We could not have achieved sales and revenues success without the untiring, dedicated efforts of our people throughout the CII network of facilities. They deserve all the credit for our growth in a very challenging international and domestic environment. To facilitate our growth and to continue providing the high level of service CII customers expect, we are adding staff both at our LAX headquarters and throughout our system. Here are some of the new players.

Greg Melissinos has been appointed Vice President-Eastern Region at our key JFK facility. Greg is a veteran of the freight business starting at his grandfather’s trucking business even before graduating from high school. Greg has strong relationships with the carriers serving JFK and enjoys the confidence of shippers in this highly competitive market. Greg was previously gateway manager at GeoLogistics, now known as Agility. Also coming on board at JFK is Ana Perez, with the title of Operations Manager. Ana, who holds an MBA degree, has a thorough knowledge of the air freight business and is well respected in the JFK cargo community.

At our Atlanta facility, Ricky Coltey has been appointed Operations Manager. With twenty years experience in air freight ranging from domestic operations to specializing in entertainment traffic, Ricky is a valuable addition to our staff there. Shawn Tatham, Southeastern Vice President, notes that Atlanta is perhaps the fastest growing facility in the CII network and requires skilled, experienced people. The facility is moving cargo not only to the South Pacific but throughout Asia and Europe as well.

Atlanta also is the new home for Tim Miyamoto who joins Corrigan’s Express, CII’s sister company, as Vice President, Southeastern Region. We believe Corrigan’s is the fastest growing “boutique” forwarder in the industry, basing its success on a powerful sense of personalized service provided to a wide variety and size of customers. Prior to joining Corrigan’s, Jim was in export operations for GeoLogistics.

At our LAX headquarters, Mehri Askari has been appointed Chief Accountant, adding to our already highly experienced and competent financial staff. With a graduate degree in finance, Mehri has some twenty five years experience in the cargo industry. She reports to Lyne Enzweiler, Vice President-Administration. From long experience, I can report that the accounting function has been the weak link at many forwarders. At CII, we have been determined not make the critical mistake of lax accounting standards.

Customers have been very pleased at our accurate and efficient financial department.

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I’ve commented on the EGL situation before, but the greed & avarice displayed by all parties is so striking, it calls for further comment.

It is indeed a tangled web that EGL head honcho Jim Crane has spun. Crane’s plan to take EGL private began to unravel in February of this year. His first private equity partner mysteriously backed away from a $36 per share offer, only days after a “special committee” of the EGL board, created by Crane, had approved the bid. Crane quickly cobbled together another team, this time with two private equity sugar daddies, and made another bid, again at $36 per share. The bid then was upped to $38 per share. At the same time, the chief financial officer at EGL, who had been on board for about a year, quietly resigned with no explanation from him or the company. Things then got even messier. Apollo Management Group, a well known private equity firm, tried to muscle into the action with a $40 per share offer with the $38 per share offer still on the table from Crane. Crane’s dream to take his company private became a nightmare when it was revealed that he had written in a $30 million “break-up” fee paid to himself if the deal fell through plus $15 million in “transaction” expenses. The entire matter now is being fought in the courts between Apollo and Crane with only the lawyers profiting.

This deal has conflict of interest written all over it. Crane’s machinations in trying to enrich himself at the expense of EGL shareholders and employees, is an object lesson on how not to go about taking a major company in our industry private - with hopefully no one noticing.

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Warren Buffett, the second richest man in the world, head of Berkshire-Hathaway with its stock price of more than $100,000 per share, the highest on the NYSE, recently had his company acquire a 10 per cent interest in Burlington Northern-Santa Fe Railroad. His company’s acquisition of a 10 per cent stake in the 150-year old railroad got me thinking. What Buffett didn’t buy was almost as interesting as what he purchased. Why did the “sage of Omaha,” so-called because of his investment acumen, after analyzing the transportation business, buy a type of transportation that existed when Indians still were still on the warpath? Why didn’t he buy any of the much more up to date truck or air companies that move freight?

Perhaps because Buffett realized that “old fashioned” railroads remain the most profitable kind of transportation today. There is nothing more profitable than a 100-car freight train highballing down a track—and Buffett knew this. There are literally thousands of FTL and LTL trucking firms, ranging from the Yellows of the world down to the single owner-driver. There are least 1,000 air freight forwarders and new cargo airlines are popping up almost every day—all fiercely competitive. Yet, there hasn’t been a new railroad started since the 1920s, almost ninety years ago. And railroads are well known for cooperating among themselves rather than competing.

Is Buffett, without knowing it, teaching a lesson to all of us in the transportation business? Yes. Profitability should remain our single most important goal.

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While the ports of Long Beach, Wilmington & San Pedro, making up the Los Angeles harbor complex, are exploding with cargo volume, the amount of freight handled at LAX is shrinking. LAX officials are scratching their heads trying to figure out this downward trend. They can’t understand it. “We read all the stories about the huge jump in Asian-U.S. air cargo volume, but we aren’t seeing it here,” they say.

Their puzzlement raises a question loaded with significance. Is the lessened volume at LAX reflecting a decision by forwarders to use less of an admittedly traffic choked airport, or does the downturn signify a larger problem of static volume in air freight? The answers are ambiguous although it is disturbing that SFO, the second largest gateway on the west coast, also has reflected a decline in air freight volume. My guess, however, is the shipping business is changing—and not to the benefit of air. While a number of companies are switching from expensive air to less costly ocean, the reversal is rarely true. We almost never hear of a major, or even minor company, announcing a switch from sea to air. The record increases in tonnage of new container ships will add pressure on ocean rates. Traffic managers may well say, “Air may be the way to satisfy our just-in-time production demands but sea is so much cheaper. The hell with JIT, let’s save some money!”

What our forwarding industry requires is not time wasted by bickering with the airlines about fuel surcharges, but finding new ideas to attract new customers.Back to Top