New from the 1871 blog: Meet the Merrick Momentum Award Finalists: Coyote The Merrick Momentum Award recognizes the top up-and-coming company that is on the cusp of being an established enterprise and significantly impacting the Chicago economy. The winner of this year’s Merrick Momentum Award will be announced on October 9, 2014 at the Seventh Annual Momentum Awards Dinner. 1871 interviewed each of the award finalists to learn more about the exciting Chicago companies that the Momentum Awards Dinner celebrates. Learn more about Coyote here: How long has Coyote been around and how did it get its start? Jeff and Marianne Silver founded Coyote in 2006. Jeff has been a pillar in the 3PL industry for more than three decades. He played an integral part of American Backhaulers (ABH) in the 1980s, which grew to be the second largest freight brokerage in North America at the time. After ABH was acquired by C.H. Robinson in 1999, Jeff took a five-year hiatus to spend time with his family and go back to school. Jeff received an MBA from the University of Michigan and a master of engineering in logistics from MIT before he and Marianne decided to return to the logistics space in 2006. What started as a software company quickly evolved into a brokerage but with a single request from Marianne: that Coyote’s culture be even more magical than that of ABH’s. Eight years, 16 offices, and 2,000 employees later, Coyote has garnered numerous awards for its culture, technology, and service, from one of America’s Most Promising Company to one of America’s Leading 3PLs. How is Coyote connected to Chicago’s entrepreneurial community? The Momentum Awards website says “Behind every great company is a great entrepreneur,” and that couldn’t be truer for Coyote. After graduating from the University of Michigan in 1984, Jeff packed everything he owned in his Cutlass, moved to an apartment on Sheffield, and started his first job in the transportation and logistics industry, where he would stay for more than 30 years. Armed with passion and entrepreneurial spirit, Jeff founded Coyote in pursuit of change in the transportation and logistics industry—he had a vision for a company that would do the right thing every time, a company that would uphold the commitments it made. At the same time, Marianne’s vision for Coyote’s culture was familial, driven, entrepreneurial, and since day one, Coyote has fostered that strong entrepreneurial spirit: Not only do employees have the ability to grow their book of business but they can also identify opportunities within the company for new roles and expansion, and as Coyote grew from startup to middle market, the company continued to offer extensive training and create jobs, and experience record growth. Several executives on Coyote’s leadership team, including Jeff, regularly speak on the topic of entrepreneurship and are part of Chicago’s thriving innovation and technology communities. In 2013 Coyotesponsored the first-ever Chicago Logistics Hackathon, cultivating relationships between leaders in Chicago’s technology scene with those in the transportation and logistics industry. What does Chicagoness mean to Coyote? Founded in Lake Forest, IL, Coyote moved its headquarters to the Logan Square neighborhood of Chicago in 2011, with a desire to be a part of Chicago’s growing tech community and to appeal to young professionals looking to live and work in the city. Coyotes are active in giving back to the community. We do that by encouraging participation in Spark, a mentoring and apprenticeship program that matches middle school students from underserved communities with volunteers like our Coyotes. That passion for doing the right thing every time is never confined to our four walls. Coyote is successful because of that mentality to do the right thing; it powers everything we stand for. We constantly look for ways to invest in the future—not only within the company but within the industry and this city. Momentum will be a keyword for the transportation and logistics industry within the Chicagoland area—the Bureau of Labor Statistics says employment in logistics is expected to grow 26 percent from 2010 to 2020—faster than average for any profession. Coyote proudly sponsored an employee to participate in the World Business Chicago’s fellowship program that supported Chicago’s Plan for Economic Growth and Jobs, the purpose being to promote the Chicago region’s economic growth and enhance the city’s position as a leading transportation and logistics hub. From this program came the creation of the Supply Chain Innovation Network of Chicago (SINC), the city’s first supply chain leadership council comprised of various leaders in the field. Coyote’s support of the City Colleges of Chicago’s College to Careers initiative, which includes curriculum development for the Olive-Harvey College’s Transportation, Distribution & Logistics (TDL) Center, expected to open in 2015, which will prepare Chicagoans for jobs in the TDL sector. And Coyote continues to add to its own pack, hiring for opportunities in IT, sales and operations, and supply chain, and being in Chicago allows us to tap into the wealth of talent that will allow Coyote to continue to contribute to this city’s driving momentum.
Posted on: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 17:20:47 +0000
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