonderful. And I think more importantly, you know, at this age, Doug, how many Christmases do I have left? So I try to I try to enjoy the hell out of each and every one of them, buddy. But you know enough of my buffoonery, my friend. We've got some great topics, and, you know, global trade this week, brought to you by our friends at CAP logistics, nother year, but it's gonna be the same old story, folks, it's us just absolutely crushing it with great topics about what we think is going to happen, what we believe is going on out there. And with that, Doug, the floor is yours for Topic number one, buddy.
Doug Draper
All right, good. Always forward thinking. Alright, so here's Topic number one. This is first part of January. So there is a big event that's going to be transpiring here very shortly, and that is called Chinese New Year. We spoke about this in our urine recap. But this is the year of the rabbit. Pete. So this Chinese New Year could have an interesting hop, if you will. I can't see your eye rolling or anything else that you're doing based on that. So
Pete Mento
I did, Doug, I did.
Doug Draper
So here's the deal, right? Initially, I said that Chinese New Year would have minimal impact on the supply chain. And I think I'm changing my story a little bit on that one. I wouldn't say it's going to be like none other that we've experienced, because that's happened in the last two years. But you've seen a lot of zero COVID policy over in China, and the way that workers have been reacting to it. And more specifically, I think there's been a lot of explanation of how factories work in China. Now, I'm not talking about, you know, the manufacturing process. I'm talking about how people live and engage in these mega campuses, where it's like college dormitories, communal meals, and you pretty much just live and work on this campus. And you know what transpired with the zero COVID pa policy is that people were getting quarantined left and right. They couldn't move. They couldn't, you know, breathe in and whatnot. So I think with Chinese New Year, and all of these folks heading back inland to hook up with their families, and spend time away from the joyous time, I've heard estimates of 100 million Chinese citizens rolling back to home, so to speak. And I still think this is more of a COVID comment. But I think that they're just going to say, You know what, it's not worth it, the potential of the COVID locked down, being uncertain of what's going to transpire. I know that things have changed a little bit with people visiting China and lifting those quarantine rules, but I still think there's going to be enough workers that are not going to come back or second guess their role within the big picture of manufacturing. And I think it's gonna have more implication than we may think. But one thing that may offset that Pete is kind of incentive pay. When I was doing some, some research on this topic this morning. I see it's a trend, at least that's what I've read about where if you work longer, hours, less days off, if there really is a day off, that there'll be some incentive pay. So there is a possible that when the workers go home, they realize they need more money, and they're going to come back. So this might be offset with incentive pay to keep things moving. But initially, Pete, I said it would be a slight implication, I think it's going to be more than slight. And we'll just see, we'll just have to see how this rabbit hops in 2023.
Pete Mento
Did you have to do the rabbit hop thing, Doug?
Doug Draper
Of course I did. You got to start with it and end with it.
Pete Mento
Anyway, so I'll start with this. But first of all, I was chastised by a co worker, when I was at Wayfair, for calling in Chinese New Year. Apparently, us old farts are supposed to say Lunar New Year, because it's not just China that celebrates it. So I don't know duck, I'm putting that in the whatever file because from the time I was, I was a teenager dealing with the the disruption that comes from supply chains. All over the world, we've always called it that. But to make the the more sensitive people in our audience, I'm sure they're pretty uncomfortable as to begin with, but I'll just I'll just call it Lunar New Year. Okay. But you and I both know what we're talking about this new year. I could not agree with you more that I feel that this is going to be a really difficult time for people to decide if they want to come back. But I mean, think about how many of them are working under conditions for the past couple of years. That particular this last one where they were saved themselves, I'm more or less imprisoned in the city or imprisoned more I'm working. not literally but figuratively because of these COVID restrictions. And now I've got some money, headed back home. It's the largest human migration every single year, people just heading back to where they're from, to spend time with family and friends. My you and I are great examples of this. You just had your kids come home, from universities for the holidays, I had my daughter come home, but youngest come home spend time with my oldest daughter, my oldest son was home for part of the holidays. You know, it's it's just part of what happens? Well, in this instance, the differences. These people have been working really, really hard. You have to get
jobs, right. So we're still getting used to our new computers. So we apologize when stuff like this happens. But when, when this when this new migration happens, everybody heads out in these new directions. They may not want to go back. Add to that the fact that orders are down in China, all across the board. Some people are saying as much as 40%. So new orders are down as much as 40%. I don't know if there's going to be the manufacturing thirst to have some of these people come back and key industries. Yeah, there'll be folks that they want to have come back. But I think a lot of industries are going to be happy to see these folks not come back. So yeah, I'm expecting to see this is the first big noticeable statistical ripple to show that we have a real problem with the Chinese economy.
Doug Draper
Yeah, yeah. Good call. Alright, my friend. I like your topics for sure. So let the first one rip.
Pete Mento
This is this is a brutal one to talk about. So I show up for the first real day back to work right the Tuesday of this week. I walked out of the gym, turn on the phone and it He's just text message after text message. WhatsApp messages of people. I used to work with a ch Robinson. Oh my god, did you hear Bobby got fired? You know, oh my god, you hear Bobby got fired. And I'm reading this thing and I'm like, I started texting while back I know what happened and no one knew what happened. You know, it's like this industry, we are like a bunch of eighth graders man, we love gossip. We're like a bunch of you know, those old church ladies I grew up with in Texas that they couldn't wait to someone's back was trying to talk trash about and it's I mean, it's the saddest thing, right? So they're all talking and then it goes through the industry like wildfire, like, oh, the CEO of Robinson got let go. And I barely knew Bob, I interacted with him, you know, a couple dozen times. nice enough guy, you know, my dealings with him, then you want to talk about a tough job, right? So I don't know what happened to the poor guy. I don't know the details of what happened. But to me, it's the aftermath of this guy being out of this job, right, you want to talk about a bizarre situation, you know, there was a large investment group that took a big part of CH Robinson, that's really making a requirement there. They're telling ch Robinson that they want to see some changes, and they want to see some serious growth. And what a hard time to be under that kind of pressure. Could you think of a harder time you're coming out of the biggest opportunity for growth we've ever had into use talked about a dog, I mean, we just talked about it, the the China is in is in a financial decline, the markets are all in ruined. And now you've got your board saying, keep the happy train rolling. So I don't know if anybody could have been successful. I work for a private company, I have an owner who made some brilliant moves with regards to the way that he did mergers and acquisitions. And he's planning on looking at the next couple of years is one where, you know, we're going to continue to grow and do all the right things and make decisions based on where the market goes, we don't have to worry. I think you work for private company to write, we don't have to worry about what the street or what investors say to us, we worry about what our owner wants to do so and what our customers want. It's very, very different. But what's been killing me, go on LinkedIn, go on Twitter, and just read for 10 minutes, the wild speculation of what they're saying needs to happen next. Flex port is going to come over and they're going to merge flex port and ch Robinson, we're going to take Expeditors a CH Robinson and put them together. Robinson needs to sell anything that doesn't have to do with over the road Nast. They need to dump all of the technology investment, as you know, bad debt into the international division and sell it off to somebody. I mean, the things that you're reading in there, it's it's sort of like when I would go on to Twitter, and everybody is suddenly a COVID vaccine experts come on. And I think I think it's a little bit early to second guess all the decisions that were made before. But more importantly, I don't think we all have a full grasp of precisely what was going on in that company. And to think that just by merging these companies, you're going to make it all better. That's madness. First of all, I believe flex sports in the midst of creating an initial public offering. So I don't think this is the time that the bank that boasts most of that damn thing wants you something like that. Second of all, expediters is a surgically well run company. And if they were going to do an acquisition or a merger, do they really want to do it with a company whose culture is so different? who focuses on such different things? I don't think so. Now, we all know Robinson was trying to sell their international division for a long time. But we have in this industry right now such big, impactful scary, shake it up kind of things that are happening. And this is absolutely one of them. But I think this isn't going to be the last one. I think that what we're seeing here is a toppling off of the head to pay for the sins of an industry. And I think we're going to see more of a Maersk as a new chairman. I don't think that was a firing or anything. I think that was just good timing on his part. But I think you're gonna see more and more of this in our industry, as the numbers begin to roll in for quarter after quarter. But
Doug Draper
yeah, yeah, I'm glad you brought up this this topic for sure. One. I'm kind of thinking like ch Robinson, from my perspective is like the Quaker Oats cereal that your grandparents used to use do and maybe still eat, right? It's the iconic ger or whatever with the I can't picture a sailor or something like that.
Pete Mento
It's a Puritan or no looking Amish guy on it. Right. It's
Doug Draper
quite valid. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. And you could you and I could go buy one today, and you could find one and your grandmother's Kitchen from 50 years ago, and they would look the same right, tried and true, it's a staple the whole nine yards. And from my perspective, that's kind of how ch Robinson has been. They're just, it's a very old company. And that's not negative at all. You know? Well, we're on for the most part from my perspective, but this is just, you know, a call that things need to change. And move forward. You know, we spoke about the, the roaring 20s, right that you and I spoke about after the post COVID. And the one thing about the roaring 20s in the 1920s, is it took like, eight, nine years for that cycle to come to fruition. The roaring 20s That you and I just talked about, and we just experienced collectively, was like 18 months to two years, things just move faster, in this day and age. And I think that, you know, the old Quaker Oats needs to move aside and reinvent itself. So the flex port piece, very interesting to me, I know flex port is got a little bit of static in the past for a good forward facing tool. And, and have a good story to tell. But really, the blocking the tackling is still guys and gals on the phone, just trying to figure out how to track and trace in a decentralized industry that we're in. So I think it's exciting, I think there's going to be some wild, you know, speculation of what's going on. But my take is when push comes to shove, you minimize your service offerings, do laser focus on what you're good at, which has been, you know, a century of truck brokerage. So I think there will be a spin off of some of their divisions. And I don't think there'll be any acquisitions or mergers, I think they're just going to be laser focused, at least, for a while to reset themselves. So the street has a little bit more confidence in what they're doing. So it'll be an interesting discussion. I'm sure this is not the only show that we'll be talking about it.
Pete Mento
I'm sure it's not in to be super clear, Doug. I have a lot of really, really good friends that are still there. I mean, really close, close friends. And I have a lot of respect for the company. But I think more importantly, I've got a lot of respect for the people that are there. And this is an industry that's you know, Pete Rose used to say it all the time at Expeditors. The greatest assets are their people. And that's the same wherever we go the greatest assets of any 40 company brokerage logistics firm, it's the people that work there. So I did my podcast today, I did an open letter to the board of directors at ch Robinson. And what I what I said there that I'm sure none of them will listen to is don't forget, you have some pretty incredible people there and it's time to listen to them. I think that there were a couple of decades where they they lost sight of the fact that most of the incredible innovation they've got came from some of those amazing forward thinking people on the beauty again. So that takes us to halftime buddy. I don't think so I halftime topics, your when you when you did your pre your pre show today.
Doug Draper
I got it. I got it. I have one that I was gonna drop. I'm gonna save it for next week. And it came to fruition when my kids were home from college. And it's all about technology. So I'm putting that one aside till next week. But I gotta I got a good one here. So you want to go first? You want me to go first?
Pete Mento
Oh, the first Yeah. So mines mines pretty straightforward. You know, I've been home for quite a while you end up watching what everybody else watches and in my house full of women. It's a lot of reality TV, and I can get sucked into it like anybody else. I have been wondering dog. However, why no one has done reality TV show on a global fording operation. Why no one has, has put cameras in one of our offices. One thing is we curse a lot. Least everywhere I've ever worked. The language is pretty rough. But there's a lot of drama that goes on in these offices. And there's a lot of crazy crazy stuff, like a lot. And I mean, there's less stuff it's boring as hell to but especially in my part of the office where customs happens, but the rest of the business is nuts. And I've wondered the personalities we have in this business. Why hasn't anyone done it?
Doug Draper
Yeah. I love it. Yeah, it would be a survivor type of theme right where you get to take people out of their element. And I think there's one going on right now on fox that is like special forces or something. We get the best characters that are well known in our industry we pin them together and we throw put them in situations. You know a phone bank with an irate customer and you have to explain why you can't stop a train in the middle of Wyoming to get the shit off of the back of the of the train and up Have them in scenarios, I just can't figure out what the physical challenges would be that would be relevant to our industry. It's not like welding, or, or, or whatever. Maybe you got to sail a boat across a small pond or something without it being tipped over. I don't know.
Pete Mento
I'll give you two responses to that deck. First of all, I think the physical one would be Can you can you drink 35 beers and still manage to close that deal? Secondly, rather, rather than then take us in prison situations, we should do something like a Donald Trump. You know, you're fired. I forget the name of the show. The Apprentice, we should take famous people and make them work in forwarding. And, you know, have have someone like me who's just an absolute jackass. Fire one of them every week. Like, you know, could you imagine someone like Nolan Paul, or like Paris Hilton working in affording office? How long that would last? I think it would be fantastic.
Doug Draper
Yeah, that's it. I think you nailed it. Bring in pseudo celebrities B and C list celebrities. And put them through the wringer. And I love the you know, we'll do at least something like a beer bong that they that they got to a beer funnel. They'll have to shut down and X number of time. I love it. We just got to figure out anybody out there. Yeah, that knows some good, you know, producers and figure out how to greenlight this thing we're all in we can script it.
Pete Mento
Oh yeah. Get get some 20 Something that's on tick tock all the time having their head screamed off by someone angry in China. They're like not even an English just someone screaming having the Mandarin for 15 minutes non stop. They don't get the chance to talk some really like I'll tell you right now Doug, you haven't been yelled at yet until some woman in in like Hong Kong or in Shanghai is very upset with you for like the second time and your your dude like that's the kind of angry wow, I the number of times I've been humiliated to the point of almost tears by a Chinese woman. Like you want to talk about growing up fast this industry like I never wanted to have that call again. I didn't screw up that twice. tell you that right now. So yeah, some Tik Tok star who's, you know, counting their followers on the phone getting their head ripped off. I think that will be a lot of that'd be great television man.
Doug Draper
Yeah, no, I love it. I love it. All right, man. Yeah, so what kicks off today is the infamous consumer electronics show the CES out in Vegas. And I was listening on the on the drive into work today about some of the crazy stuff going on. There's, I think 100,000 It's not quite as big as it is pre COVID Or it was pre COVID. But 100,000 attendees and ungodly amount of just random, a type of thing. So here is a list of five of the craziest ces inventions. It's kind of like I put down to say it's a list of shit that nobody really needs, but they're trying to pump it in Vegas. So first one, self driving baby stroller. Yeah, I said that self driving baby stroller not even going to comment on that you can just see how inappropriate and crazy that is. This one's kind of cool. It's a health tech toilet puck that you would drop into a urinal. And it can provide health feedback by tracking your urine and give you a few thoughts on what you should be doing to improve your health. This one is probably for the top point 1% of one percenters out there. It's a kitchen cutting board with a 13 inch display that you can buy for $700 and you can have a $40 a month subscription fee that will provide recipe ideas and cooking classes. And this is important Pete you can disconnect the monitor so you can clean it up appropriately. So I don't even know what that is. A breathable pillow would be the fourth one that I saw which seems incredibly creepy. There's also a snoring pillow that will literally push your face to the other side of your pillow when when snoring starts to happen. And then in line electric skates, which is kind of like the ebike kicker but the one they showed us this battery pack was like a fanny pack that you had to wear around your midsection and it was hard wired of all things down your leg to the skates to make you move forward. And Pete The one thing I was thinking of is that maybe the Boston Bruins should look into something like this With with ice skates to improve their performance for this year, because I'm not think they're doing very well, I don't know. But anyway, cameras, artificial intelligence really cool stuff. So I encourage our audience go Google some of these crazy things out there that are being schlepped around and and give us your feedback.
Pete Mento
I will first of all, you clearly don't pay attention to hockey because they're blowing away any record for points. Like if the season ended today, they would have won, they would have more points than any other team in NHL history. They're, they're kicking the EverLiving dogshit out of every team they play. So settle down. Second of all, I think this idea of a puck that is I'm trying to think about how so so what I put it in, in the toilet, and then it's every time I PMS do a urine screen for me.
Doug Draper
Yeah, you gotta pee on it first. And then it'll tell you if you're low and electrolytes, you know, give you a health assessment, you can connect it to your watch. Or your, you know, there's an app connected to the hockey puck. And it'll give you all kinds of good stuff. You just got to make sure to aim appropriately or the whole thing just doesn't work
Pete Mento
truth. Yeah, true. I love doodads and gadgets and whatnots. So I think this stuff is fascinating. I don't see the point in it. You know, that great example of self driving baby carriage what kind of a wingnut puts their kids, something that's self driving. I'm sure there's more to it. I remember having a conversation with my ex father in law passed a long time ago. But when I had my first camera phone, he said What kind of a moron needs a phone on their camera? And I tried very hard to explain the concept to him when I first got one, but it was pointless. So maybe at some point, someone's gonna say, Well, of course, you're gonna have a urinal puck. That explains you know, I mean, what kind of the you wouldn't want that. But right now I am. I can't imagine caring that much about my electrolytes and, you know, my, my blood sugar that I've got whatever dude, like, but you kind of glossed over the point here at the Consumer Electronics Show, Doug, you know, there's two parts to that, pal. I don't I don't know if you're aware of this, Doug. But it's also it's also the largest adult industry gathering in the world.
Doug Draper
Say that, again.
Pete Mento
The Consumer Electronics Show is also the largest collection and gathering of adult entertainers and the adult industry. So one drives the other, as I'm sure you're aware. And the CES is also when all those people so I when you first said you were going to talk about the CES, I did not know where this was going to go. I didn't know if you're about to start releasing some very fascinating Not Safe For Work discussion points. But that's actually a bigger part of the CES than the actual consumer electronics show. So I think it's fascinating. We know that Doug, you really are just a fashion. Sweetheart from from Prairie boy, aren't you, Doug? Yeah, no.
Doug Draper
Well, that comment, right? There is a microcosm of the show, Pete, I tried to keep it straight and lean. And you just come up with these crazy ideas. I guess it makes sense. And, yeah, maybe we should just leave it at that.
Pete Mento
I guess we will have time for YouTube, our good friends at CAP logistics, who probably didn't need to know about what the Consumer Electronics Show was really all about. But it's to learn more about CAP logistics, please check them out at cap logistics.com. And once you take us into the second half, Mr. Draper.
Doug Draper
All right. So one of the predictions that we had just a couple of weeks ago for 2023 was over capacity in a lot of transportation modes. One of them was was in the air freight space. I think in 20. I don't think what happened in 2022 Is everybody in their dog wanted to buy an airplane and start throwing a freight on there because I just liked the CH Robinson discussion. You know, everybody was a rising tide raises all ships. And let's try to put some more capacity in the air. And go go go. And my concern at that time was, yeah, Where's all this capacity? Not going to go but it's going to be over, there's gonna be over capacity, because everybody's trying to get to the game as fast as possible. Well, just the other day, FedEx announced that they are going to help fill that void. And they're going to outsource more of their cargo planes in their ongoing cost cutting measures. So that immediately thought to myself Pete and as as sales guys that we've been involved with our entire career. Sometimes I find that providing services to service providers can be very stable, predictable and profitable, right? For a couple different reasons, it's stable, because you know, there's ongoing business, you're not trying to go out and try to sell individual transactions. And the unit price may be a little bit lower, so to speak, but the predictability makes it a pretty good business. And the company you're providing the service to is in the industry and kind of gets it. So things go wrong. You're one on one step removed from the end customer who's not screaming at you, which we can go into, on the on the show that we're going to bring to the airwaves. But I think that this will be a trend, I don't think FedEx is going to go back to owning more aircraft and will continue to diversify or divest, divest. There you go, some of their assets, that the one. So my point is, is that the capacity that's there, FedEx is doing a decent job of absorbing some of that capacity. And we talked about how the air freight industry would pivot faster than others to fix the capacity issue. So it's FedEx alone going to fill the void? Nope. But I think it's a good Bellwether indicator of a lot of companies, and service providers are continuing to outsource their assets and get rid and get out of the owning aircraft business. The one thing that could throw a wrench in that Pete is, I don't know if these companies are just gonna buy FedEx planes. And it's a pretty seamless, or are they going to try to insert the assets that they have bank notes on, and everything else and really flip it upside down? So it's been a fast pivot, it will have an implication, I don't know how great it will in the overall picture, but it is noticeable and is important to make mention of here on global trade this week. So I don't know what's your take about FedEx doing some outsourcing that will help gobble up the air freight excess capacity?
Pete Mento
Well, they're a monster right there like the 800 pound gorilla. So whenever whenever you see them get involved like that, that's that's definitely it's something to notice. And it's going to have reverberations, you know, friend of the show, Brandon freed with the air forwarders Association, he posted on LinkedIn, a couple, I think it was last week, Amazon has such lowered capacity that they're actually going to be selling space, just selling space on those planes that they bought. And I wonder if if that's another situation where some of these, some of these large integrators like FedEx, and UPS and DHL are gonna buy it up? It would make sense, right, so as, as air carriers, and particularly aircraft manufacturers see this as an opportunity to ratchet down production, or put production in different different places, I think we're gonna see more of this, not less. And they're, they're going to do what they can to use existing assets, not get tied up in them financially on paper, but buy space where they can rather than buying aircraft. So I think we'll see more of a debate, not less.
Doug Draper
Yeah. Agreed. All right, Pete, bring us home. final topic of the show.
Pete Mento
Yeah, this one's kind of making my head hurt man. And I'm, I am. Admittedly, I'm still gathering my thoughts on this one. So this one's sort of still a thought soup. But, but the there's a bunch of different freightwaves, a bunch of different people have got information about this Journal of Commerce, I even saw something on the Wall Street Journal, the ever present, apparent lack of drivers and trucks, it doesn't appear to be such a problem now. So there appears to be, quote, unquote, enough capacity. Like there's, there's enough truck drivers. So that problem apparently is solved. The the bell that we ran constantly, that we need more drivers, and there's not enough trucks and bla bla bla, bla, bla, everyone's story about it. It's all good, settled down. And, you know, this time last year, I'm sure if we roll the tape back, we were probably freaking out about drivers. And this is so indicative of our our entire industry. As soon as things get quieter, we figure well, that problem solved. Rather than understanding the underlying problem about why at times of, of infrastructure stress, we don't have enough infrastructure, whether it's physical or human resource. Just because we have enough drivers to deal with demand now, doesn't mean that we'll have enough drivers to deal with demand. If we have even what five 10% increase. We'll be back in the same problem with the same stresses financial and human resource side that we had just six months ago. So rather than all of us running around, saying well All right, yep, smacking your hands together seeing problems saw pat each other on the back. I think instead, we should say now that things have calmed down and quieted down a little bit. What lessons can we learn to try to apply to this so that we can ramp it up when we have a problem? Again? I think it's just one of those other instances, Doug, where we're proving yet again, how short sighted our industry is. And I hate that the press is buying into it.
Doug Draper
Yeah. Well, it's a good, it's a good story. First of all, I can't agree with you more. Truly, right. It's, it's an ongoing problem. And we are in a valley where it doesn't seem so bad. But the problem is, and here's an analogy, because you're, you're good at these beats. So I'm gonna give it a shot here, right? So mountain biking, I love to mountain bike, I go with a group of people, they're always ahead of me, we're about the same level of fitness. Long story short, one of the guys said, I'm going to watch you right up this hill. And I'll give you some feedback. So I did, and immediately said, here's your problem, you're looking 15 feet in front of you. And you need to look 50 feet ahead of you. So one, five in front, or five, zero ahead. Because the 15 feet in front of you, all you're doing is reacting to the moment. And it leads to a not enjoyable ride, you can't ride as fast, and you don't have as much control. And so I think what this industry does time and again, not only with trucking, but in general is we're looking at 15 feet in front of us because we have so much going on that like you said, Hey, this problem is now officially solved. Well, it may be in a valley, and it may be a little bit better. But I think the key that you said Pete is, let's use it as lessons to figure out what what we can do. Because if we continue to look the 15 feet in front of us, and not the 50 feet ahead of us, we're going to be having this exact same cyclical conversation in 12 to 18 months. And I'll tell you what, autonomous trucking, and long haul autonomous is not going to solve the problem, because that's decades out. And so the reality of that saying, Oh, another year or two, we won't have any humans behind the wheel. It's completely in inaccurate information. And I'll talk to anybody about that one. So 100% agree with your feet.
Pete Mento
You're gonna die on that hill, drones and autonomous trucks. You are? Yep, just die. I wish. I wish that there was there was somebody in this industry that had enough heft that could get the powers that be to just sit down and say, we're going to come up with a plan to constantly have people trained in these sorts of jobs like pilots, like like vessel operators, like truck drivers, so that when the time arises, we can call them into service. And I don't know why we haven't been able to overcome that. Maybe it's part of our system as an economy, but there really is frustrating.
Doug Draper
Yeah, agreed. All right. Well, Pete, I think we're you've checked the box on the first official show of 2023. Want to thank you for signing up for another, at least couple of months, I don't know sign up, we're just going to keep rolling with this thing, as long as people will listen and not taken us down on the airways. And that group would be cap logistics, and I hope that they don't. And I hope they enjoy the content that you and I bring. And I hope our audience enjoys the content as well. So one down many more to go. I want to thank all of you for listening to us on global trade this week. I can't see a page so I'll do a thumbs up or something. But I don't know if you're doing it saying you could be flipping me off as far as I know. But I want to thank you for being my wing man. And I look forward to a great 2023
Pete Mento
Likewise, buddy, have a great week. see everybody next week. All right. Take care.