An AMS team member at work in the material yard.

AMS Earth Movers hauls 30-35 truckloads per day for a project at Chicago O’Hare International Airport.

Eight years ago, few would have expected AMS Earth Movers (AMS), a regional hauling and material supply company based in Lake Villa, Illinois, to be a thriving business today. In its early days, the company struggled to gain a foothold in the Greater Chicago area as a hauler. While work was available, the company employees endured discrimination from an unreliable customer base, which ultimately led to $250,000 of debt.

Then Julie Savitt, a mother of three teenagers, took over as President. While she possesses a degree in psychology, she had no experience in construction. She recalls, “At the time, I noticed that truck drivers, particularly minorities, were not treated well and given little respect by our clients. I wanted to change that. I’ve owned a business before, as have many in my family. So while I didn’t know much about the truck hauling trade, I understood the elements of running a good business—and the most important one is to take care of your people.”
With that philosophy in mind, Savitt refused to give in and decided instead to revamp the company’s business strategy. Today, AMS is a thriving, certified disadvantaged business enterprise (DBE) and woman-owned business enterprise (WBE). It has grown from having just one employee and considerable debt to a profitable business with 16 employees, despite the recession. The hauling and supply company is the first WBE-certified company to supply aggregate in Illinois, Wisconsin and to the Indiana Department of Transportation (DOT).
The company’s notable improvement began because Savitt made the deliberate decision to focus on company operations and developing a reliable client base—and to do that she needed insight from the top experts in Chicago’s construction industry.

Digging In

AMS was founded in 2008 by Savitt and her then-partner, who had a trucking license but wanted to own his own company. In the midst of starting the business, her partner had to return to his home country and Savitt was left with little backlog and mounting bills. She recalls, “Many of our early customers saw that the business was new and struggling to gain a foothold. They assumed that it would fail and just didn’t pay their invoices. I was amazed at the degree of unethical behavior that existed in the business.”
While some might have given up at that point, Savitt dug in. She obtained her commercial driver license as a way to immerse herself in the world of trucking and to understand the challenges associated with hauling materials. Then, she went in search of those who could offer advice and possibly assistance.

“One of the first things I did was figure out who and what I needed to know,” she says. “I must have met over 2,000 worthy contacts in the first two years of starting the business—everyone that I needed to know to run a successful trucking business.”
She developed a professional friendship with Hedy Ratner, Founder of the nonprofit Women’s Business Development Center, which is headquartered in Chicago. She also joined the Cycle-of-Success Institute, a Chicago-based program that teaches business owners how to transform their companies into profitable, high-growth businesses. Additionally, she participated in the Small Business Administration’s Emerging 200 Initiative, which selects 200 high-potential businesses from inner cities across the country to take part in a seven-month-long executive training program.

What’s more, Savitt partnered with the Federation of Women Contractors to better understand how legislation and the economy affect the trucking business, joined the Illinois Tollway’s Construction Coaching for Growth Program, and enrolled in the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program.

She says, “Many might think I went overboard. But I needed to learn as much as I could as quickly as I could if the company was going to survive. To this day, I advise other entrepreneurs to do the same thing—­to get to know as many reliable industry experts as possible.”
Her plan worked well. Just two years later, Savitt’s company had grown to four employees, doubled its sales volume, built a backlog of work, paid all vendors and managed the $250,000 debt so that the business could run as usual.

In 2011, the company won its largest hauling job up to that point when it was hired to support hauling for the $55 million, 853,200-square-foot Consolidated Rental Car Facility at Midway Airport. During 2011, AMS moved 2,000 loads. The company performed the job so well that it won several more large hauling projects, including the recent contract to haul what will be in excess of 6,000 loads, or 30-35 truckloads per day, for a project at Chicago O’Hare International Airport.

Shifting to a Higher Gear

One of Savitt’s early strategic growth objectives was to expand her company’s services beyond hauling for highway work, which slows considerably in the winter months.

Again, she looked to reliable industry experts. She says, “I learned that the biggest spend for road construction is materials. So it just made sense that a trucking company develop relationships with suppliers of materials and learn about the primary aggregate products.”
Key in those developing relationships was to get to know the largest supplier of aggregate in the area. She found a mentor and a 30-acre site to use as a material yard for stone and other products in 2012. By 2013, AMS was the first WBE contractor in Illinois to supply stone on a public project.

AMS first contract was to supply aggregate to the Chicago Metropolitan Water Reclamation District. More recently, the company won a big project in Lake Villa supplying stone to the Illinois DOT.

Empowering Her Team

Savitt’s business philosophy remains focused on creating opportunities for her employees—both in terms of project backlog and skills. For example, she encourages her drivers to learn to drive all different types of trucks so that they can work on multiple projects throughout the year. Thus far, she has cross-trained 15 drivers on dump trucks, flatbeds and lowboy semi-trailers.

Today, AMS has 11 trucks, 13 dump trailers, three flatbeds and one lowboy truck trailer. The staff has increased to 16 employees, which includes 10 drivers, admin staff and a material yard operator. AMS has also become a supplier of aggregate, topsoil, sand and rock salt in recent years. The company was named 2015 DBE Contractor of the Year by the Illinois Tollway; Savitt was personally honored as a 2012 Enterprising Women of the Year award winner by Enterprising Women magazine and as the 2011 Chicago Business Owner of the Year by the National Association of Women Business Owners.

Savitt concludes, “I’m not in business to get rich or to take over the world. I have 16 families who rely on me. When I hear that one of them has bought a new car or a new house, I know we’re on the right track. That’s really satisfying to me. My goal eight years ago is the same as it is today—to operate a company that provides quality service and empowers its people, one that allows them to provide for their families.”