A forwarder that grew up on a factory floor
We started with one client, one lane and one very specific problem: getting parts from China to an assembly line in Illinois without the line ever stopping. Thirteen years later, that's still how we think about freight.
Two desks, one whiteboard, 2013
Erik Fisker spent the late 2000s as a supply chain manager for an appliance maker outside Chicago. His job was to keep a line running on parts from eleven suppliers in Guangdong. His biggest problem wasn't the suppliers or the ocean. It was that nobody between them and his receiving dock was thinking about the line.
In 2013 he left to fix that himself, with one colleague, a rented office in Elk Grove Village and his old employer as the first client. The whiteboard in that office had every container number on it, with the line date written next to each one in red.
We don't use the whiteboard anymore. We do still write the line date next to every shipment.
How we got here
Slowly, mostly. We've opened offices when clients needed them, not before.
- 2013
Founded in Chicago
Two people, one client. The first shipment is a 40' container of motor housings from Ningbo.
- 2014
Shenzhen office opens
Our first origin team, three people in Yantian, set up to consolidate parts from Guangdong suppliers.
- 2016
Ningbo office opens
Mei Lin Zhao joins to run it. She now runs all of our China operations.
- 2018
In-house customs brokerage
We bring customs in-house with our own licensed brokers, and stop handing clients off to a third party.
- 2019
Elk Grove warehouse
A 112,000 sq ft bonded warehouse near O'Hare, for transloading and buffer stock.
- 2020
Shanghai office, and a hard year
We open in Shanghai weeks before the pandemic. Our China teams keep working through it, and no client line stops for lack of parts that year.
- 2021
Kitting at origin
We launch origin kitting in Dongguan for our first three production clients.
- 2023
Long Beach gateway
A West Coast team for drayage, transloading and rail, as volumes through LA/LB pass 5,000 TEU a year.
- 2024
10,000 TEU
We cross 10,000 TEU in a year for the first time.
- 2026
Toronto
Our first office outside the US and China: a Canadian customs team and a 58,000 sq ft bonded warehouse in Mississauga. Read the story.
Four things we try to hold ourselves to
Line date first
Every shipment has the date the client actually needs it written next to it. That date drives every decision.
Bad news early
If something's going wrong, the client hears it from us first, with options, before they find it in a tracking screen.
Our own people
We staff our own offices at origin and destination. Agents are for the edges of the network, not the core.
Stay small enough to care
We turn down work that doesn't fit, so we can do the work that does properly.
The people you'll probably end up talking to
Erik Fisker
Founder & CEO
Former appliance supply chain manager. Still answers his own phone, and still visits suppliers in Guangdong twice a year.
Mei Lin Zhao
VP, Origin Operations
Opened our Ningbo office in 2016 and now runs all three China offices. Has walked more factory floors than anyone in the company.
Dana Okafor
Director, Customs & Compliance
Licensed customs broker who built our in-house brokerage in 2018. Reads the Federal Register so our clients don't have to.
Priya Raman
General Manager, Canada
Fifteen years in Canadian customs and cross-border trucking. Joined in early 2026 to open our Toronto office.
Have a production schedule we should see?
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