Latest / Beyond Fulfillment Podcast / The Future of Logistics Nearshoring: Outsourcing, Automation, & Industry Challenges with Nick Schrock

Transcript

The Future of Logistics Nearshoring: Outsourcing, Automation, & Industry Challenges with Nick Schrock · Beyond Fulfillment Podcast

• 0:05
  Yeah, I would.
• 0:06
  I would.
• 0:07
  Because as more people nearshore, and this isn't as.
• 0:11
  It's just.
• 0:12
  It hasn't just popped up since, you know, 2022.
• 0:16
  People have been doing this for longer than that.
• 0:18
  Like, we opened 2019.
• 0:20
  There's companies open before us, so the longer people do it, the more talent gets there.
• 0:27
  Today we sit down with Nick Schrock, founder and CEO of Valaroo, a company that's been shaking up the logistics industry since 2019 by specializing in near shoring talent from the Philippines, Belize and Mexico.
• 0:42
  With a track record of helping U.S.
• 0:44
  logistics companies find top tier experienced talent overseas, Nick brings his unique insights on building an agile team and I optimizing costs in a rapidly evolving market.
• 0:57
  In this episode, we discuss the state of nearshoring within logistics.
• 1:01
  We'll break down the differences between nearshoring, offshoring and reshoring, and address hot topics like the ongoing freight recession, the impact of AI, and the changing landscape of tariffs.
• 1:15
  Nick shares real world stories on how near shoring isn't about replacing American jobs, but rather elevating them by letting US Workers focus on higher value tasks.
• 1:26
  As always, if you found value from this content, please like and subscribe.
• 1:30
  All right, Nick Schrock, welcome back to Beyond Fulfillment.
• 1:35
  Hey, thanks for having me.
• 1:36
  It's always good to see you.
• 1:37
  Yes.
• 1:38
  Yeah, we appreciate you taking the time.
• 1:40
  So, Nick, you've been on the show a couple different times talking about the entrepreneurial journey and what Valoroo is doing.
• 1:47
  And for.
• 1:48
  For those that may not know, you're the CEO and founder of Valoroo, a near shoring company that's been around since 2019, so the past six years.
• 1:58
  And you're primarily operating out of supplying talent from the Philippines and Belize, is that right?
• 2:04
  That's correct.
• 2:05
  And we.
• 2:05
  We're also in Mexico as well.
• 2:07
  In Mexico also.
• 2:08
  Okay.
• 2:09
  All right.
• 2:10
  And so we specifically are talking today about the state of near shoring within.
• 2:15
  Within the logistics industry, and certainly a topic that's on people's mind with all the.
• 2:23
  All the changes, the uncertainty, different things going on.
• 2:26
  So we just want to dive deep into some topics that are relevant and provide context and value for the audience here.
• 2:32
  But let's just start too, because we hear these terms being thrown around near shoring, reshoring, friend shoring.
• 2:39
  Can you just give us a breakdown of what those are?
• 2:43
  Yeah, so, and it is interesting because there's also offshoring, right?
• 2:49
  Which is kind of where this started in the 90s where people were hiring call centers in India and the Philippines.
• 2:54
  Other Places in Asia.
• 2:56
  In Asia and then someone else.
• 3:00
  And then once people call centers, let's just say people doing office style work that might not be in Texas or Chicago.
• 3:10
  It's like someone opened an office in Mexico, Colombia, Belize, you name it.
• 3:15
  That's, that's more near shoring.
• 3:17
  So think of it as just offshoring but closer.
• 3:19
  Right.
• 3:20
  You could get in a car and you could drive there.
• 3:22
  It'll take you long hours, but it's actually you can get there.
• 3:25
  Besides going all the way to the eastern hemisphere where when you're talking about reshoring, this is more on manufacturing where near shoring out.
• 3:34
  That's like office work, things like that.
• 3:37
  But instead of manufacturing an iPhone, if Apple decided, hey, I want to go to Mexico City, I want to build a factory, I want to beer this back to bring this over, that's more of that friend shoring or
• 3:52
  and then if that was in the use United States, maybe they go back to Michigan to build cars.
• 3:57
  That's reshoring.
• 3:58
  So bring it.
• 3:59
  Reshoring it back to there where if you would, I don't know if I guess it technically would be if you brought your call center back to St.
• 4:07
  Louis or back to Chicago, that would be reshoring.
• 4:10
  But that's not really what the industry talks about.
• 4:12
  Reshoring is much more on a manufacturing basis.
• 4:15
  At least that's how I understand it.
• 4:17
  Okay.
• 4:18
  All right.
• 4:18
  And so with Valoroo, the main benefit you offer people is lower cost labor and still at a very high level.
• 4:26
  Is that right?
• 4:27
  Correct.
• 4:28
  Where pain points of offshoring and near shoring in the past was like, yeah, it's cheap, but we've all had those terrible phone calls calling customer service.
• 4:40
  So what we wanted to do is like, hey, let's find People with 10 years of experience that speak perfect English, that understand our industry.
• 4:47
  Let's hire them and put them to work in different logistics companies throughout the U.S.
• 4:52
  so 100%.
• 4:54
  Okay.
• 4:55
  And within logistics, you're, you're mainly working with three PLs and freight brokerages for, for back office and admin style positions.
• 5:03
  That's correct.
• 5:04
  Yeah.
• 5:04
  Helping people move freight around.
• 5:05
  We work with some shippers as well, but you're right, the majority of our, the folks we help are three PLs, freight forwarders, asset based companies, etc.
• 5:14
  Okay.
• 5:15
  And we're, we're, we've been in this freight recession for the last number of years and you know, we, everyone sees the headlines with the number of brokerages going under and all that sort of thing.
• 5:26
  I mean, how have you seen that impact the.
• 5:30
  The near shoring market at large overall?
• 5:35
  Yeah, and I would say overall when, but right before we've, and we're still in this, in my opinion, this kind of freight recession that we're seeing where prices are so tight and competitive.
• 5:47
  But before that when it was just businesses were booming, people were paying four or five dollars a mile to, to move things across the U.S.
• 5:56
  it's like everybody went near because they couldn't find enough talent.
• 5:59
  It's like, hey, I just need to hire people because I need butts and seats.
• 6:03
  I need to be able to fulfill this.
• 6:04
  And then once the market got really tight, it was people came to near shoring for the same, for a different reason, but in the same amount of volume.
• 6:12
  It's like, hey, I still need the people to support the amount of freight.
• 6:17
  It's like, yeah, it's dwindled a lot, but I still need these headcount.
• 6:20
  But I have a tenth of the margin I had, you know, 18 months ago, two years, two years ago.
• 6:27
  So people have come to us like, hey, I want this high level of talent.
• 6:31
  How do I find these people that maybe aren't so expensive in loss as Los Angeles, but I still need this stuff done.
• 6:38
  And that allows them to also cost of living is continued to rise with inflation.
• 6:43
  I need to be able to pay my local people more.
• 6:46
  So maybe they don't have as many people.
• 6:48
  They can pay people what they deserve as because they have more margins to go around.
• 6:52
  So as the markets tightens, I need profit margin maintenance, maintain the same.
• 6:56
  I still need the headcount because freight's so demanding.
• 6:59
  Nearshoring's been a great option for them.
• 7:02
  Okay, and how are you seeing this play out?
• 7:05
  Right?
• 7:06
  Like in your opinion, we're still in this freight recession.
• 7:09
  Prices are still very tight and competitive.
• 7:12
  It's still people still aren't getting the margin they want.
• 7:14
  So near shoring is certainly an option to mitigate that.
• 7:18
  But I mean do you see that as like sustainable, longer term for the industry?
• 7:25
  Yeah, I would, I would.
• 7:27
  Because as more people nearshore and this isn't as, it's just, it hasn't just popped up since, you know, 2022.
• 7:36
  People have been doing this for longer than that.
• 7:38
  Like we opened 2019.
• 7:39
  There's companies open before us.
• 7:42
  So the longer people do it, the more talent gets there.
• 7:46
  Right.
• 7:46
  It's like you can find somebody in the US with 30, 50 years of supply chain experience offshore.
• 7:52
  You can find someone five years, 10 years.
• 7:54
  Right.
• 7:55
  It's a few years Here or there.
• 7:56
  But the longer people outsource and nearshore, the better the talent gets.
• 8:02
  Right.
• 8:02
  The more people flock to this industry and know, so you can hire somebody, you know, at the third of the price in the U as the US and still get someone with, with a CPA or a master's degree
• 8:15
  in supply chain.
• 8:15
  So I think the talent's going to continue to go up and people are going to be able to pull more value out of pulling talent from around the world.
• 8:24
  So yeah, I think it's going to only continue to go up because as AI comes into the picture, as tariffs and all these challenges come into the market, margins are just going to continually get compressed.
• 8:38
  So you need great talent, you need them to be at cost effective rates and near shoring, outsourcing.
• 8:44
  Great solution for that.
• 8:45
  Okay, and so we're going to talk about AI and the tariffs and all that.
• 8:50
  Another question.
• 8:51
  So given that, you know, you highlight the benefit of near shoring and particularly with these countries, Philippines and Belize and whatnot, to where you can supply, you know, great English speaking talent at a much lower price.
• 9:04
  I mean, what, what does that say for the U.S.
• 9:06
  worker?
• 9:09
  Yeah, and what we've seen in ours is not necessarily we, I don't think in the six years, I don't think we've ever done what I would call like a repeal and replace.
• 9:20
  Like, hey, we have this team of 10 customer service reps in Des Moines, Iowa.
• 9:27
  Let's hire 10 Filipinos or 10 Mexicans and then that way we can lay them off and we save two thirds on our headcount.
• 9:34
  It's more of, hey, maybe Instead of my 11th person, I'm going to hire this from a different country or I'm going to take these 10, yes, I'm going to hire these 10 in the Philippines.
• 9:49
  And then now instead of these people being customer service reps that are just answering phones, building orders, you know, track and tracing trucks.
• 9:56
  It's like, let's have them be revenue generating.
• 9:59
  Let's have them actually talk to customers, right?
• 10:01
  Understand, build relationships.
• 10:03
  Let's find out how we win more lanes, let's drive more value.
• 10:07
  That's really what we see more.
• 10:09
  And I would say almost you know, a hundred percent of the time is people's roles getting redefined.
• 10:15
  And we've seen and measured that employee retention in the states actually goes up because it's like, hey, I used to have to make 200 phone calls and build 50 loads a day, which is just repetitive and tedious.
• 10:28
  And over and over again it's like now they're actually driving value that they can directly correlate.
• 10:36
  And what I do now, and even what I've done my whole career, it's like what I really, I just want to drive value for my company.
• 10:41
  I want to see what I'm doing actually makes a difference.
• 10:45
  And for the US worker I think it's much easier to relate driving value when they're actually talking to customers, they can actually see the profits coming out of the loads they're, they're working on versus just tracking and tracing
• 10:59
  or versus load building.
• 11:01
  And, and I'm not saying and those things of course drive value.
• 11:05
  We need those done for the, for the logistics company to be, you know, valuable and drive a profit.
• 11:11
  But it's just, it's hard to see when you're just doing the same thing over and over again every day.
• 11:16
  So if I was, I would highly recommend everyone kind of do this just because it makes your job easier.
• 11:20
  It really does.
• 11:22
  Okay.
• 11:23
  So it's almost kind of not automated but outsourcing these maybe lower level tasks so the US worker who is a higher cost employee can focus on higher level activities and therefore it's a win win for the employer.
• 11:39
  Yeah.
• 11:39
  And when I hear lower level it's like, it's right.
• 11:42
  But these things can still be really complicated.
• 11:45
  Right.
• 11:45
  It's like, oh, you get a low.
• 11:46
  We were working on something which we're trying to automate a portion of it but then we're trying to science.
• 11:51
  Okay, we need to build this load and some of it's in the email, some of it's in the tms.
• 11:56
  You got to go to this website for this.
• 11:57
  You got to go.
• 11:58
  And it's like it's a complicated process to get this whole shipment set up and process and you got to reach out to all these people.
• 12:05
  But just because it's complicated doesn't mean it's, it's still repeatable.
• 12:10
  You're doing the same thing over and over and over again.
• 12:13
  So it's great to kind of pass that off so that way you can build the relationships and kind of do more emotionally valuable things.
• 12:21
  Ah, okay.
• 12:22
  All right.
• 12:23
  And you brought up AI earlier.
• 12:26
  So how have you seen AI impact the near shoring in the labor market at large?
• 12:33
  Yeah, and I would say there's, we've seen people drive a lot of value in some automations and some doing things.
• 12:42
  I would say how what companies talk, like what I hear in the news is, excuse me, is much different than what I'm actually seeing on the ground.
• 12:51
  Right.
• 12:52
  It's like, oh, we replaced 70% of our workforce and we're doing this and this and this.
• 12:58
  It's like, yeah, things are getting automated.
• 13:01
  Right.
• 13:02
  And things are that a human used to do, a robot's now doing now.
• 13:05
  But what I see much more of is the 80% of the work that we couldn't even get to before just because we didn't have the bandwidth for AI is allowing us to get to that.
• 13:15
  Right.
• 13:16
  I've not seen anyone substantially reduce their workforce in a meaningful way without having a quality degrade attached to it.
• 13:24
  Right.
• 13:25
  And maybe that's coming down the road.
• 13:28
  What I'm more saying it's like, hey, it's like, how do we.
• 13:31
  Instead of maybe three years ago, as our business doubled, our seven, our headcount would have to grow by 70%.
• 13:39
  That might only be 30% today because AI is allowing the humans to be more efficient and drive more value.
• 13:45
  And I think that's only going to continue to increase.
• 13:47
  Do I think we are around the corner for no one having jobs?
• 13:53
  I think we're very far from that.
• 13:55
  Right.
• 13:55
  It's my business is supposed to be the first one to be hit.
• 13:59
  It's like, hey, outsourcing low level, entry level jobs.
• 14:02
  AI was supposed to eat this stuff up three years ago and we're triple to four times the size.
• 14:08
  Right.
• 14:08
  And that just showed there's still a huge need for human interaction and different things like that.
• 14:13
  I would say don't be, don't just avoid AI like the plague.
• 14:19
  I would say it's just an advanced form of software.
• 14:22
  It's like five years.
• 14:23
  Look at Track and Trace.
• 14:24
  It's like we call it Track and Trace because that's more of a legacy title.
• 14:29
  No one's track and tracing trucks before.
• 14:31
  Everybody's got apps on their phones.
• 14:32
  This is fully automated.
• 14:34
  Unless someone falls off or does these different things, we have larger Track and Trace teams than we have ever had.
• 14:41
  They're just doing different things.
• 14:42
  They're not calling drivers, asking them where they are anymore.
• 14:45
  It's like things have changed.
• 14:46
  Things will continue to progress.
• 14:48
  I don't think we're on a jobs apocalypse that everyone's kind of preaching for.
• 14:53
  I think that's a little bit of hype cycle so startups can raise more money, to tell you the truth.
• 15:00
  All right.
• 15:00
  And I'm sure you've seen because I see these all the time and they're really geared towards entrepreneurs like these.
• 15:06
  These companies that are saying that hey, you can save X amount and reduce your payroll by, you know, like you said, like 70% by just implementing this AI.
• 15:15
  And you hear it, like you said, is it maybe just hype to.
• 15:18
  To raise more money and to, you know, to further the company that way?
• 15:22
  Because you hear that it doesn't sound like something you'd want to do, but there's so much of that marketing out there in terms of all these AI companies.
• 15:29
  Yeah.
• 15:30
  And tight.
• 15:31
  It's like, Dave, I'm a capitalist, right?
• 15:34
  If I can.
• 15:35
  It's like one.
• 15:37
  A great example.
• 15:38
  It's like I've tried this maybe three times in AI sdr.
• 15:41
  It's like, hey, how do we reach out to more people?
• 15:44
  But I look at what I've and I've tried them.
• 15:46
  None of them have worked for me.
• 15:47
  And it's like, I think they will work eventually.
• 15:50
  They're just not there yet.
• 15:52
  Right.
• 15:52
  And so I feel like this is kind of coming down to it.
• 15:56
  I do think it's just a hype cycle where people are really adaptive to.
• 16:02
  On the customer end, it's like, how many emails do you get that are sales emails?
• 16:06
  You know, it's written by an AI, so you just don't respond.
• 16:09
  It's like you can tell just by reading it.
• 16:11
  Somebody, an AI calls me on the phone, it's like I can tell this is an AI, a human.
• 16:16
  I'm gonna give the.
• 16:17
  I'm gonna give them the benefit of the doubt and it's like I'm gonna hear them out.
• 16:21
  It's like, it's a sales guy.
• 16:22
  I've done that job.
• 16:23
  I'll listen to your pitch and maybe it's valuable or where if it's.
• 16:26
  I don't feel any empathy towards a computer.
• 16:28
  It's like I'm just going to hang up on them.
• 16:30
  So the.
• 16:31
  Even if they're better on the phone, the success rates drop.
• 16:34
  And again, I think we'll get there eventually.
• 16:36
  I just don't think we have a ton of worry in the next 18 to 24 months of US all being out of work.
• 16:42
  So, and this is.
• 16:44
  I might be on, you know, on.
• 16:46
  On your podcast later, just being out of business because I'm wrong.
• 16:49
  Because AGI came around.
• 16:51
  Right.
• 16:52
  But the world's got bigger problems if we're all out of work.
• 16:55
  Kind of.
• 16:56
  As you mentioned, a previous guest said, it's like, hey, if no one has jobs, I think we have a much larger problem in this.
• 17:02
  I'm kind of just head down doing this.
• 17:05
  We're building our own AI, so I don't want to be hypocritical.
• 17:07
  It's like we're fully embracing this.
• 17:09
  We're trying to be efficient for our clients.
• 17:11
  Build automations.
• 17:13
  Philippines and Mexico is the same way.
• 17:15
  If a computer would can do it, why should a human do it?
• 17:18
  It doesn't matter where they are around the world.
• 17:21
  But there's so much work to do.
• 17:22
  Every logistics person knows it's like there's so much to do.
• 17:26
  Let's automate what we can so we can get to more work and drive more value for our shippers.
• 17:32
  Absolutely.
• 17:33
  Okay.
• 17:34
  And another hot button issue is the tariffs going on.
• 17:38
  And you know, we, we talked earlier too about sometimes it can be so fragmented to where it can hit one company extremely hard and then the other company may not depending on their niche or their industry.
• 17:51
  So what are you seeing from the 3 PL and the freight brokerage side with regard to tariffs?
• 17:57
  Yeah, great question.
• 17:58
  And 100% to your point, it's like if you're moving 100% auto and an auto tariff comes through, you're panicking for sure.
• 18:07
  It's like you're trying to figure out what you need to do.
• 18:10
  But I would say as a whole, the supply chain has come really resilient because after the pandemic we had this surge.
• 18:19
  Everybody expanded, did all these different things and then we'd been in a freight recession ever since.
• 18:24
  So everybody tightened their belt, got really tight.
• 18:27
  But now with these huge swings, owners of and leadership of these companies have found out, hey, these big swings aren't good for my business.
• 18:35
  I need to learn how to weather these storms a little bit.
• 18:38
  So when we saw the big first waves of tariffs come in, no one made massive changes.
• 18:43
  People prepped for it, maybe pre ordered ahead and kind of got a, got ahead of these different things.
• 18:48
  But they're not changing the way they run their business.
• 18:51
  They're not making massive hiring, they're not doing massive layoffs and anticipation.
• 18:56
  They're kind of waiting to see and kind of.
• 18:59
  We're a little bit on the back end of this.
• 19:01
  I would say rightfully so.
• 19:02
  It's like, hey, they go up, they come down, they go up, they come down.
• 19:06
  They're kind of waiting for the ground to settle, to figure out what business changes I need to make.
• 19:11
  And we saw this, you know, while the strikes were going on in the auto market.
• 19:17
  We've seen this with the tariffs.
• 19:19
  If freight market starts to come back, we don't see, you know, earlier, what was it?
• 19:24
  January freight waves is like freight recession's over.
• 19:27
  They kind of exclaimed it and we're kind of Sitting in relatively the same realm here that we were earlier in the year.
• 19:34
  It's sure it's come up a little bit, but it's not a wave of freight that everybody's rolling in money again.
• 19:39
  And so everybody's just, I've seen them weather the storm more than they have in previous years where they were trying to be first to adopt, first to change, and now people are being more patient.
• 19:51
  Okay.
• 19:52
  And with Mexico specifically that you, you've added recently as a.
• 19:57
  Another source for your talent and that that's certainly been a country that's been in the spotlight with regards to tariffs.
• 20:04
  And it's still, as we record this in late July, still being negotiated.
• 20:08
  It's still.
• 20:10
  Right.
• 20:10
  Not necessarily final.
• 20:12
  I mean, what are you seeing with the market there as well with regards to how the tariffs on that country may affect their economy and then the people there.
• 20:23
  Yeah.
• 20:23
  So Mexico, and this is the, on more of a labor standpoint, Mexico is tougher to work with than some other countries.
• 20:37
  And I, and I don't mean bureaucratically, I mean they just have more employee friendly labor laws.
• 20:43
  Right.
• 20:44
  It's like large sevens agreements, lots of benefits tied to this.
• 20:47
  So when we place people there in the US Companies, there's a certain level of education and I think the same thing happens on the reshoring basis.
• 20:56
  But what greatly outweigh those negatives.
• 20:59
  Maybe not negatives, but adoption cost.
• 21:02
  Right.
• 21:02
  Of education costs, these different things is just geographical location.
• 21:06
  It's like you can still have the benefits of building, you know, outside of the United States, but then being able to ship over the road or rail into the US where you just can't do that in Asia.
• 21:21
  Right.
• 21:21
  It's like, okay, yeah, you build this at this cost, you get all these labor benefits and this cost of production benefits.
• 21:28
  But now you have delays, you have, it's harder to control quality and things like that.
• 21:35
  I think.
• 21:35
  I'm not sure how because we just operate less in the manufacturing space.
• 21:40
  I wouldn't want to speak to it.
• 21:43
  I'm not sure how the tariffs are going to impact the near shoring, but I think people continue to move to Mexico or other parts of Central America to develop that because large shippers are also patient.
• 22:01
  Right.
• 22:02
  It's if we don't have a new administration in three years, we probably will in eight or 12.
• 22:09
  And in the grand scheme of things, that's not the longest time for companies that have been around 200 years.
• 22:15
  So it's like they know they can either weather this storm of current tariffs that will Shift back or figure out ways that are most profitable for them.
• 22:23
  So, yeah, I hate to, I've, I don't have a super good direct answer just because I'm not super close to the manufacturing of near shoring or onshore reshoring, things like that.
• 22:33
  Okay.
• 22:34
  All right.
• 22:34
  And so as we record this, you know, in late July, what are you seeing in terms of how, how you think the rest of Q3 and Q4 4 is going to play out, given the tariff situation and you
• 22:46
  know, how we've been in recent, you know, like you said, we're still in the freight recession in recent years.
• 22:51
  I mean, what do, what do you see coming for the rest of the year within logistics industry?
• 22:55
  Oh, I have no idea.
• 22:57
  I have no idea.
• 22:58
  Yeah, I wish I knew.
• 23:00
  I wish.
• 23:00
  I know.
• 23:00
  I'd say if you ask me this every quarter, like, I bet I'm 50.
• 23:05
  50, 50 right.
• 23:06
  50 wrong.
• 23:08
  Just trying to like, guess where the freight market's going to, what we've done.
• 23:12
  It's like we just put our head down.
• 23:13
  It's like, let's just get.
• 23:15
  Find the best people we can, give them the best training that exists and put them in and just deliver like an awesome product.
• 23:24
  And it's been really beneficial for us through a freight boom, a freight recession.
• 23:29
  And I would say our customers that do that, they're in the same boat.
• 23:33
  It's like they're just consistently putting their head down and doing the best.
• 23:37
  Where if you're subject to the, the es and flows of the economy, it's like your business is kind of fragile at that point.
• 23:47
  Right.
• 23:47
  And it's like I would say look at the product.
• 23:49
  Yeah, I wish I knew.
• 23:50
  I really do.
• 23:51
  I hope it's up into the right.
• 23:53
  I hope, I hope we're all like doubling what drivers are getting paid and everybody's making lots of money because that's good for everybody.
• 24:00
  It's like the more money that's kind of moving around.
• 24:02
  So that's what.
• 24:03
  That's my prediction.
• 24:04
  Right.
• 24:04
  It's like an overly positive one.
• 24:07
  But I have no.
• 24:08
  Even if looking at metrics, it's like, if it's kind of like, no, if you knew what's going to happen in the stock market, you're going to be a billionaire.
• 24:15
  Nobody really knows, unfortunately.
• 24:17
  So what do you think?
• 24:18
  I'm curious.
• 24:19
  You talk to more industry folks than I do.
• 24:22
  Where do you, where do you think we're headed?
• 24:24
  You know, I said there's a lot of uncertainty with the tariffs still.
• 24:30
  But I mean, I think in General, I think the long term view is very good, but I think there's still going to be a lot of short term volatility and a lot of people really need to be nimble
• 24:41
  and agile.
• 24:42
  And again there's, there's just a lot of, a lot of unpredictability.
• 24:47
  And so I, I think it's, people need to really, you know, keep a close eye on, you know, just the, the results they need, you know, your month to date and whatnot and kind of weather the storm in,
• 25:00
  in the short term.
• 25:01
  But I think long term the, the outlook looks very good as this all settles.
• 25:05
  And once we have certainty on what this is all going to look like.
• 25:08
  Do you think we'll have the other kind of side to the coin is do you think we'll have inflation concerns?
• 25:15
  Because government just passed a huge spending bill.
• 25:18
  Tariffs are inflationary, at least you can call it transitory, but it's increasing the cost of things.
• 25:25
  Do you think that will play a factor in our realm at all?
• 25:31
  You know, I, I just recorded an episode, it just came out actually like an hour ago on YouTube.
• 25:38
  Jim, Jim Tompkins and he's, you know, he's a true expert in this space but he's got a bunch of data how the, so far the tariffs have not caused inflation.
• 25:48
  And his really thesis for that is like it's logical that they would but because the situation is dynamic, people adapt to change so quickly.
• 25:59
  Basic basically in that it's not like they're just going to accept a higher cost.
• 26:05
  They're going to figure out a way that if this is the tariff then they're going to go over here or do this or change things to basically deal with that more effectively.
• 26:15
  So yeah, I'd love to talk to them because it's what I think it's like I don't think if these tariffs are inflationary, kind of what we talked about, I don't think we'll see it yet.
• 26:25
  Yet because like we said earlier, it's like nobody knows where they are yet.
• 26:30
  Right.
• 26:30
  It's like I saw a speaker at, I think it was TIA and he's like, hey, these tariffs go into place tomorrow.
• 26:37
  Raise your hand if you think they are going into place.
• 26:39
  And no one raised their hand.
• 26:40
  Right.
• 26:41
  And they were and they didn't.
• 26:42
  Right.
• 26:43
  Because the deadline was approaching, it was changing.
• 26:46
  So these tariffs have yet to settle.
• 26:49
  So price increases are in, are inflammatory to client relationships.
• 26:55
  So you don't want to jump the gun.
• 26:57
  Right.
• 26:58
  You don't want to give them a price increase and have to pull it back and all these do these different things.
• 27:03
  So I'm curious that, like, I don't think we would see, and I'm not an expert.
• 27:10
  He sounds like much more of an expert than me, but will we see this inflationary hit after these tariffs settle?
• 27:19
  Right.
• 27:19
  Because right now, why would you give a price if they might not stick?
• 27:23
  Right.
• 27:23
  China was 40.
• 27:24
  Now it's not.
• 27:25
  And now it's.
• 27:26
  Now it's back on the chopping block.
• 27:28
  Like they're still fighting each other.
• 27:30
  So I don't know.
• 27:30
  I'm curious.
• 27:31
  Yeah, Yeah.
• 27:33
  I mean, time will tell.
• 27:34
  Time will tell, but thus far they.
• 27:36
  They haven't.
• 27:37
  And he had a lot of data highlighting all the other good things.
• 27:41
  Yeah.
• 27:42
  Okay.
• 27:44
  All right.
• 27:44
  And Nick, so if for companies that may be considering near shoring or logistics people out there that maybe are not familiar with Valoroo, why don't you give them a quick overview of the services that you offer and how
• 27:58
  you can best benefit them?
• 28:00
  Yeah.
• 28:01
  So as we kind of talked briefly, we do near shoring and outsourcing for logistics companies, which essentially means we find people that are outside the United States that have already, that have already worked in logistics, that have already
• 28:14
  worked in supply chain, that know what a bol pod is, know how freight moves, and we place them on a dedicated basis with different supply chain companies.
• 28:25
  So if somebody needs a logistics coordinator, carrier sales, load builder, you name it.
• 28:29
  It's like we can find experienced reps that are not kids fresh out of college.
• 28:34
  You know, they're been in the working workforce for 10 plus years, know what they're doing, and we'll place them and train them, manage them, help you develop them, and be a great part of your team.
• 28:45
  So that's what we've been doing since 2019.
• 28:48
  Had a lot of success in it.
• 28:50
  And somebody wanted to talk to me.
• 28:52
  You can feel free.
• 28:53
  Shoot me an email.
• 28:54
  Nick.
• 28:55
  Valerie.com.
• 28:56
  and then our website is valerie.com.
• 28:59
  All right, we'll link all that in the show.
• 29:01
  Notes for everyone.
• 29:01
  Nick.
• 29:02
  All right, we appreciate the time, as always, and the.
• 29:05
  The insights on the market, and best of luck for the rest of this year.
• 29:09
  You too.
• 29:10
  Thanks there.
• 29:10
  All right.