“Syfan Says” Newsletter – Fall/Winter 2022

Steve Syfan, Exec. VP

In addition to getting most of us sick, COVID changed a lot of business plans – from restaurants and the travel industry to healthcare and manufacturing.

While we’ve also had to adapt with new business practices, Syfan Logistics has benefited from a lot of new business, too. For the first time in our 40-year experience, for instance, we recently started hauling live birds and rendered byproducts for the poultry industry. This required a much different skillset than hauling refrigerated perishables, which is one of our longtime core strengths.

Faced with a shortage of drivers, one of our poultry customers asked us to equip our trucks with wet kits to allow us to ship grain for the first time.

By pushing us out of the norm recently, these challenging jobs have tested our longtime policy of never saying no to a customer. But we have come through with flying colors.

Some business experts might say you should stick with your primary business model and turn down any new business that is outside your focus. However, we learned a long time ago that customers don’t like to hear the word “no.” On the other hand, “yes” will open doors and strengthen relationships.

Steve Syfan, our Executive Vice President, has been named to the GEORGIA 500 – The State’s Most Influential Leaders list, a publication of Georgia Trend magazine.

GEORGIA 500 highlights leaders in major industries and organizations who impact the state. Selection is based on extensive research, nominations and interviews.

Appointed by Gov. Brian Kemp, Syfan formerly served on the Board of Directors for the Georgia Department of Economic Development, the state’s lead agency for attracting new business investment, encouraging the expansion of existing industry and small businesses. It aligns workforce education and training with in-demand jobs and new markets for Georgia products. The agency also promotes the state as a destination for arts and location for film, music, and digital entertainment projects.

Syfan also was recently appointed to the Lake Lanier Islands Development Authority by Gov. Kemp. The development authority provides administrative oversight and support for the Lake Lanier Islands Management Company, a private company that manages the year-round entertainment destination.

Kim is one of our longest tenured employees, dating back to our days at Turbo Transport (our original Syfan company). She started work at Turbo in 1998, then joined Syfan Logistics when it was founded in 2011.

Kim has served as assistant controller for Syfan Logistics and Syfan Transport for the last two years. She began her career at Turbo as a staff accountant and moved up at Syfan to become senior staff accountant.

“I love the family-oriented atmosphere we have at Syfan and the people I work with,” Kim says.

She grew up in Cornelia and currently lives in Clarkesville. Kim and her husband, Chris, have been married for 25 years and have a son and daughter.

When Kim is not working, she likes to travel as time allows. One of her favorite trips was a cruise to Alaska to celebrate her 25th wedding anniversary. She also enjoys hanging out with her family and friends.

Driving a truck runs in the family for Robert Brown. His dad and brother both drive, while Robert has been a trucker for 24 years.

For three of those years, Robert – a resident of Smith Station, Ala. – has driven for Syfan Logistics. And he loves being out there on the road.

“I enjoy the flexibility of setting your own schedule,” Robert says. “I get to see the country. I’ve been to every state over the years, and I’ve seen some beautiful places.”

For the past five years, our Syfan Internship Program has given college students an introduction to all aspects of the trucking and transportation logistics industry.

Our goal with each group is to provide experience and an awareness of the opportunities within our exciting industry. While it benefits the students, our program is a huge benefit to us as well in screening potential new members of our team.

In today’s tight labor market, our internship program has grown to become a key component of our hiring strategy. We have had interns accept full and part-time positions across all departments, including operations, sales, IT, accounting, HR, and marketing.

Working throughout the region and Southeast, we have drawn students from the University of North Georgia, University of Georgia, Young Harris College, Georgia Southern College, University of Tennessee, Appalachian State, and Piedmont University. We welcome these interns as our next generation of Syfan team members.

Throughout August and September 2022, an impending railroad worker strike threatened to dislodge our nation’s already fragile supply chain. That’s when a couple of major shippers turned to our company to prepare for the worst.

Fearing shipments of auto parts and perishable items could be left stranded inside rail cars, a major car manufacturer and a foodstuffs producer enlisted our company to begin unloading rail cars as union negotiations seemingly were breaking down.

Syfan was proud to be among a network of top nationwide logistics firms entrusted to coordinate rescue recovery shipments with the Class I rail company, food producer, and automaker to keep the country’s supply chain moving – just in case. Fortunately, the rail strike was averted just hours before a deadline with a tentative deal brokered by the U.S. government.

Syfan’s existing relationship with our two shipper partners, in addition to our longtime experience with rescue recovery loads for a Class I railroad, gave us a leg up on other companies. We were able to leverage our industry knowledge to create a successfully coordinated plan.