{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"The Freight Show","title":"Greg Sanders (RDS Capacity Solutions) on Building a Brokerage Through the Worst Freight Market in a Decade","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":4611,"description":"Starting a brokerage from scratch is hard. Starting one at 55, after a 30-year career running brokerage at Schneider, OHL, Redwood, and ITS Logistics, is a different kind of bet — and doing it 18 months before the market collapses into a multi-year freight recession is something else entirely.Greg Sanders has lived all of it. He grew up in the family business, an intermodal company his dad sold to Landstar in 1994. He spent 12 years at Schneider, helped build their brokerage division alongside Aaron Benzeland, and later sold the OHL brokerage to Brad Jacobs as XPO was just getting off the ground. After a run as CEO of ITS Logistics in Reno, Greg launched RDS Capacity Solutions in 2019 — partnered with the original RDS family (his dad's old attorney from the Landstar deal), brought in operators with skin in the game, and built a brokerage that returned all startup capital in six months and was profitable in year one.Then COVID hit, the market ripped, and the 3.5-year slump arrived.In this conversation, Greg breaks down what it actually takes to build a brokerage that survives a cycle like the one we just came through — the partner model, the pod structure, the recruiting playbook he learned from TQL, and why he believes the next three to five years will separate the brokers who integrate AI thoughtfully from the ones who don't. He also gets into his work with the TIA on broker liability, the F4A case in front of the Supreme Court, and what's broken about how FMCSA regulates carriers today.What you'll learn:Why Greg started over at 55 and what made the RDS opportunity different from starting from zeroThe partner model behind RDS: skin in the game, equity ownership, and how Jeremy Inksroom grew his book 5x after joiningWhy the pod structure beats the traditional sales-and-carrier split on a big broker floorHow field generals get paid on contribution margin, not top line — and why that changes everythingWhat Greg learned from Brad Jacobs about M&A execution and why...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/f0lw4441guZC8PqbG1LeEKiz-6dFl98YZjNUQNRMTjU/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS80M2Vl/NThjZmRkZTYyNWU2/YzkyNGYyZmNiZjU2/ZWIyOC5wbmc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}