Since 2003, Central States Trucking has increased revenues by 67 percent, from $23 million to being on pace to hit $42 million this year.
Chicago always has been a major hub for all modes of freight transportation, and by all indications, its share of domestic and international freight volumes will continue to grow. In 1980, in the wake of deregulation, Fred Grane seized an opportunity to improve customer service in the Windy City’s intermodal freight market. He launched a new company, Central States Trucking, centered on intermodal and dedicated contract carriage.
Early on, the Bensenville, Ill.-based company had formulated a strategy to differentiate itself from the many competitors that saw the same opportunity. The initial strategy was to offer multimodal services to solve customers’ logistical challenges, says company president Doug Grane, who along with his brother, Bryan – chief executive officer of Central States – purchased the company from their father, Fred, in 2006.
By 1982, this initial strategy had played out well – in its first year, Central States pulled in nearly $4 million in revenue. One of the world’s largest container transportation and shipping companies, American President Lines (APL), asked Central States to manage its first inland terminal, a U.S. Customs-bonded Container Freight Storage (CFS) station situated on a 22-acre facility in Summit, Ill. A CFS is a physical location for devanning – i.e. unpacking – and packing of intermodal containers.
In 1985, the Burlington Northern railroad and a consortium of five large Pacific Northwest shippers urged Central States to open a new CFS warehouse facility in Berwyn, Ill. One of the unique features of this facility was that a U.S. Customs official was on site to ensure products matched the paperwork, Grane says. U.S. Customs quickly adapted this first-of-its-kind facility as a prototype for the many other Central Examination Sites (CES) in the country today, he says.
The success of these first two CFS locations led Central States to expand into the airfreight business by opening its two present CFS sites. One facility doubles as the company’s headquarters in Bensenville, near Chicago’s O’Hare airport; the other site is in Romulus, Mich., near the Detroit airport.
By 2003, despite its diversification of services, Central States still fit the mold of most trucking companies in the Chicago area, Grane says; it had two locations and a fairly standard set of equipment, drivers and technology. That hasn’t kept the company from being a success: Since 2003, Central States has increased revenues by 67 percent, from $23 million to being on pace to hit $42 million this year. The company has 300 employees, 200 tractors and 300 company-owned trailers, and serves customers across six Midwestern states.
