The real Sysco

Theweez

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I was recently with Sysco for a short stint, this was my 4th job in 9 years driving and was by far the worst. Some of you may love this company sing its praises and that is fine, but my experience was way different.

In orientation, its all about safety which is typical for a large corporation and that is great, but once you get out there its a different animal. For a newbie like me, its Sysco's policy to give a new driver training routes for 4 months which consisted of 4 to 6 stops and 400 cases give or take. Well, 3 days into my career my route consisted of 200+ miles, 15 stops and 982 cases which I was able to finish in 16 hours even. After I finished that gave them false expectations on my abilities to preform this 5 days in a row. So every day I worked (which sometimes was just one day a week) I had no less then a 14 hour route according to the route draft. Keep in mind these are routes I had no clue on. There was a driver there that had been there 10+ yrs and was sleeping with one of the dispatchers and never had more then an 8 hour day, while other veteran drivers they did the same thing to them as they did to me.

My average pay was okay but it is NOT worth the physical abuse your body takes. They also made us sign a form banning cell phone use while driving and then promptly called drivers they wanted to get rid of numerous times until they picked up. When they picked up it was all on video and they were canned. If you call off and leave the house they may follow you videotaping you to make sure you only go to the doctors, there was a driver that got fired for shoveling his driveway after calling off.

This company is a corrupt nightmare. Go to an LTL company and save yourself and your back.
 
Dang Weez,

Sounds like what happened to me my first week, mind you I had alot of grocery experience before coming here, got a 1000 case key drop route and had to have help to finish it, my boss was pissed and it didn't happen again till I was ready.

Did you work out of a shuttle yard or warehouse? Union or non?

Once I learned the system and the product its a piece of cake, I had 1300 friday and couldn't finish it, I only had 14 hrs to work and the route was a 16.5 hr route, I usually finish ahead but I had a bunch of stuff I didn't know and there was a learning curve, also all the parking lots were iced over so that slowed me down too, had to finish up on sat morning, no big deal, I wound up a half hour behind after it was all said and done.

Sounds like your supervisor didn't have your back, safety is big here if my boss catches us jumping out of the trailer or not using 3 points we catch hell real quick, he is all about safety, we can't use the phone in the truck either, had to sign a paper as well, they don't call us and try to catch us though,

Sounds like you worked for a terrible opco, I hate that it didn't work out for you, I bet you would like it here, if you lived here, the loading is good and I have a really good boss that looks out for all of us, even the mgmt in Norman at the warehouse is pretty good to us.

As for my deal fri, my boss called and chewed the router out over my deal, the router called me and appologized, all of us were loaded down, we are still playing catch up from the storms we had here, I understood it, it was irritating but he had no choice, we have 2 drivers on vacation, not much they could do.

All in all I like it here, we have our problems but I make good money and I enjoy the work, that makes a big difference for me, if the money wasn't there I don't think I would do it either.

GT
 
I was recently with Sysco for a short stint, this was my 4th job in 9 years driving and was by far the worst. Some of you may love this company sing its praises and that is fine, but my experience was way different.

In orientation, its all about safety which is typical for a large corporation and that is great, but once you get out there its a different animal. For a newbie like me, its Sysco's policy to give a new driver training routes for 4 months which consisted of 4 to 6 stops and 400 cases give or take. Well, 3 days into my career my route consisted of 200+ miles, 15 stops and 982 cases which I was able to finish in 16 hours even. After I finished that gave them false expectations on my abilities to preform this 5 days in a row. So every day I worked (which sometimes was just one day a week) I had no less then a 14 hour route according to the route draft. Keep in mind these are routes I had no clue on. There was a driver there that had been there 10+ yrs and was sleeping with one of the dispatchers and never had more then an 8 hour day, while other veteran drivers they did the same thing to them as they did to me.

My average pay was okay but it is NOT worth the physical abuse your body takes. They also made us sign a form banning cell phone use while driving and then promptly called drivers they wanted to get rid of numerous times until they picked up. When they picked up it was all on video and they were canned. If you call off and leave the house they may follow you videotaping you to make sure you only go to the doctors, there was a driver that got fired for shoveling his driveway after calling off.

This company is a corrupt nightmare. Go to an LTL company and save yourself and your back.

Sounds like you got the old bait and switch. whose who?? Not you....

 
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It is dissapointing because I left an old job because of a paycut. The ops thought we were jump a bunch of nonstop robots. There was maybe 2 or 3 guys that were content the rest just hated it. 90% of the guys got 13+ hr routes daily while the favs got 10 or less hr routes. They were probably 10 or 12 drivers short out of the 110 we had. I told the ops mgr no more then 3000 cases weekly starting off, the first full week I did 3900, the second week 4600 or so. It was union which was okay I guess but they did not do much for us the location was cleveland, great benefits, horrible job.
 
I do 4500- 5500 a week but i'm on key drop, start at midnight 4 days a week, on key drop its easier because I don't have to deal with anyone the first half of the route.
 
It is dissapointing because I left an old job because of a paycut. The ops thought we were jump a bunch of nonstop robots. There was maybe 2 or 3 guys that were content the rest just hated it. 90% of the guys got 13+ hr routes daily while the favs got 10 or less hr routes. They were probably 10 or 12 drivers short out of the 110 we had. I told the ops mgr no more then 3000 cases weekly starting off, the first full week I did 3900, the second week 4600 or so. It was union which was okay I guess but they did not do much for us the location was cleveland, great benefits, horrible job.

SYSCO Cleveland? I have YET to hear anything nice about that one. Every Cleveland driver I have talked to(they do chain accounts in the Pittsburgh area) have never said anything nice yet. Now, every SYSCO Pittsburgh driver I have talked is the complete oppisite. All happy drivers.
 
Cleveland has issues, they can't route to save their souls. I knew we would suffer when we switched to Cleveland, however the other half of the drivers that got stuck with Cincinnati have it worse. Also I have been hearing rumors of the Pittsburgh Yard shutting down.....better keep track of it, that is the same thing that happened to the Central Ohio warehouse and Cleveland's warehouse is still only operating at less than 60% even with the addition of Central Ohio's business. We thought there was no way they would shut down Central and leave a city with over 1 million people without a warehouse to do will calls or get express deliveries.....guess we were dead wrong!
 
Cleveland has issues, they can't route to save their souls. I knew we would suffer when we switched to Cleveland, however the other half of the drivers that got stuck with Cincinnati have it worse. Also I have been hearing rumors of the Pittsburgh Yard shutting down.....better keep track of it, that is the same thing that happened to the Central Ohio warehouse and Cleveland's warehouse is still only operating at less than 60% even with the addition of Central Ohio's business. We thought there was no way they would shut down Central and leave a city with over 1 million people without a warehouse to do will calls or get express deliveries.....guess we were dead wrong!

Sysco Pittsburgh just had a help wanted ad on career builder, looking for drivers.
Plus, they expaned the warehouse several years ago. Now, I do know they lost a HUGE account around here thanks to bad routing though.
 
Warehouse expansion and want ads mean nothing, Central had just and when I say just...I mean within a week or so....completed installation of a Million $ plus generator and hired 3 new drivers. We thought things were looking up until they went downhill in a hurry, no warning, just arrived to find Presidents from Cleveland, Cincinnati and Detroit, telling us not to worry.........
 
I know gordon foodservice has taken alot of business from sysco. Atleast thats what ive been hearing

Hey!! I thought you were on my side Money!! J/K man, it happens, we all bounce back, get new accounts, lose some take some away, I see it all the time.

So have you decided what your going to do regarding shuttle vs. delivery? What ever it is I hope it makes you happy, your a good guy, I know you have yourself and your families best interest in mind.
 
I always want to make sure everyone is able to ake a paycheck. But were growing fast. I know your kidding GT lol

As for switching for now I wont be I'm staying on Shuttle. They decided not to put another truck up here right now. Thats fine I love what I do but it would be easier with day care and all if I was on days because my grandma said she would watch him for a couple hours if are scheduals crossover. We will just have to wait and see what happens. I do miss routes tho and interacting with people during the day.
 
I would stick with the transit runs, you will make the same amount of money every week regardless of the weight and $ amount of the route trucks. Always good to know how much you are making from week to week. Plus an added benefit is you can get to your million safe miles quicker and get your $1500 gift card.
 
Yeah i know. I think here at gordon at 150,000 or 250,000 we get a nice custom jacket with a gfs truck and a set of doubles on the back. I cant remember what we get passed that. At are yard are drivers put on as many or more miles then i do because they drive so far to get to minneapolis and we got one truck that goes to duluth. Im still thinking. It will depend on what routes i would get.
 
Yeah, I know a little about the GFS Safety bonuses, maybe a little about the Gold CLub Man of the Year trips also....
 
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