The truth is this company has had the success they've had over the past 50 years because the Roberts clan has three ways of doing things: the right way, the wrong way, and the R&L way. It's not always pretty, but it seems to work out.
Being privately held I suppose that’s their right. They don’t answer to shareholders and only to themselves. I guess that’s all that you guys need to know and accept. Like you said, it seems to work out. The pay is good and you know what you bargained for. So you can’t ask for much more.
They leave me alone and I leave them alone . Smiley face here if I knew how to insert them!
Well you pretty much covered the basics on Sanger. Company definitely didn't have a plan. I think the elephant in the room is the fact the company never realized how much trouble it would be to staff this facility with experienced drivers. Most who transferred live north of Dallas or in North Fort Worth. Not all but most. They will continue to send 10 to 15 drivers from Dallas to Sanger every day until they get it staffed. I understand some VP of operations was up there last week along with mr ron. Those 2 men want to blame DISPATCH but when they are 20 drivers short service failures are a given. They need 45 but only have 25? Actually to cover the routes they probably need 60 plus. It's another one of those not enough deliveries and too many pickups conundrums. R+L always runs lean on staffing in DFW. I'm sure R+L will give it a couple months to see if the Sanger team can handle the load. They can easily swing routes back to Dallas but then they wouldn't have the freight base to justify operating that new terminal thus the dilemma. Operate a terminal that serves no purpose or staff it properly to get the job done with a minimum of service failures. Let's see what happens.
The LTL industry has the best paying driver jobs. That's a given. Problem is R+L is at the bottom of the grid industry wide. Nice equipment. Not all but in general. Decent health insurance. No overtime. No retirement. It's weird this company is unable to acquire and retain good employees at least here in DFW.
Well apparently the rumors from last Friday are true. The company has scaled back the routes closer to Dallas because of multiple week long service failures. Lost a multi million dollar account in Valspar. Didn't handle their pickup or swap multiple times. I guess that was the final wakeup call to R+L. It's more of a manpower shortage because the terminal is only half staffed. Left freight on multiple docks for a week. They want 43 p&d drivers but only have around 20. Sending drivers daily to help from Dallas. The people I feel bad for are those who have been promised transfers back to Dallas when the an opening develops. R+L is in a tough spot. Never imagined they couldn't find drivers to staff that new terminal. Hope it gets up to speed in the next couple of months but it could take longer. My router made a comment that Sanger needs these pickup routes to justify line haul runs. Gonna take time and revisit after they get Sanger fully staffed .I won’t spend too much time here but I’d like to comment on this Sanger terminal. Being a former dispatcher in the 80’s and being a life long resident of the D-FW area you could say I know a thing or two. I see how they are dividing the areas ... basically sending everything North of 635 to Sanger. That’s the stupidest thing they could ever do. I guess they need to justify the existence of that terminal that sits right next to the Walmart D.C. They could maybe drop down to Lewisville off 35E. They are dividing it all wrong. It’s so stupid to put Carrollton... Farmers Branch... Coppell... and even Garland on Sanger. Now they could run across 377 in Denton into McKinney, Plano and maybe Allen and Richardson. Traffic is horrible heading North and South in rush hour. They need to focus on 35W and Ft.Worth and points west more. No wonder it’s such a clusterin Dallas right now. Shuttling swaps back and forth during rush hour is beyond ridiculous. They should have thought this through long before now. I’m done for now. I will revisit if my “BOY” comments
They should have put that terminal in Ft. Worth because the pool of drivers is 10 fold of what they have in Sanger. Denton would have the biggest pool but that’s not near enough. No one will want to make that drive. Traffic is horrid going up north from D-FW and that’s the biggest problem about staffing Sanger. They will never admit it was a mistake because that would mean incompetence in upper level management. Right or wrong the Roberts family will stand by their managements decision to put that million dollar terminal in Sanger because ultimately they have no other choice. They haven’t invested millions only to admit a mistake and walk away. Not happening Mr. Nobody, they will just have to make the best of a bad situation and prepare themselves for massive turnover for the foreseeable future. No recruiter can save them this time around.
To answer your question, it takes about 2 years for everybody to forget who's bad idea it was.
right now things are in such chaos almost everyone is doing p&d. one thing about R+L p&d especially up there it's mostly peddle run lift gate deliveries. Pickup freight is at a minimum. staffing is a major issue. dock workers here are the worst paid in the industry especially when it comes to topping out. Linehaul pays about 48 cents a mile where all the other big boys are somewhere around 65 per. You know how people are....once they settle in they prefer not to change jobs....I mean once you settle in.
turnover is definitely an issue in Dallas. Guys starting off in LTL for the 1st time especially in Sanger with weed themselves out....P&D isn't for everyone. It's just not.
Amen to that! P&D is not for everybody
It just depends on what you’re use to. A linehaul driver will say that the only way to go is linehaul while a city man will say the city is best. More city guys jump to linehaul because of the money and never look back and they grow accustomed to it. Driving at night on black ice was never my thing and I prefer to sleep in my own bed at night and money was never an issue for me. Not as many jump from linehaul to city through my experiences over the years but there are always exceptions. Linehaul drivers are a breed apart and honestly many are just strange and lack many social skills including myself back in the day. Not all but a very high percentage. City guys must have some social skills because they deal with customers all day. Linehaul pays more for a reason! Perhaps it’s not as physically demanding but mentally it can do a number on you. Too much windshield time and far to much time for the mind to drift. Linehaul drivers just loves to stir the rumor mill. It’s just there thing. LTL definitely isn’t for everyone. Some just want that no touch OTR crap. No thank you. I retired an LTL man and built a wonderful life. Finished my last 20 years in the city. Retired at 63 because I didn’t want to push my luck. This job can take it’s toll on your body and yes even linehaul. Pushing and pulling those gears around can slip a disc or lose or break some fingers. Good and bad to both city and linehaul. Thank God I came out of it with my health intact.
At other outfits, maybe.
The city guys make more here if they got a long run with some stem time. I run 2 1/2 hours away.
That's kind of my point, we hire road drivers from mega carriers and stick them in P&D which is tough enough as it is and then add our mix of freight and long stem times like yours and it will separate the men from the boys
