Sophia Strother says she tries to mirror the type of leader she wishes she had when she was working corporate jobs.
Courtesy of Sophia Strother
Sophia Strother became an Amazon delivery partner in 2020 and reached $3 million in revenue in 2022.
In her second year in business, a winter storm almost ended her company, she says.
Strother says that creating a positive company culture helped save her business.
This article is part of Talent Insider, a series containing expert advice to help business owners tackle a range of hiring challenges.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Sophia Strother, the 43-year-old founder of the multimillion-dollar delivery company L2E Industries in Austin. Insider has verified her business’ revenue. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I own a delivery company called L2E Industries, which stands for Learning 2 Exhale Industries, and Amazon is my transportation client. My company is responsible for servicing a portion of Central Texas, and it just cleared over $3 million in revenue in less than three years. But we had a rough quarter in 2021.
In February that year, a winter storm shut down deliveries for a whole week. On top of that, some people had no electricity or water at home, and Central Texas was running out of gasoline. We didn’t do any routes during that time, and based on how much we’re paid per package most delivery owners in Central Texas lost about $60,000 to $70,000. Most of my team lives paycheck to paycheck, and I had 50 employees then.
Despite our difficulties, I was able to make some changes and turn my business around. I learned that in business, you need a positive attitude, and I now focus on reinforcing a positive company culture to help my employees stick it out when times get rough.
I decided to pay everyone who was scheduled to work that week
Even though I paid everyone who was scheduled to work during the storm, by the time March hit, we still had people who were financially depleted. It was devastating. Some employees even left the company.
Once July came, I had no money in my account to make payroll or take care of the vans. I had taken out loans when I started this business and was paying them back each month. Eventually, I had to use my retirement funds and personal savings to keep the business running.
I took all that money out of my account, kept a portion to pay my mortgage and car note for the rest of the year, and used the rest for the business.
It helps for employees to know their boss has their backs, as I did when I made sure people got paid during the storm. At the same time, it’s important to hold employees accountable.
I had to learn to balance caring about people’s feelings and caring about the bottom line
Certain employees had low numbers. I sat down with a temporary business coach — which Amazon provided — for 15 minutes, and she broke down some numbers for me. She showed me the metrics of people who were negatively affecting my business.
After that meeting, I gave those employees a deadline to bring their numbers back up so the business could get back on track. The meeting propelled me to refocus and turn my company around. I immediately implemented a policy around our scorecards and holding drivers accountable. I started thinking about how to make smarter financial decisions that would make the business sustainable. Since then, I haven’t missed a payroll check, and I’ve been able to start paying myself again.
I also brought on an operations manager right after the winter storm. Within a month, I started hearing negative things and noticed my good and loyal employees started leaving. As a result, I let the manager go and took over the day-to-day duties again.
When I was an employee, I sometimes hoped that someone cared about my feelings. I try to mirror what I wish I had during my years in corporate jobs.
I’ve also realized that recognizing your employees often is very important
To bring morale up at my company, I try to create a celebratory atmosphere. I want to make sure employees are recognized through a points system and rewarded when they’re great team players. So I’ve done the following:
1. I made a program called Driver Stars. The drivers that get the most stars over four weeks can go out to dinner with me.
2. I created an initiative called Pass the Pen. It’s a colleague-to-colleague recognition program where the team highlights one of its members each week. This gives employees the opportunity to call out people who’ve helped them or whom they’ve witnessed doing something great.
3. We have started honoring the employee of the month and the employee of the year. The employee of the year gets an all-expenses-paid vacation for a week, along with a stipend. I allow them to use my timeshare with this reward.
4. I also provide tuition reimbursement, 401(k)s, and regular raises. When I launched in 2020, the minimum pay was $15 an hour. My entry-level pay is now $19.75 an hour.
In this industry, if you don’t make your employees feel appreciated or valued, they’re out
Some people say, “Employees are supposed to do their jobs, as long as they’re getting paid.” That’s true, but we’re in a competitive culture. The more benefits you offer the more you show that you’re sewing into their future. It allows them to feel like they’re appreciated and that they can make their job a career.
I now have 80 employees and my retention rate is great. This experience has taught me that startups will have failures. But I’ve learned how to delegate, set the company culture up with written values, and express those values with a focus on accountability.