The young and the not-so-restless: interview with Dana Regan
Dana Regan began helping out in the family logistics business at the ripe old age of 10. Now 28, she has become one of the leading advocates of the profession.
Mitch Mac Donald has more than 30 years of experience in both the newspaper and magazine businesses. He has covered the logistics and supply chain fields since 1988. Twice named one of the Top 10 Business Journalists in the U.S., he has served in a multitude of editorial and publishing roles. The leading force behind the launch of Supply Chain Management Review, he was that brand's founding publisher and editorial director from 1997 to 2000. Additionally, he has served as news editor, chief editor, publisher and editorial director of Logistics Management, as well as publisher of Modern Materials Handling. Mitch is also the president and CEO of Agile Business Media, LLC, the parent company of DC VELOCITY and CSCMP's Supply Chain Quarterly.
At just 28 years old, Dana Regan already has an impressive track record in the logistics profession. Since joining the family business, TranzAct Technologies, a year out of college, Regan has helped numerous clients reduce their transportation costs, manage cash flow, and leverage best supply chain practices.
Today, she is assistant vice president of business development for TranzAct, which provides freight payment and auditing, spend management, and consulting services. In her current role, she works with both large and small companies to evaluate the supply chain operating environment and identify specific business practice improvements.
Regan is a 2004 graduate of Villanova University in Pennsylvania and has completed the Certification in Transportation and Logistics program through the American Society of Transportation and Logistics (AST&L). She is the chair of the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals' Young Professionals Committee and was appointed to the 2010-2011 CSCMP board of directors.
She is actively involved in many civic and professional organizations and served as the co-chair for the World Presidents' Organization Legacy Experience Annual Conference in 2008. She spoke recently with DC Velocity Group Editorial Director Mitch Mac Donald about her short but eventful career to date.
Q: What prompted you to get into the logistics and supply chain field? A: I grew up in the business with my father starting TranzAct in 1984 and my mother joining the organization in 1989, so I spent numerous school holidays and summers at TranzAct. I remember when I was 10 or 11 years old I came into work for a few hours and I was calculating float credits back in the days when those were part of the payment fee structure.
Q: No young person should have that much fun. A: I guess it appealed to my interest in numbers and math, and I liked the fact that it wasn't the same thing every day. There were different reports and different analyses. I did some projects that I was told were very helpful with assisting clients and provided a good return to them. I took some satisfaction in knowing that I could help companies.
When I graduated from college with a degree in marketing and accounting, I figured I'd eventually join TranzAct, but I don't think my parents thought I was that serious about it. So I started looking for jobs in Chicago in marketing and logistics, and eventually landed a job with a truckload brokerage firm.
I worked as a dispatcher there for a year and learned how to work the phones and dial for trucks. I was there during Hurricane Katrina, when trucks were really at a premium. I remember pulling out the FMCSA book and basically just having to go through the list, calling trucking company after trucking company trying to find a truck for certain loads. It was good experience.
After about a year, I was presented with an opportunity to move into a sales role at another company. At the time, TranzAct was also looking to fill an open position in its small truckload brokerage division. After discussing it with my parents, I decided it was the right time to join TranzAct. So I came in and ran that division for about three years. I definitely got a lot of valuable experience doing that.
Q: Describe your current role at TranzAct and what you do as the assistant vice president of business development. A: Well, I wear multiple hats. In my current role, I focus a lot on sales, obviously, but my job also involves developing relationships and partnerships with other companies in the industry, looking for new opportunities to expand our services and our offerings, new product development, things like that. We're always asking ourselves: "What are clients looking for that we aren't providing right now?"
Q: You haven't wasted any time getting involved in industry associations and various civic and professional groups. Right now, for instance, you serve as the chair of the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals' Young Professionals Committee. What prompted you to get involved? A: Getting involved is one thing that my parents always stressed to us. We learned the importance of being charitable and being generous with our time. I've done a lot of volunteer work in the past. I coached youth soccer and did some tutoring on the West Side of Chicago in a Catholic school.
By staying actively involved with the industry, I am also able to stay abreast of current trends, which is extremely useful in my work. That is one of the biggest reasons why I chose to get involved in the industry. I think CSCMP is an incredible organization. I really wanted to get more young professionals engaged with CSCMP because you often see this gap in membership—their student membership lapses and then it's another few years before they rejoin the organization. We need to basically fill that gap.
Q: What would you say to other young professionals to encourage them to consider a career in logistics and supply chain management? A: I think now more than ever, companies are competing on their supply chains. So, the companies with the best supply chains are the companies that are going to be here five, 10, 20 years from now.
Supply chain really is the intersection of a lot of different aspects of a company. You've got inventory management, you've got procurement, you've got finance, and you've got transportation, so getting some experience there is really important in terms of building your career. These days, we're seeing more and more people with some sort of background in the supply chain and logistics area ascending to higher leadership positions.
Q: Do you have any closing thoughts? A: I wish there was a way to communicate the importance of the things going on in this industry across America. If you think about everything you wear, you eat, you use on a daily basis, I would guess at least 90 percent of it has been on a truck or train or boat at some point.
But as important as they are, logistics and transportation issues don't receive much media attention. There's the highway bill that's up for reauthorization. That is not front page news. There's hours of service. That is not front page news. Every American should care about that because it affects the cost and availability of all the items they take for granted.
Nearly one-third of American consumers have increased their secondhand purchases in the past year, revealing a jump in “recommerce” according to a buyer survey from ShipStation, a provider of web-based shipping and order fulfillment solutions.
The number comes from a survey of 500 U.S. consumers showing that nearly one in four (23%) Americans lack confidence in making purchases over $200 in the next six months. Due to economic uncertainty, savvy shoppers are looking for ways to save money without sacrificing quality or style, the research found.
Younger shoppers are leading the charge in that trend, with 59% of Gen Z and 48% of Millennials buying pre-owned items weekly or monthly. That rate makes Gen Z nearly twice as likely to buy second hand compared to older generations.
The primary reason that shoppers say they have increased their recommerce habits is lower prices (74%), followed by the thrill of finding unique or rare items (38%) and getting higher quality for a lower price (28%). Only 14% of Americans cite environmental concerns as a primary reason they shop second-hand.
Despite the challenge of adjusting to the new pattern, recommerce represents a strategic opportunity for businesses to capture today’s budget-minded shoppers and foster long-term loyalty, Austin, Texas-based ShipStation said.
For example, retailers don’t have to sell used goods to capitalize on the secondhand boom. Instead, they can offer trade-in programs swapping discounts or store credit for shoppers’ old items. And they can improve product discoverability to help customers—particularly older generations—find what they’re looking for.
Other ways for retailers to connect with recommerce shoppers are to improve shipping practices. According to ShipStation:
70% of shoppers won’t return to a brand if shipping is too expensive.
51% of consumers are turned off by late deliveries
40% of shoppers won’t return to a retailer again if the packaging is bad.
The “CMA CGM Startup Awards”—created in collaboration with BFM Business and La Tribune—will identify the best innovations to accelerate its transformation, the French company said.
Specifically, the company will select the best startup among the applicants, with clear industry transformation objectives focused on environmental performance, competitiveness, and quality of life at work in each of the three areas:
Shipping: Enabling safer, more efficient, and sustainable navigation through innovative technological solutions.
Logistics: Reinventing the global supply chain with smart and sustainable logistics solutions.
Media: Transform content creation, and customer engagement with innovative media technologies and strategies.
Three winners will be selected during a final event organized on November 15 at the Orange Vélodrome Stadium in Marseille, during the 2nd Artificial Intelligence Marseille (AIM) forum organized by La Tribune and BFM Business. The selection will be made by a jury chaired by Rodolphe Saadé, Chairman and CEO of the Group, and including members of the executive committee representing the various sectors of CMA CGM.
The global air cargo market’s hot summer of double-digit demand growth continued in August with average spot rates showing their largest year-on-year jump with a 24% increase, according to the latest weekly analysis by Xeneta.
Xeneta cited two reasons to explain the increase. First, Global average air cargo spot rates reached $2.68 per kg in August due to continuing supply and demand imbalance. That came as August's global cargo supply grew at its slowest ratio in 2024 to-date at 2% year-on-year, while global cargo demand continued its double-digit growth, rising +11%.
The second reason for higher rates was an ocean-to-air shift in freight volumes due to Red Sea disruptions and e-commerce demand.
Those factors could soon be amplified as e-commerce shows continued strong growth approaching the hotly anticipated winter peak season. E-commerce and low-value goods exports from China in the first seven months of 2024 increased 30% year-on-year, including shipments to Europe and the US rising 38% and 30% growth respectively, Xeneta said.
“Typically, air cargo market performance in August tends to follow the July trend. But another month of double-digit demand growth and the strongest rate growths of the year means there was definitely no summer slack season in 2024,” Niall van de Wouw, Xeneta’s chief airfreight officer, said in a release.
“Rates we saw bottoming out in late July started picking up again in mid-August. This is too short a period to call a season. This has been a busy summer, and now we’re at the threshold of Q4, it will be interesting to see what will happen and if all the anticipation of a red-hot peak season materializes,” van de Wouw said.
The report cites data showing that there are approximately 1.7 million workers missing from the post-pandemic workforce and that 38% of small firms are unable to fill open positions. At the same time, the “skills gap” in the workforce is accelerating as automation and AI create significant shifts in how work is performed.
That information comes from the “2024 Labor Day Report” released by Littler’s Workplace Policy Institute (WPI), the firm’s government relations and public policy arm.
“We continue to see a labor shortage and an urgent need to upskill the current workforce to adapt to the new world of work,” said Michael Lotito, Littler shareholder and co-chair of WPI. “As corporate executives and business leaders look to the future, they are focused on realizing the many benefits of AI to streamline operations and guide strategic decision-making, while cultivating a talent pipeline that can support this growth.”
But while the need is clear, solutions may be complicated by public policy changes such as the upcoming U.S. general election and the proliferation of employment-related legislation at the state and local levels amid Congressional gridlock.
“We are heading into a contentious election that has already proven to be unpredictable and is poised to create even more uncertainty for employers, no matter the outcome,” Shannon Meade, WPI’s executive director, said in a release. “At the same time, the growing patchwork of state and local requirements across the U.S. is exacerbating compliance challenges for companies. That, coupled with looming changes following several Supreme Court decisions that have the potential to upend rulemaking, gives C-suite executives much to contend with in planning their workforce-related strategies.”
Stax Engineering, the venture-backed startup that provides smokestack emissions reduction services for maritime ships, will service all vessels from Toyota Motor North America Inc. visiting the Toyota Berth at the Port of Long Beach, according to a new five-year deal announced today.
Beginning in 2025 to coincide with new California Air Resources Board (CARB) standards, STAX will become the first and only emissions control provider to service roll-on/roll-off (ro-ros) vessels in the state of California, the company said.
Stax has rapidly grown since its launch in the first quarter of this year, supported in part by a $40 million funding round from investors, announced in July. It now holds exclusive service agreements at California ports including Los Angeles, Long Beach, Hueneme, Benicia, Richmond, and Oakland. The firm has also partnered with individual companies like NYK Line, Hyundai GLOVIS, Equilon Enterprises LLC d/b/a Shell Oil Products US (Shell), and now Toyota.
Stax says it offers an alternative to shore power with land- and barge-based, mobile emissions capture and control technology for shipping terminal and fleet operators without the need for retrofits.
In the case of this latest deal, the Toyota Long Beach Vehicle Distribution Center imports about 200,000 vehicles each year on ro-ro vessels. Stax will keep those ships green with its flexible exhaust capture system, which attaches to all vessel classes without modification to remove 99% of emitted particulate matter (PM) and 95% of emitted oxides of nitrogen (NOx). Over the lifetime of this new agreement with Toyota, Stax estimated the service will account for approximately 3,700 hours and more than 47 tons of emissions controlled.
“We set out to provide an emissions capture and control solution that was reliable, easily accessible, and cost-effective. As we begin to service Toyota, we’re confident that we can meet the needs of the full breadth of the maritime industry, furthering our impact on the local air quality, public health, and environment,” Mike Walker, CEO of Stax, said in a release. “Continuing to establish strong partnerships will help build momentum for and trust in our technology as we expand beyond the state of California.”