Hi guys,
Today at truck driving school we had a recruiter come in from a certain flatbed/covered wagon company from Ashland, Ohio. The company is a regional carrier and has red and silver Volvo Trucks and red and silver Mac covered wagon trailers. They operate about 128 trucks so they are a smaller fleet.
You guys in the steel belt near me here in Cleveland and Pittsburgh probably know what company I am talking about.
As far as this certain company which I will not name goes, I like what they do and think they have a beautiful fleet of trucks and trailers, but as we already talked about that doesn't always pay the bills, and also there are some things they do that I really really do not like and will be staying away. The minute they said "We do not use Qualcom's and will not go to elogs." Something about that does not sit right with me and would make me very worried about working there. So I crossed them of my list and will not be going there.
Personally I like the idea of electronic logs, like having the insurance not being able to screw up a log book. I think electronic logs are more accepted now then they have been and I think a lot of people are very much okay with them, at least that is the vibe I have been getting.
I know in food service they use Xata as the logging system and actually probably a lot of food service guys don't need to use logs. Especially if your 100 miles within the warehouse or drop yard and end up going back there at the end of the day.
I mean really my top choices if I had to pick a for hire motor carrier would probably Crete Carrier of Lincoln, NE, Melton Truck Line of Tulsa, OK or Werner Enterprises of Omaha, NE.
However I've said it once and I'll say it again Food Service Like Sysco, GFS, MBM those are my top picks for food and ultimately I would like to work at Sysco, GFS or MBM of Rockymount, North Carolina. Northern Hasserot Brandt here in Cleveland would also be a good pick too, but that's my top 4 Sysco, GFS , NHB or MBM.
I was at the dentist the other day and I was talking to the receptionist and she said her husband is a truck driver, he's driven all kinds of things over the years and drives a dump truck right now. She said "Man it would have been great if my husband could have gotten in at Sysco Cleveland a few years ago."
Sysco is actually pretty sought after and these food service companies I have noticed the employee overturn is really a lot less it has to be far far far below industry average when compared to a for hire company even small for hire companies have high over turn. Like Sysco Cleveland I look from time to time to see what they have and sometimes they don't even have any openings at all for drivers. Gordon Food Service here in Cleveland is the same way they haven't had an opening for a driver in the longest time.
It's like Moneyman said the private fleets usually have less overturn in employees and are better to work for all the way around. My dad always said LTL line haul or a private fleet. Those were his picks for trucking he said LTL line haul is usually not to bad same route same terminals it might change from time to time, but terminal to terminal pulling doubles it's nice work if you can get it.
What else did we talk about in school today, oh they went over job placement and other formalities. It turns out my school does not push people toward or near CR England, PAM or USA Truck which is a very good thing in my opinion. CR England does have some business cards at my school and shows up at the job fair they have once a year, but they do not send recruiters to the school and I can tell our school does not want people to go to CR England.
Actually the school I go to I think knows CR England is not the answer and they kind of said nicely "You can apply at CR England, and they will take you, but eventually you'll want to work someplace else." The school I go to has a strained relationship with CR England and I think the head honchos at the school are not big on CR England and know full well about CR England's wonderful reputation and they don't want us going with CR England, USA Truck or PAM. I think they would much rather see us at Werner, Schneider, Crete, US Express or some of the Ohio based companies like Falcon of Youngstown, Ohio or Garner of Findlay, Ohio also Wooster Motor Ways of Wooster, Ohio.
Actually if I wanted to just to OTR dry van Garner would be on my list and would make the most sense Findlay is not all that far from Cleveland and Garner runs up in Cleveland a lot I see them all the time. Same with MCS of Toledo, Ohio I see MCS on I-90 in Cleveland every day. Really it's like this Crete/Shaffer recruits out of my school and Crete doesn't recruit out of everywhere Crete/Shaffer is far superior to CR England if you want to do refer call Crete and get on the Shaffer Division which both Crete/Shaffer sound good Grocery Thrower told me to check them out and I would say they are at the top of my list for sure after talking to them.
If you want to make a career out of OTR refer and run out west then I would say Decker Truck Line of Fort Dodge, Iowa I called them up to see about working there the man said they don't hire from my school but he was very nice and we left the door open actually I have heard a lot of good things about Decker and when I decided I finally wanted to pull the trigger and get into this, it's something I have always wanted to do never could shake it and never wanted to shake it, but when I first started a year ago I wanted to work at Decker of Fort Dodge, Iowa over time my tastes changed a little bit from OTR to food service, but Decker was always my first choice and high on my list of OTR companies.
The school I go to said stay away from any kind of lease purchase nobody fresh out of truck driving school is qualified to be an owner operator. That's what I have said from day 1. I never ever ever have had any desire to be an owner operator and since a food service companies primary business is selling food and researching consumer dining trends and working on building business for the restaurant and hospitality industry lease purchase at least from what I can see is not what they are about.
School also talked about oil field the school I go to teaches oil field safety and where I live in Ohio and Western Pennsylvania energy companies are fracking like crazy and there is an abundance of oil field work. I think oil field and energy is good, but I don't know I am a food service guy at heart what can I say it's hard to give up the two wheeler ha-ha!
and I used to work in a restaurant did it for almost half a decade so you know how that goes.
School also pointed us in the direction of railroads. They said CSX Transportation has called the school and has been asking them to send over graduates probably to work in the maintenance of way department. Well I already applied to work at Norfolk Southern once, I applied to be a freight train conductor, but that's kind of a hard job to get and any kind of train and engine service job at a class 1 railroad the training is very intensive and they are pretty selective on who they take for train and engine service jobs. In a lot of ways being a train engineer or conductor is very similar to OTR truck driving, you are gone a lot from home, have to work the extra board for a long time can get called into work any time, should expect to work nights, evenings, weekends and holidays.
However railroad jobs have some very big perks the money is usually very good and railroad workers on the big railroads do not pay into social security they have there own retirement called the railroad retirement board.
What else did they say, oh they talked about being careful, one of the graduates was lucky enough to get on with Sherwood Food Distributors who has a main warehouse in Maple Heights,Ohio. He got him self a job at Sherwood Foods and then quit his job at Sherwood to go work at Central Transport **** Any how this guy got hired on at Sherwood and he wasn't making a ton of money at Sherwood, but at the same time I mean your the new guy and a trucking school grad with no experience who was lucky enough to get into broad-line food service right off the rip, just stick it out for a year and move up the ladder at Sherwood that's what I would have done, but no this person decided Central Transport was the answer and Central said oh yeah go and quit Sherwood and come to us. So this person quit Sherwood went to Central and Central said to him, wait you don't have 6 months experience sorry we can't hire you. So now this person just quit there nice local job at Sherwood and pretty much got screwed by Central Transport. That's the thing I mean if you get hired at like Sysco you don't quit Sysco or GFS to work at Central Transport to me that's like taking a major step back. I mean you might quit Sysco or GFS and go to ABF or another private fleet, but generally Sysco and GFS are coveted jobs,but most truck driving school students don't really think about places like Sysco or GFS most are sent to OTR companies which makes sense and I very well may end up being one of them, but it doesn't always work out that way it's really all about timing and how things are going.
Any how thanks for your time
Mike
Today at truck driving school we had a recruiter come in from a certain flatbed/covered wagon company from Ashland, Ohio. The company is a regional carrier and has red and silver Volvo Trucks and red and silver Mac covered wagon trailers. They operate about 128 trucks so they are a smaller fleet.
You guys in the steel belt near me here in Cleveland and Pittsburgh probably know what company I am talking about.
As far as this certain company which I will not name goes, I like what they do and think they have a beautiful fleet of trucks and trailers, but as we already talked about that doesn't always pay the bills, and also there are some things they do that I really really do not like and will be staying away. The minute they said "We do not use Qualcom's and will not go to elogs." Something about that does not sit right with me and would make me very worried about working there. So I crossed them of my list and will not be going there.
Personally I like the idea of electronic logs, like having the insurance not being able to screw up a log book. I think electronic logs are more accepted now then they have been and I think a lot of people are very much okay with them, at least that is the vibe I have been getting.
I know in food service they use Xata as the logging system and actually probably a lot of food service guys don't need to use logs. Especially if your 100 miles within the warehouse or drop yard and end up going back there at the end of the day.
I mean really my top choices if I had to pick a for hire motor carrier would probably Crete Carrier of Lincoln, NE, Melton Truck Line of Tulsa, OK or Werner Enterprises of Omaha, NE.
However I've said it once and I'll say it again Food Service Like Sysco, GFS, MBM those are my top picks for food and ultimately I would like to work at Sysco, GFS or MBM of Rockymount, North Carolina. Northern Hasserot Brandt here in Cleveland would also be a good pick too, but that's my top 4 Sysco, GFS , NHB or MBM.
I was at the dentist the other day and I was talking to the receptionist and she said her husband is a truck driver, he's driven all kinds of things over the years and drives a dump truck right now. She said "Man it would have been great if my husband could have gotten in at Sysco Cleveland a few years ago."
Sysco is actually pretty sought after and these food service companies I have noticed the employee overturn is really a lot less it has to be far far far below industry average when compared to a for hire company even small for hire companies have high over turn. Like Sysco Cleveland I look from time to time to see what they have and sometimes they don't even have any openings at all for drivers. Gordon Food Service here in Cleveland is the same way they haven't had an opening for a driver in the longest time.
It's like Moneyman said the private fleets usually have less overturn in employees and are better to work for all the way around. My dad always said LTL line haul or a private fleet. Those were his picks for trucking he said LTL line haul is usually not to bad same route same terminals it might change from time to time, but terminal to terminal pulling doubles it's nice work if you can get it.
What else did we talk about in school today, oh they went over job placement and other formalities. It turns out my school does not push people toward or near CR England, PAM or USA Truck which is a very good thing in my opinion. CR England does have some business cards at my school and shows up at the job fair they have once a year, but they do not send recruiters to the school and I can tell our school does not want people to go to CR England.
Actually the school I go to I think knows CR England is not the answer and they kind of said nicely "You can apply at CR England, and they will take you, but eventually you'll want to work someplace else." The school I go to has a strained relationship with CR England and I think the head honchos at the school are not big on CR England and know full well about CR England's wonderful reputation and they don't want us going with CR England, USA Truck or PAM. I think they would much rather see us at Werner, Schneider, Crete, US Express or some of the Ohio based companies like Falcon of Youngstown, Ohio or Garner of Findlay, Ohio also Wooster Motor Ways of Wooster, Ohio.
Actually if I wanted to just to OTR dry van Garner would be on my list and would make the most sense Findlay is not all that far from Cleveland and Garner runs up in Cleveland a lot I see them all the time. Same with MCS of Toledo, Ohio I see MCS on I-90 in Cleveland every day. Really it's like this Crete/Shaffer recruits out of my school and Crete doesn't recruit out of everywhere Crete/Shaffer is far superior to CR England if you want to do refer call Crete and get on the Shaffer Division which both Crete/Shaffer sound good Grocery Thrower told me to check them out and I would say they are at the top of my list for sure after talking to them.
If you want to make a career out of OTR refer and run out west then I would say Decker Truck Line of Fort Dodge, Iowa I called them up to see about working there the man said they don't hire from my school but he was very nice and we left the door open actually I have heard a lot of good things about Decker and when I decided I finally wanted to pull the trigger and get into this, it's something I have always wanted to do never could shake it and never wanted to shake it, but when I first started a year ago I wanted to work at Decker of Fort Dodge, Iowa over time my tastes changed a little bit from OTR to food service, but Decker was always my first choice and high on my list of OTR companies.
The school I go to said stay away from any kind of lease purchase nobody fresh out of truck driving school is qualified to be an owner operator. That's what I have said from day 1. I never ever ever have had any desire to be an owner operator and since a food service companies primary business is selling food and researching consumer dining trends and working on building business for the restaurant and hospitality industry lease purchase at least from what I can see is not what they are about.
School also talked about oil field the school I go to teaches oil field safety and where I live in Ohio and Western Pennsylvania energy companies are fracking like crazy and there is an abundance of oil field work. I think oil field and energy is good, but I don't know I am a food service guy at heart what can I say it's hard to give up the two wheeler ha-ha!
and I used to work in a restaurant did it for almost half a decade so you know how that goes. School also pointed us in the direction of railroads. They said CSX Transportation has called the school and has been asking them to send over graduates probably to work in the maintenance of way department. Well I already applied to work at Norfolk Southern once, I applied to be a freight train conductor, but that's kind of a hard job to get and any kind of train and engine service job at a class 1 railroad the training is very intensive and they are pretty selective on who they take for train and engine service jobs. In a lot of ways being a train engineer or conductor is very similar to OTR truck driving, you are gone a lot from home, have to work the extra board for a long time can get called into work any time, should expect to work nights, evenings, weekends and holidays.
However railroad jobs have some very big perks the money is usually very good and railroad workers on the big railroads do not pay into social security they have there own retirement called the railroad retirement board.
What else did they say, oh they talked about being careful, one of the graduates was lucky enough to get on with Sherwood Food Distributors who has a main warehouse in Maple Heights,Ohio. He got him self a job at Sherwood Foods and then quit his job at Sherwood to go work at Central Transport **** Any how this guy got hired on at Sherwood and he wasn't making a ton of money at Sherwood, but at the same time I mean your the new guy and a trucking school grad with no experience who was lucky enough to get into broad-line food service right off the rip, just stick it out for a year and move up the ladder at Sherwood that's what I would have done, but no this person decided Central Transport was the answer and Central said oh yeah go and quit Sherwood and come to us. So this person quit Sherwood went to Central and Central said to him, wait you don't have 6 months experience sorry we can't hire you. So now this person just quit there nice local job at Sherwood and pretty much got screwed by Central Transport. That's the thing I mean if you get hired at like Sysco you don't quit Sysco or GFS to work at Central Transport to me that's like taking a major step back. I mean you might quit Sysco or GFS and go to ABF or another private fleet, but generally Sysco and GFS are coveted jobs,but most truck driving school students don't really think about places like Sysco or GFS most are sent to OTR companies which makes sense and I very well may end up being one of them, but it doesn't always work out that way it's really all about timing and how things are going.
Any how thanks for your time
Mike
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