“There’s a million people that sell what you sell … what else do you offer?” asks Vincent Carey, founder of Madison-based freight brokerage company Triple Double Logistics (TDL). As the company name implies with its basketball allusion, TDL’s mission is predicated on what Carey calls “filling the stat sheet” with reliable freight transportation.
Carey discusses the imperative of this kind of branding for businesses like TDL, which connects local companies with trucking solutions. “So much of logistics is done through phone calls, through emails, and we want to build these real, genuine relationships with companies … Logistics companies, we’re middlemen. Freight brokerages, we’re middlemen, so if you don’t have a great, established relationship with people, then your product is not what you advertise it to be.
“People think that having relationships with customers is the only piece because that’s who’s giving them the [truck] load,” Carey adds, “but I feel like having that relationship with the truck driver and trucking company is just as important.”
Carey founded TDL in 2021 after previous work in the trucking industry and the sale of his former business, Triple Double Trucking. He came into trucking knowing what he wanted to do, learned more about logistics, and began to understand more about the changes he could bring to the industry.
TDL is breaking new ground as one of the only non-asset-based, Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE)- and Minority Business Enterprise (MBE)-certified companies in Wisconsin. Among its current clients are UW Provision, Coated Metals Group, Midwestern BioAg, and Future Foam. “Companies are looking for minority-owned businesses to do business with,” Carey notes.
Carey is also actively pursuing multiple government contracts.
Despite its unique industry positioning, however, Carey says getting TDL on its feet has been a learning process, especially without outside financial backing to support its launch. He says it’s been a “hustle,” with “people taking leaps of faith,” but the company’s annual growth is evidence that it’s all paying off.
“Our first year, 2021, we [grossed] no money,” he notes. “Year two, we [grossed] about $1,475 total, and year three, we [grossed] about $83,000. This year, if nothing changes, we’ll make close to $130,000, but a lot will change.”
What could change? Carey says that with the company’s recent MBE-certification and the potential to lock down government contracts, “we could easily surpass $1 million.”
With TDL’s financial growth comes anticipated expansion — job creation within the community. Carey says it’s an opportunity to make success accessible in the form of high-paying work. “Logistics is a lucrative market, and anybody can do it with the right training and a pure heart. So, what we eventually want to do is build something that we can bring people into, where you don’t necessarily need a college degree … you’ve just got to come in willing to learn and [with] a drive to be better.
“That’s what I feel is so cool about it,” Carey adds. “We’ll be able to offer jobs — real, livable jobs.”
Beyond the tangible business benefits is another window for impact — paving the way for youth and others struggling with adversity. Carey wants to positively affect people who look like him and mentor them. “The journey has been so much trial and error,” he notes. “I understand so much more now.”
Triple Double Logistics
