Despite growing concerns of a trade war, one of Chattanooga’s fastest growing international companies still expects to grow by more than 60 percent this year shipping goods around the globe.
Steam Logistics, started in 2012 as the international arm of the third party logistics business Access America Transport, was among the fastest growing logistics companies in the country last year on Inc. magazine’s list of rapidly growing companies. Jason Provonsha, the former Coyote and Access America executive who is CEO of Steam Logistics, predicts the company will maintain its healthy growth pace among the top growing logistics companies again this year as the 6-year-old company continues to build its technology, reputation and partnerships with operations in about 70 countries around the world.
The company ranked 254th on Inc’s list in 2017 with revenues of $13.6 million and should remain among the top 500 companies again this year when the Inc. list is released later this year.
“We have a very positive outlook overall,” Provonsha told the Chattanooga Rotary Club in a recent speech about the growth of Steam Logistics. “I am hopeful that (new international tariffs and trade restrictions) won’t be dramatic once all of the dust settles. We are very diversified in terms of the commodities that we ship and we tend to have long term relationships that give us some confidence about the future.”
As Steam Logistics has grown from a startup firm to a global company generating more than $20 million a year in revenues, Provonsha said executives have learned to be more focused and disciplined, recognizing that company changes and pivots can now be more costly and disorderly to developing a common culture and direction.