This past weekend, I had just minutes to put away groceries, get the kids fed, and carpool my older daughter to a play date, when my 3 year old daughter, Chloe, decided that she needed to be held. As much as I love to hug my girls, this was just bad timing. I tried to ignore her request with the hope that she might get distracted. No luck. Chloe became more and more vocal about her need to Be. Held. NOW! In my frustration, I asked her in an annoyed tone “Why do you
Read more →Archive for the Thought for the Weekend Category
Invented in 1901, Pepto-Bismol has been around longer than we have. Who doesn’t recognize the bright pink liquid used to treat nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, and more? But did you know that their current marketing slogan is “Eat, Drink and Be Covered”? I especially like that slogan, because, in a way, Matchmaker Logistics has Pepto Bismol covered. We’re responsible for coordinating the transfer of the Bentonite clay used in Pepto Bismol from its originating warehouse to its distribution center. Read on to see how we always keep those loads “covered”: “Our company mines
Read more →Last week, college students returned to our local university, and this week marked Back to School for elementary, middle school, and high school students in our area. In fact, at the end of August and the beginning of September, just under 80 million students, kindergarten through grad school, head back to the classroom. The National Retail Federation says that the parents with K-12 children will spend an average of $688.62 to get a youngster ready for school. That number increases to an average of $907.22 for college students. Let us hope that all those
Read more →In last week’s Thought for the Weekend, I introduced you to Shelly, the newest member of the Matchmaker Logistics team. You also got to meet a few Matchmaker dogs. Everyone in our office enjoys a little friendly competition (read about our ongoing interoffice sports rivalry here), so it didn’t take long for the rest of our team to decide they also wanted an opportunity to show off their pampered pooches. In fact, even Steve, one of our faithful Thought for the Weekend readers, emailed us a great shot of his two best friends. Since
Read more →I consider myself to be an extremely lucky guy. I was blessed with great parents, an incredible wife, two amazing children. Opportunities like playing on a nationally ranked Ultimate Frisbee team and being a guitar player in not one, but two, regularly working bands have serendipitously fallen into my lap. Some might call me a lucky dog, and they wouldn’t be wrong. Not so long ago, we decided to add a full-time Administrative Assistant to the Matchmaker Logistics team. I started by placing an ad on craigslist.org, much to the horror of friends with extensive
Read more →It’s being called “The Worst Dive”, “The Most Embarrassing Dive” and the “Biggest Fail” of the Olympics. Competing in the men’s three-meter springboard qualifying rounds on Monday night, 22-year-old German diver,Stephan Feck, launched himself into a forward 3 1/2 somersault pike. Feck had no doubt successfully completed the same dive thousands of times during his years of training, and it was not the most difficult dive in his repertoire. But this time, it did not go well. Feck’s hand slipped from his left thigh during a rotation, causing him to lose his tuck and
Read more →The Olympic Games are finally here! With all eyes on London, most people are thinking about the games, the ceremonies, and the heroic stories. We learn how athletes struggle against adversity, rising to victorious levels of human achievement. But as the athletes beat the odds and deliver ‘the goods’ for their countries, few stop to remember the logistics professionals who are doing the same. The logistics industry plays a vital role in making the Olympic Games a success. It’s no easy feat to transport equipment, products, athletes, workers, and attendees. Nearly 15,000 athletes, 21,000
Read more →What I say is that, if a fellow really likes potatoes, he must be a pretty decent sort of fellow.” ~ A. A. Milne, Creator of Winnie-the-Pooh With two young daughters in the house, I get my fill of Disney movies, storybooks, and silly kid jokes: “Dad! Why did the potato cross the road? It saw a fork up ahead!” Kids love corny. And, at Matchmaker Logistics we love what one of our customers called “small potatoes”. When other shipping giants couldn’t help out this ‘little guy’, we’re proud to say we were able
Read more →This week at Matchmaker, we’ve been talking about “drills” and “holes” just as much as we’ve been talking about trucks. That’s because we have a new page on our website entitled: Why We’re Not in the Business of Finding Trucks (and why you might be our perfect match…) This process of going public with a profile of our typical customer and our approach to helping said customer reminded me of an old joke that perfectly illustrates why it’s all about “the hole” (and not necessarily about “the drill”): An entrepreneur attended an auction at which he won the bid on an old
Read more →The year was 1988, and we were setting up our first fax machine. “Do you think we will use it?” asked my Mom. As I set the thermal paper roll in place, I assured her that this new “cutting edge” technology would be a big help. It would allow us to: Set up new carriers in minutes Confirm spot rates in writing Receive lists of available trucks (a precursor to internet load boards) Get lots of vacation package offers and discover long lost relatives leaving us claims to diamond mines in Nigeria (Who knew?) Never mind
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