Highlight from IAM Headquarters

Another IAM Annual Meeting & Expo in the books!

Thank you to all our members and partners who joined us to celebrate the 60th Anniversary of the International Association of Movers. Our theme this year - "The Next 60 Years" - paid tribute to our six decades of history while focusing the members on the challenges and opportunities ahead.

Much has already been shared about the event on social media but stay tuned for photos and videos capturing the purpose and energy that makes this event such a wonderful experience.

I need to highlight a few people and groups here though for special gratitude:

• The Hyatt Regency Atlanta for hosting us this week and giving us this platform to have this experience.
• Our strategic partners GLOMO and Mobility Exchange for enhancing IAM's capacity to do cool and creative things in service to our members and the industry at this conference and throughout the year.
• The IAM Staff for their amazing work not just last week but all year in the lead-up to this event. At just 11 people, we are small but MIGHTY!
• Finally, none of this happens without the dedication and expertise of Toshia Bruster and her team at Meeting Management Services (MMS). Thanks for all your hard work making this event a wonderful experience for everyone who came to Atlanta.

This will be a shorter ePortal this week because our staff are returning from the conference but normal ePortal service will resume in two weeks.

See you all next year in Toronto!

Brian Limperopulos

Vice President

U.S Court of Federal Claims Upholds HomeSafe Alliance Contract to Modernize Moving Process for U.S. Armed Forces and Their Families

In response to the U.S. Court of Federal Claims decision to uphold HomeSafe Alliance, LLC’s exclusive Global Household Goods Contract (GHC) with the U.S. Transportation Command (USTRANSCOM), Alan S. Thompson, HomeSafe Chief Executive Officer, made the following statement:

"We are extremely pleased with the federal court’s decision to endorse the award of the Global Household Goods Contract to HomeSafe Alliance.  Combining our HomeSafe Connect advanced digital solution and global program management expertise, we will transform and modernize the relocation experience for the members of our Armed Forces, Department of Defense civilians, and their families.”

Read More

Top Five News Stories You Might Have Missed

1. Port of Antwerp braces for yet more strike action
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3. South Africa presses ahead with national shipping line plans
4. Insurers want stronger regulations covering transport of lithium-ion batteries
5. Carriers consider laying-up box ships as blanking fails to prop up rates

Get more news like this on IAM's LinkedIn page.

IAM Annual Meeting a Huge Success

In case you missed it, the 2022 IAM Annual Meeting & Expo happened last week in Atlanta, Ga. About 1789 attendees took part in numerous meetings, learning sessions, the exhibit hall, the expo hall (the “Hub”), and in-person business meetings. Everywhere around the hotel, we saw small groups convening and having business discussions. Nothing could have made us happier, and we can't wait to get to Toronto next year and do it all again.

By the Numbers

• 99 - The number of exhibitors this year.
• 25 - The number of new members we have this month
• 332 - The number of first-time attendees to the Annual Meeting
• 6127 - The number of LinkedIn followers IAM currently has. Are you following?
• 332 - The number of days until the IAM Annual Meeting & Expo in Toronto. The staff is still napping on and off but before long, we will start planning again.

Portal Magazine

In every issue of the Portal, we invite our authors to share their experiences, success stories, learning experiences, and vision with others in the moving and forwarding industry. In addition to our regular columns, feature articles for each issue are united by a central theme. 

Submit your story today for the upcoming edition of the Portal Magazine. Contact Portal Editor Will Kohudic if you have any questions or want to send him your article.

Awards at the Annual Meeting

IAM always enjoys the opportunity to promote others and highlight their important works. Here are some who were specifically enumerated at the Annual Meeting.

New Inductees for the Hall of Honor:

• Adam Lowy, Move for Hunger
• Eric Lim, Asian Tigers Singapore
• Lucrecia Sikora, SIRVA
   

The Rising Star Award:

• Francesco Argiro, Bliss Moving & Logistics Srl

The Excellence in Leadership Award:

• Simon Hood, John Mason International Limited

Your New IAM Executive Committee Members

These are the Executive Committee members elected at the Annual Meeting. The Executive Committee has general supervision of the business of IAM and represents the interests of the entire IAM Membership on all IAM matters.

CHAIR

*Michael Richardson, Senate Forwarding Inc.

VICE CHAIR

*John Burrows, Dewitt Move Worldwide

MEMBER-AT-LARGE

*Stephan Geurts Jr., Government Logistics NV

*Adam Hall, Coleman Worldwide Moving

*Jacob Pieroni, Central Van Lines, Inc

*Susan Staszewski, National Van Lines Inc.

CORE & SUPPLIER MEMBER REPRESENTATIVE

*Boris Populoh, Unirisc, Inc.

CORE & SUPPLIER MEMBER REPRESENTATIVE-AT-LARGE

*Catherina Stier, Harsch, The Art of Moving Forward

NON-US CORE MEMBER REPRESENTATIVES

Ido Barner, AGS Worldwide

*Ben Scheiner, Global Relocations Ltd.

IAM YOUNG PROFESSIONALS (IAM-YP) CHAIR
*Sheena Kiser, SEACORP

The Chair of the U.S. Domestic Asset-Based (DAB) Mover Group also sits on the IAM Executive Committee. The current Chair, Chris Lantz of Bekins Moving Solutions, has one additional year left in his term and was not up for election this year.

*Incumbents

IAM Country Guides

IAM’s Country Guides provide customs information for more than 170 countries and territories around the world.

IAM Membership Updates

• New Members This Month
• Prospective Members for Next Month
• Alleged Debtor List
• Voluntary Cancellations List 
• Members canceled for not paying their dues
• Companies known to be misusing the IAM logo

Member News

ISS Relocations: Personal effects collected and donated to the needy

From ISS Relocations:

"During the relocation process, our customers may not need certain items to be included in their move to the new location due to various reasons like limited allowance of volume/weight, or the residence at the new location is smaller or due to restrictions in carrying certain stuff into the new place.  Our CSR team identified an opportunity of collecting such items under CSR initiative and hand out to the needy after necessary packing and labelling of those items at our warehouse.

“An MOU is signed with well-known Dar Al Ber Society in the UAE for donating clothes, food stuff with valid shelf life, books, toys, shoes, blankets, and other household items which we collect from our customers when they move out from the city. The above items in good condition would be carefully sorted and brought to ISS warehouse and neatly folded, packed and labelled. The same would be handed over to Dar Al Ber Society who distributes them to the needy within the country and abroad.”