One more question

[MikeJ]

Hi everyone,

As you all know I am a greenhorn working on earning my class A commercial drivers license in the state of Ohio. Like them or dislike them I am enrolled in truck driving school for me and my situation I felt truck driving school was the best option for me and the best way to get started.

I got into this because one day I was delivering a couple cases of liquor to Red Lobster and when I got to Red Lobster Meadowbrook Meat Co, was there making a delivery. I saw the delivery driver had all the roller ramps set up and he was sliding product down the ramp, out the side doors of the trailer. I had worked in the restaurant industry before for 4.5 years so I knew all about food getting delivered to restaurants and it was something that always interested me. So I researched it and found out the pay was very good and it did not have nearly as much drama and politics as all the OTR companies have.

Any how the Estes Terminal in my city is hiring dock workers and the Sysco Terminal in Cleveland, Ohio also has a warehouse position. I know that Estes if I applied there to work on the dock and put my time in on the dock would train me to be a driver especially if I told them I am working on the weekends to earn my class A CDL.

My other question is does Sysco operate the same way? I have a feeling Estes might be a tad easier to get into then Sysco for what ever reason. However that is my question if I applied to work in the warehouse at Sysco building pallets and loading them onto trailers, would I have the same potential to be a driver at Sysco after sometime?

 

[Lazlo]

You can switch departments if there are openings, at least you can here. One thing to find out: If they're union there may be contract language that requires you to be in one position for 6 months before moving. That's how it was when I worked at a different place anyways.

Driving would be better than warehouse work. You'll be looking at overnight work, probably in the freezer to start with.

 

[MikeJ]

You can switch departments if there are openings, at least you can here. One thing to find out: If they're union there may be contract language that requires you to be in one position for 6 months before moving. That's how it was when I worked at a different place anyways.

Driving would be better than warehouse work. You'll be looking at overnight work, probably in the freezer to start with.

Sysco Cleveland is a Union, I used to work as a restaurant manager and Sysco was our main supplier, so I have been up close and personal with them, all the guys who worked at Sysco Cleveland were cool and helpful. I'll just hold out for driver position somewhere which is fine.

I see Coca Cola and Pepsi out all the time, same with all the Beer Distributors, when I worked in the restaurant I delt with mostly Sysco guys I never really had to deal to much with the beverage guys not that they did not come through, but I was a worker bee and the place I worked at would order fairly heavy sometimes so when Sysco came in I would be the person check it in and put it all away.

I guess that is my next question, I though about Coca Cola, Pepsi and the Beer Distributors. I see the Beer guys out everywhere, and I mean everywhere. I see 3-4 Beer trucks to every 1 Sysco truck. Today when I was out delivering, I work for a small delivery service running hard liquor for the state liquor store, actually had kind of a busy day today for liquor standards liquor is nothing like beer, pop or food. It's like pre-school compared to beer, pop and food. Liquor is counted in bottles not cases if you guys wanted to know.

However I will say this, their isn't anything cheap about liquor and you have to be careful and treat everything with the utmost of care, because the last thing you want to do is break a $500 dollar case of Crown Royal. I had a bar this morning 2 full cases of Fireball Cinnamon Whiskey $600.00 for those 2 cases of Fireball. Like if I go up stairs and one of my stops has a fairly steep stair case I have to take one box at a time up the stairs, now I can drag 2-3 boxes on a dolly up the stairs, but because the bottles are all glass and liquor is not sold in case lots, but by the individual bottle the boxes are not always even at the top and that's when it gets dangerous because you cannot stack the cases evenly and some boxes are packed better then others. With Liquor if you break a bottle you have to fill out paper work and put all the broken pieces of the bottle in a brown bag so the liquor store can send the bottle to the state to prove it was broken. The state of Ohio liquor warehouse controls all liquor inventory in the state and every bottle has to be accounted for.

It's not like 12 packs of Coke, I handle some of that because the private clubs are lazy and like to over pay for pop and write one check instead of bothering to pick up the phone and call the Coca Cola Terminal.