The Chairman's Corner

By Shiree Hammer

September 2022

Two things come to mind as we wind down the summer; balance and trust. Both are important and hard to attain whether personally or professionally. Recently, I was sent a picture of a plaque from the campus of Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. It was a quote by the founder of Kinkos, Paul Orfalea, “Trust people. If you don’t, you have to do everything yourself.” This is what our customers do every day; rely on our ability to safely pack, transport, and deliver their prized possessions. We wouldn’t be in business as movers if this level of trust didn’t exist. At the same time, we trust our employees, suppliers, vendors, and partners to make a move successful. I am sure we have all been in situations where we have taken on too much, due to a lack of trust. Instead of delegating or hiring extra help, we try to do too much on our own, I felt this quote was fitting for those situations as well. A small reminder to have trust and ask for help, it is what we expect our customers to do.

 Balance is the act of even distribution. This has been challenging to achieve in the current economic state. Not only is the work versus family balance harder with the demand for instant communication and response. The balance of operating a successful business is as well. Just when we figured out how to stay in operation during a pandemic and keep our employees and customers safe; we are now faced with the escalating costs of running a moving company. This year feels like it has been a constant stream of increases; with no end in sight. As we analyze the success of the summer season, will the surge in volume outweigh the price of doing such business? As most companies adjust rates annually to keep up with the cost of living; were those raises enough for what we have faced so far in 2022? Many moving companies send out new compensation schedules at the beginning of the year and unfortunately, a lot of the increases our industry faced came after that. As the year comes to end and we work on rates for 2023 there will be a fine balance of increasing rates enough to offset higher costs without scaring customers away. What is going to rise next and to what degree?

As I start my tour of the state next week with Steve, I look forward to discussing the above with all of you to help continue to make our industry the best it can be.

September 2022- CMSA Communicator