SALES & MARKETING – ANTHONY LICATA – Page 3
At the end of every year, I always look back and think “wow, that went by quick” but as I dig a little bit deeper and think about what we went through, It seems like a life time ago. This time last year, we were locked and loaded with 12 sales people and 4 coordinators. Almost immediately to start the year, we lost Brian Arnold who headed our two biggest accounts. Upon his resignation, Trevor, Angel and myself were on the road meeting and reacquainting ourselves with our accounts to prevent losing any business. With the huge help of Angel Burl, Trevor and I then spent the next couple months getting trained up on Natl Account sales and logistics. Just when I thought we were back to normalcy, Trevor Hewes then resigns and it was back to square one. All while this was happening, the coordination staff had issues of their own with a number of coordinators coming in and out the door, having to take on more work. By the end of the year, we were down to 9 sales people and 3 coordinators. A lot of questions came my way as to if, who, and how I was going to replace these positions. Well, as one person shuts the door, it opens opportunity for someone else. While I decided to handle Northwestern and RUSH myself, rather than hiring some one new, Mike Licata and Andrew Matthews were given the opportunity to take on the remaining Reebie house accounts. That being said, I want to congratulate Mike and Andrew again for the opportunity and thank them for stepping up. While they are still learning, the transition has gone as good as I can ask for so far. Again, BIG thank you to Angel Burl for sticking with me through the ups and downs this year and all of the diversity that we faced. As for the coordination staff, we are beginning this month to interview people to fill at least one, maybe two spots. Quarter 1 is usually the time to prep for the upcoming peak season and come the end of this quarter, we will be ready. The teams may look a bit leaner than usual, but with the lack of volume we have seen the past couple years and speaking with other agencies, everyone is a bit leaner. 2025 presents a HUGE opportunity for us. One of our biggest Allied competitors in our market, Federal has lost all but one of their sales staff members. As you may remember, the leads we receive get split amongst all Allied agents in the market. Being that Federal will not be able to handle these leads, and will take a while to get their conversions back up to par, we will be receiving the leads that they cannot handle. Its is also worth pointing out that Reebie was receiving about 50% of all the leads while the 2 other agents split the remaining 50% amongst each other. This was all thanks to Reebie’s incredible conversions. Despite the turnover, our sales staff maintained an almost 40% conversion rate which was WELL ABOVE the rest of the agents. Our top two performers, Bill Ruecking and Tim Granata ended the year tied for first place as top performing sales person in our Allied division. The remaining sales staff members all managed to break the top 200 (out of roughly over 500 sales people in the allied system) Congratulations Tim, Bill and the rest of the team! With all this being said, despite the trials and tribulations, we ALWAYS manage to come out on top. While we came across speed bumps in the road, our sales and coordination staff members stepped up to the plate. Not only did we step up to the plate, we also out performed our market and region. I know I always say this, but I couldn’t be more proud of our staff. We continue to not only step up when needed, but we do it all while being the best in our market/region. I cant wait to see what we do in 2025