Regional Expedited Trucking & Dedicated Logistics, 2005-Founded Kentucky Carrier with Property

$3.1M

Revenue

$725K

SDE

7.6x

Multiple

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Full Editorial Writeup

This is a Louisville-area expedited trucking and dedicated logistics operation founded in 2005 that moves time-sensitive freight nationally for manufacturing, automotive, and commercial customers. The business runs a hybrid model: a fleet of company-owned tractors and dry van trailers supplemented by owner-operators, which lets it flex capacity without carrying the full weight of every truck on its own balance sheet. Long-standing customer relationships and transferable contracts sit under a management team that already handles day-to-day dispatch, safety, shop, and accounting.

The headline number here is not the earnings, it is the asset stack. The $5.5M asking price bundles roughly $2.5M of real estate (two adjoining properties, a 7,000 SF office/shop and a 7,500 SF warehouse with three loading docks) plus $2.5M in fixed assets including semi tractors, trailers, service trucks, forklifts, loaders, and shop equipment. Strip those out and you are effectively paying about $500K of enterprise value for a business throwing off $724K in SDE and $662K in EBITDA.

That reframes the deal entirely. On paper this looks like a rich 7.59x cash flow multiple, but the vast majority of the price is hard, financeable collateral. The real question for a buyer is what the operating business is actually worth once you back out the real estate and the fleet, and whether the earnings hold up in a soft freight market.

Why we like it

Earnings quality is anchored by a real management team, not the owner grinding a truck. The owner describes his role as strategy, customer relationships, and fleet acquisition while dispatch, operations, safety, shop, and accounting are staffed, which means the SDE reflects a business that runs rather than a job that pays.
The moat is contracts and iron. Transferable dedicated freight contracts with manufacturing and automotive accounts create switching friction, and the company-owned fleet plus owner-operator mix lets the business scale capacity up or down without full fixed cost on every load.
Expedited and dedicated freight for manufacturing and automotive is essential, non-discretionary logistics. When production lines need time-sensitive parts, they pay, and that keeps this business relevant through cycles far more than spot-market van freight would.
The asset backing is a genuine downside floor. With roughly $2.5M of real estate and $2.5M of fixed assets inside a $5.5M price, a buyer is heavily collateralized, which makes SBA or conventional financing far easier and limits how far you can fall if earnings compress.

How to improve it

Separate the real estate from the operating company and structure it as a leaseback. Buy the property in a holding entity, charge the operating business fair market rent, and you clarify true operating economics while capturing depreciation and building a second cash-flowing asset.
Push the brokerage and asset-light freight mix the listing already flags as higher margin. Growing brokered loads lets you serve overflow demand and new lanes without buying more tractors, lifting margin without proportional capex.
Audit fleet utilization truck by truck in the first 90 days. Expedited carriers bleed money on idle or underutilized assets, so identify low-utilization units to reassign, sell, or convert to owner-operator coverage.
Formalize and extend the dedicated contracts before close and immediately after. Get multi-year commitments with fuel surcharge and rate escalators from the top manufacturing and automotive accounts to lock in the revenue base and de-risk the customer concentration.
Build a lightweight sales function to add dedicated accounts. Growth here has historically depended on the owner's relationships, so hiring or assigning a dedicated business development person reduces reliance on the seller and opens new manufacturing and automotive logos.
Tighten maintenance and safety data into a real dashboard. With an in-house shop and mechanics, tracking cost-per-mile, CSA scores, and downtime lets you control the single largest variable cost and protect the operating authority that makes this business valuable.
Model fuel surcharge pass-through discipline across every lane. Diesel volatility can quietly erode margin, so verify that surcharge mechanisms are contractual and enforced rather than absorbed on legacy relationship accounts.

Diligence notes

Verify the real estate valuation independently. The $2.5M property figure drives the entire deal thesis, so order an appraisal on both adjoining parcels and confirm the holding company can transfer clean title, because an inflated property mark makes the operating multiple look far worse.
Scrutinize customer concentration inside the $3.1M revenue. Expedited carriers serving automotive and manufacturing often lean on a handful of accounts, so pull revenue by customer for three years and confirm the transferable contracts actually survive a change of control.
Reconcile the fixed asset value against actual fleet condition and age. $2.5M in equipment is a large claim, so get a unit-level list with model years, mileage, and hours, and confirm whether tractors and trailers are owned free and clear or carry hidden financing.
Test whether SDE holds without the owner. The listing calls the business management-run but the owner still handles customer relationships and financial management, so quantify what a market-rate replacement for those functions costs and whether earnings survive it.
Examine the owner-operator dependency and classification. Reliance on owner-operators exposes you to capacity risk and potential worker-classification liability, so review contracts, insurance, and whether those drivers could be reclassified as employees.

Source

Originally listed on BizBuySell. View original listing →