The Next Chapter in My Marketing Career

As most of my family and friends know, I have been evaluating new career opportunities over the past few weeks. I have met and spoken with a lot of great people. Some of the companies that expressed interest in my talents include a telecommunications distributor, two logistics software companies, a couple transportation providers and several third party logistics companies - oh, and an eco-friendly bus manufacturer too. The networking experience has been eye-opening and I have also found the true meaning of friendship when it counts most. Even with the positive activity, one organization in particular really showed a great deal of interest in me, and I in them. And so, earlier this week I followed my heart and accepted an offer to join an organization called PartnerShip LLC as their new marketing director. Even though I have not yet begun working for them, their President & COO has already sent an internal communication announcing my addition to the team, as he puts it, to "... help refine existing and develop new marketing strategies in support of business goals and objectives, and create efficient and profitable processes for the execution and implementation of such strategies." I am really looking forward to this new and unique opportunity. The company is a small, for-profit subsidiary of a larger non-profit organization called the National Association of College Stores (or NACS for short). PartnerShip LLC specializes in providing transportation and logistics services to college bookstores and to other small and medium businesses. They recently moved into new offices in Westlake, OH and all of the people I have met so far have been wonderful. It will truly be a breath of fresh air to work for a small, non-public company with a lean, high-integrity management team - and so I am really excited about this opportunity. Thank you again for the support of my family and friends. More Hollywood marketing details to come in future posts.

Goodbye YRC Worldwide

It is with great sadness and mixed emotions that, after 22+ years of service, I bid goodbye to YRC Worldwide. I will truly miss all of my friends and colleagues at Holland, Reddaway, New Penn and YRC. It's a difficult chapter to close on my career, but it is time for a fresh start. I look forward to sinking my teeth into a new opportunity where I can apply my marketing experience, education and talents towards the success of another organization.

I also appreciate the support of my true friends and family as I transition to a new career opportunity. Your guidance and prayers are welcomed.

Scott G. Frederick
Marketing Professional
http://www.linkedin.com/in/sgfrederick

Industry Awards Dinner

Last week I had the honor of attending the Logistics Management magazine Quest for Quality awards dinner with some of my colleagues last week in Philadelphia, PA. Four YRC Worldwide companies received awards this year from the readers of this trade publication. This is pretty much the preeminent award in our industry, so it was nice to see YRC Worldwide, Holland, Reddaway and New Penn all receiving awards. After the awards were presented, we were entertained by Bill Herz who was a fabulous magician/comedian act. He did some pretty amazing stuff. The next day I spent working with the New Penn management team in Lebanon, PA. As always, great to get out and about; but also good to return home again.

New YRC Promotion

Just launched our next big YRC promotion. We are calling this VIP 2.0 internally because it is a new and improved version of something we did earlier this year. It's basically a program that is meant to build partnerships with our customers by creating a win-win scenario where the customer can receive rebates, or money-back, if they ship over a certain amount during the promotional time period. The improvements include a new website where customers enroll into the program, weekly progress emails to let them know where they are at, and tracking tools for our sales executives as well. On a related note, YRC Worldwide is going through more oganizational changes. Our Chief Marketing Officer lef the company last week and we have new presidents at YRC and Holland. It will be interesting to see where our Marketing function goes from here as well (hopefully in a good direction for me!). More to come.

Reddaway Trip Out West

Last week I traveled to Clackamas, OR for a quick 4-day stint working with our Reddaway team at their corporate offices. The itinerary included a review of our "Totally California" sales & marketing campaign results, account segmentation strategies, sales reporting and automation, and other topics. I also had a chance to spend some time with our Portland area local sales team. The weather was fabulous (sunny and 80's/90's). I always enjoy my time visiting the Reddaway gang - really good people.

The Bridgestone Invitational

Today I took my mother (grandma Carole) and Abby to the Bridgestone Invitational golf tournament at Firestone Country Club. I was able to (eventually) sneak them both into our YRC/Holland Signature Suite overlooking hole 16 (the Monster). It was hot, but a good time was had by all. My mom was able to get autographs for Jim Furyk and Mark Wilson. He highlight of the day, however, was seeing Tiger Woods. In the end, Adam Scott was the winner this year.

On The Road Again

I am working from the YRC Worldwide corporate offices in Overland Park, KS this week again. This is my fifth trip to Overland Park this year. This week I am working on a special project with our CMO; but hope to also spend some time with some of my fellow marketing colleagues this week as well. I always enjoy a little face-to-face time with the "other half" of our corporate marketing team (the other half, of course, are based in Akron, OH). Word of my trip must have leaked because our stock is up over 40% today! :)

Totally California Campaign

This past month we launched a new, integrated marketing campaign for Reddaway, one of the regional transportation companies in the western U.S. that is a part of YRC Worldwide. This was the first really complete marketing program I was able to lead in the past year or so given budget cutbacks and organizational unrest. It's a pretty cool program that was supported with a highly analytical business case. The external portions of the campaign include print advertsing, online display ads, paid search, a microsite website, a promotional offer, print collateral, targeted email campaigns, a customer rewards program and a number of other tactics that all support the overall strategy of growing Reddaway market share to, from and within the state of California. Now, just hoping to see some results as the program runs throughout the year.

San Diego Conference

The past few days I was attending the Transportation Marketing & Sales Conference (TMSA) in San Diego, CA. The actual conference was at the Rancho Bernardo Inn. The facility was beautiful and I was able to get a little bit of golfing in (shot a 91, good for me). The weather was very mild staying between 50 and 70 degrees pretty much the whole time I was there. I was also able to spend some quality time with my former boss as well as a little time with my current CMO. The conference provided some good mental stimulation and the two keynote speakers, Bill Butterworth and Joe Calhoon did a real nice job.

Back in KC Again

I have been working out of our Kansas City office again this week. One of the projects I am helping spearhead is developing our "Town Hall Live" internal communications channel. This is a pretty cool channel that will allow us to stream live and recorded town hall meetings over the Internet so that all of our employees can interact in these quarterly (and soon to be more frequent) company events. The image shown here is the login screen which presents the content in a sort of "virtual campus" type of environment. Our first big event will be in a couple weeks when after we release our Q1 2011 earnings. After that, we'll use this channel to help communicate other major events to our employees (like the re-launch of our Time-Critical services). Nice to be in the thick of things here in KC, but looking forward to get back home too.

Back Home from KC

Traveled back home today from Kansas City, Missouri. The YRC Time-Critical Partnership Meeting (see short video clip I took with my phone of the Sprint Center stage) seemed to go well and I got to meet a lot of new YRC folks (in person) that I talk to over the phone with frequently and via email (and I found a very cool, huge cigar lounge called "The Outlaw" near my hotel last night as well). Looks like a new assignment has me going back to Kansas City next week again.

YRC Meeting at the Sprint Center

This week I am in Kansas City for work meetings as part of the relaunch of our YRC Time-Critical service portfolio. We are calling this our YRC Partnership Meeting because some of our "final mile" partners have been invited and are sponsoring, i.e., paying the bill, for a portion of the meeting. The event is at the Sprint Center which is also home to the College Basketball Experience. The venue is actually pretty cool. I couldn't resist snapping a couple photos - one of the 2000 MSU Championship Banner with coach Izzo on it. Mostly light meet-and-greet fare tonight with sales, marketing and operations leaders across the company. More substance tomorrow.