Overdrive's 2023 Trucker of the Year contenders

Another edition here drops in Overdrive Radio's re-air of the Over the Road podcast series, coproduced by Overdrive and PRX's Radiotopia podcast network and hosted by 'Long Haul Paul' Marhoefer. Here, the host's "Long Haul of Fame” tells the stories of five of Marhoefer’s personal heroes -- longtime professional driver Idella Marie Hansen; owner-operator Big Jim Selkirk; trucker Ken “Shoestring” Waugh; overnight radio D.J. Marcia Campbell; and, finally, a tribute to one of those heroes who’s passed on, New York-based Fast Freddie Lieb, the “Pope of Pompano” running out of the Florida Pompano Beach market and up and down the East Coast, where Marhoefer knew him best. 

What emerges over the course of the episode is an indelible take on recent trucking history through these individual stories, including that of Marhoefer himself. 

Also in the podcast: Highlights from the week's news, which you can keep tabs on daily via Overdrive's daily newsletter. Subscribe via http://overdriveonline.com 

Find all editions of Over the Road via this playlist collecting our re-airs: https://soundcloud.com/overdriveradio/sets/the-over-the-road-podcast-on 

Hear more from the Radiotopia network via http://radiotopia.fm

Indelible trucking portrait -- Long Haul Paul's 'Long Haul of Fame' through highs, lows of history

Today’s special edition of the podcast is a re-air of ATBS President Todd Amen’s semi-annual conference call with clients of the business services firm and other owner-operators that offers the opportunity for listeners to benchmark their own income performance against the averages of their peers that ATBS computes. Near the call’s beginning, though, Amen detailed the pressures that the Biden administration and Congress have renewed against the independent contractor model writ large. Fleets of all sizes are worrying more about it, as he shows, and some owner-operators are, too.

At once, the majority of ATBS’ owner-op clientele aren’t aware even of California’s A.B. 5 law, for instance, in place now for a year and a half and currently not applying to trucking, though that could change depending on pending court cases. The so-called ‘ABC test’ in that law in essence prevents an independent contractor relationship between a worker and a business if both parties are essentially in the same line of work, making current and traditional owner-operator lease arrangements with other motor carriers problematic in various ways. 

What’s abundantly clear from other surveys ATBS has conducted, though? When asked if leasing suddenly were not an option any longer, just what would ATBS client leased owner-ops do? 

Not even two in 10 would become company drivers, Amen noted results of his company's surveying. There’s a lot more where that came from in this episode, and a wealth of data on the topsy-turvy 2020 year’s income performance for average owner-operators among dry, reefer, flatbed and independent segments ATBS tracks. 

Read more about Amen's presentation: http://overdriveonline.com/15064950

Subscribe to Overdrive's daily newsletter for updates, news, views and analysis via http://overdriveonline.com

Owner-ops are not company drivers for a reason -- ABC test in practice, more data from ATBS

You probably think you know Wedowee, Alabama-based Brian Lindley. Not afraid to work, grew up on a farm, grew up 'round trucks – all are familiar aspects of many a story in the trucking business. But as with so many of the millions of stories out there, there’s plenty of twists and turns in the details when it comes to the tale Lindley has for you in today's edition of Overdrive Radio.

Having started out hauling chicken litter from poultry operations with this Mack daycab -- which had a trash body to begin with as part of one of Lindley's early-career efforts doing storm recovery and tree work -- Lindley is the owner of the now-20-truck LB3. He's got three owner-operators leased on, and the balance of the power units are operated in full-service lease arrangements with Penske. He's hauling mostly for direct customers.

In just under a decade, he's turned what was a very small operation into what he hopes is a "destination company," of a fashion, for the best in the business. He's doing dandy in that regard so far. During the March event of the Alabama Trucking Association, Lindley operators scored both number 1 and 2 spots in the association's driver of the year awards program. Nathan Heflin of Lineville took home the top spot, and LB3-leased owner-operator Jason Webber the second.

Brian Lindley’s wife, Valerie, was named Safety Professional of the Year for her work as safety director, and Maintenance Director Todd Martin was honored as Maintenance Professional of the Year. It all comes on the heels of near-disaster in early 2020, when the operation had part of its principal reefer contract undercut by a larger carrier just a month ahead of the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In today's podcast, hear how Lindley and company steered through it all, and much more. 

Also in the podcast: Following up with ATBS President Todd Amen's Q&A portion from the owner-operator performance benchmarking session we re-aired last week on the podcast. Amen address his thoughts on where fuel prices are likely to go the rest of the year, the outlook for owner-operator business viability long-term, several tax matters from per diem calculation to dealing with quarterlies and back taxes, and more.

Building a small fleet as destination for the best: Alabama-based Brian Lindley's LB3

DawgNation Daily-- the daily podcast for Georgia Bulldogs fans

Beginning of the show: I discuss my thoughts on Charles Barkley's appearance on the Paul Finebaum show and his words about Kirby Smart and the Georgia Bulldogs.

12-minute mark: I share some bold predictions submitted by viewers of DND.

16-minute mark: Former UGA QB Jake Fromm joins the show.

28-minute mark: I share my bold predictions for upcoming season regarding the Alabama Crimson Tide.

End of Show: Gator Hater Countdown

Episode 1958: Charles Barkley perfectly describes what makes UGA special

In this edition of Overdrive Radio, the clarion voices of the spectacular pair of owner-operators behind Chicago-area-based, two-truck Rita’s Absolute Trucking. That’d be Roger and Rita Wilson, who made a match with marriage in 1998 after separate histories trucking, Rita toting butter up and down the Eastern seaboard, Roger with an OTR history that stretches back to hauling swinging meat in 1970 his first time out over-the-road. 

Through the 1980s, he worked with a friend in LTL consolidation out of the Chicago area, growing to 50 trucks there before venturing out on his own with five. Then Rita brought two of her own to the operation, becoming Rita's Absolute early this century and growing to 15 units. They’ve had big ups and downs managing fleets both, but after a slow period of downsizing over more than decade are now settled squarely into a super-sweet niche moving reefer trailers full of finished chocolate mostly between Chicago and Pennsylvania, for a single customer. 

The pair were our Truckers of the Month for September, and regular Overdrive readers may recall their story recently published at OverdriveOnline.com: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15635072/lifes-a-lot-easier-ownerops-find-sweet-spot-with-two-trucks 

In that story, we heard from a Ryder System rep directly about the Wilsons’ work with their warehousing customer in Blommer Chocolate Company, who've been the Wilson's customer for two decades now. Ryder had nothing but praise for Rita’s Absolute Trucking, for sure. Yet after the story published, we also heard back finally from a rep from Blommer. Janie Moore called Rita and Roger Wilson’s Absolute Trucking the “Absolute best. If I could have more carriers like them it would be a joy!”

Moore has worked with the pair for eight years, she said, and they’ve “helped simplify managing" and now totally dominate "the Illinois to Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania to Illinois lanes. Locally,” too, Rita has been a godsend, she added. “There were times we had more loads to move than they could manage legally in a day. Rita would go out of her way and rent a trailer for preloading purposes. This was not a Blommer request, but instead a decision she made to assist. And for that we are forever grateful.”

In eight years, Moore said, “I can count on one hand the times where they were late or delayed. While we know things happen beyond the carrier’s control, they have been more than proactive and giving us advance notification on mishaps, transportation delays, breakdowns, and etc.”

A worthy pair to honor, no doubt. And, clearly, they’ve found a sweet spot hauling chocolate.

Super-sweet spot hauling chocolate for Roger and Rita Wilson's two-truck operation

Today on the podcast we’re featuring Overdrive News Editor Matt Cole’s talk with October Trucker of the Month John Schiltz, nominated for the Overdrive 2023 Trucker of the Year award by his wife and now fully-minted, CDL-holding business partner, Sarah Schiltz: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15637523/owneroperator-john-schiltz-a-keen-eye-on-maintenance 

The pair run a two-truck fleet as a team and pull alongside each other in a pair of Kenworths (a 1999 W9 and a 2013 T660) running fresh vegetables to canning operations in the Midwest during harvest season, flatbed and RGN platform freight much of the rest of the year. You can probably guess just what they’ve been up to in recent times out of their Wisconsin home base as vegetable harvests wrap up.  

What emerges from this talk with both John and Sarah, though John officially gets the Trucker of the Month nod, is a spotlight on the teamwork it truly takes to excel as an owner-operator business. John’s quick to credit Sarah with a large part of his recent-years’ success, buttoning up the biz to where it is today.

More from the Trucker of the Year program this past year: http://overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year

Find all Overdrive Radio episodes featuring 10 Truckers of the Month for 2023 via this playlist: https://soundcloud.com/overdriveradio/sets/overdrives-2023-trucker-of-the

Owner-operator John Schiltz's top-notch team with business and life partner: Trucker of the Month

This edition of the Overdrive Radio podcast features a roundtable of sorts with four small trucking businesses among 2023 Trucker of the Year contenders. We’re in the process of wrapping up judging of 10 semi-finalists for the final award, with a huge amount of operational diversity among them -- from food-grade and hazmat tanker to car-haul, flatbed and step deck, reefer, hopper, dry van and more. 

Here, owner-operators John and Sarah Schiltz with their independent Veteran Transportation Services business were joined by fellow independents and now-four-truck Tim and Shelley Pulli of Pulli Express, owner-operator Matthew Karr of K-Mac Trucking, and Texas-based car-haul owner-operator Crystal Rives. 

It’s been been a tough year on the customer front for Rives’ car-haul operation, yet as with many an owner-operator, a stick-to-it-iveness, hustle and quick-on-her-feet nimble quality as a business owner yielded new opportunities, even in this market. 

The same can be said for others in the roundtable, including Karr, who when he was featured as our Trucker of the Month in May was playing the waiting game on final registrations, insurance and more to go back out under his own authority after a big profit year leased in 2022.

The conversation amongst the four businesses was centered on the year just passed -- the challenges faced, and just how they chose to overcome (or at least start the process of overcoming) the worst of them throughout 2023. 

Stay tuned next week for the remainder of the 2023 Trucker of the Year contenders. Read about all of them via http://overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year 

Catch a playlist, too, featuring all 10 of the contending operations via https://soundcloud.com/overdriveradio/sets/overdrives-2023-trucker-of-the

Overdrive 2023 Truckers of the Year: The 'exit interviews' toward the finale, Part 1

"Don't be afraid to ask questions." --Owner-operator Steve Massat: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15546000/ownerop-overcomes-physical-challenge-for-successful-career

This Overdrive Radio podcast features Part 2 of our “exit interviews” with 2023 Trucker of the Year contenders. All put a special emphasis on short-term tactics, on proven long-term strategies, others might also adopt on the drive toward success with healthy profits.  

This exemplary group, too, delivered a strong current of advice for aspiring owners.

Owner-operator Chris Smith operates Dreamline Trucking, our February Trucker of the Month with his wife and team owner, Ruth, leased to Southern Pride. Smith, as with Massat, advised not to get too starry-eyed out custom equipment with a big price tag associated starting out. "That's not what's going to make you money," he said, noting decades of hard work led to where he and Ruth Smith are today, pulling in veritable custom showpiece, a move made after considerable research and deliberation: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15307364/how-this-owneroperator-team-earned-success

Massat, who pulls with a vintage 1989 Marmon tractor, does as much work on his rig as he can himself, stocking parts he knows he'll need when he sees deals on them. He reduces both his cash outlay and, given ready availability in his truck and/or at his home shop (he's home every weekend), costly downtime, too. Massat was Trucker of the Month in September. 
 
Rita and Roger Wilson preside over the two-truck Rita’s Absolute Trucking, Truckers of the Month for October: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15635072/lifes-a-lot-easier-ownerops-find-sweet-spot-with-two-trucks

The pair have downsized considerably from early parts of this century when they were consolidating LTL freight from a Chicago-area warehouse with a much more sizable small fleet. Though we caught up with them on Sunday, what Rita called the Wilsons' "no-truck day" in efforts to build in the work-life balance that eludes so many over-the-road, she was also quick to note the necessity of giving it 110% for new owners to get past rough early days. 

South Mississippi-based Jay Hosty kept his eye on the finsh line, with a tip particularly for younger starting owners to set up a retirement investment account and contribute as much as you can to it from the get-go. The Roth IRA, in particular, he finds attractive given it's not taxed when you pull the money out in retirement. " Hosty pulls dry vans leased to Landstar, and pulled in the monthly nod in April: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15383689/frugality-focus-on-costs-pays-off-for-owneroperator-jay-hosty

Finally, with advice to simply “never give up” on the mission for those choosing the owner-operator route in trucking, Walkabout Transport independent Debbie Desiderato, based in Virginia today, was our Trucker of the Month for June: https://www.overdriveonline.com/business/article/15544055/direct-freight-can-provide-consistency-in-topsyturvy-market As with others in this roundtable, she noted owners are best served when they devise ways to make themselves more valuable to whoever happens to be their customer. In her case, that's lately come in the form of trailer purchases to better serve one in particular on some new lanes out of her area. 

The story of how Desiderato came to that direct customer as an independent might be a veritable testament to the "never give up" mantra. Read more of that story in this feature from early in the year: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15541324/independent-debbie-desideratos-keys-to-trucking-success

Those were but a small sample, a few little bites out of the apple of advice from this brain trust, though. Find more in the podcast and via all 10 of the 2023 Trucker of the Year profiles: http://overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year

'Never give up' in drive to trucking success: New owners' pitfalls, best advice for the long term

By the mid-late 1980s, when Jay Hosty was in his mid-20s, he'd been through three trucks -- a 1971 gas-powered International and then two cabovers bought used -- hauling containers for Brown Transport in and around New Orleans. He then made a move his elder container-pulling owner-operators in the Southeast told him was going to be a career killer in the out-and-back niche. 

It was 1987. "I never thought I'd own a new truck that soon," said Hosty, yet it was working out right -- the trade-in value on the old cabover he was pulling with, the cost of the 1987 International 9300 he was about to replace it with... "Associates Finance -- they were famous for doing commercial vehicles, they took me on in the very beginning" for the financing, he said, much to his surprise.

His rate for revenue at the time, as he told: "72 cents a mile, loaded and empty."

He was working with Brown and related companies with a lot of older men. They called him a kid. Owner-operators who've been around a long time may remember Brown for a kind of mascot that was the company's emblem. "They called him 'the Brownie,'" said Hosty. "He looked like a little Robin Hood or something, a little character."

Those seasoned experts amongst the prior generations at Brown got one look at the kid's sharp new 9300 and "started asking me what my payments were," Hosty added -- $1,400 every month, for five years. "They said, 'You are never going to make it pulling these containers for 72 cents a mile. You're going to have to go over-the-road.'" 

What they meant: The young upstart owner-operator Jay Hosty would have to make that truck his life -- "to go out [OTR] and stay out," he said. His young wife wouldn't go for that, he knew, and for as much as he loved the work, he didn't want that sort of life, either. Besides, owner-operator Hosty had done the math, knew his costs back and forth, and was confident he could in fact make it work.

"I can make it, and I will make it," he told himself.

"And I did," he says today, telling the story as part of this week's special edition of Overdrive Radio, and proving wrong the naysayers in process. The tale showcases a quality held by many a successful owner -- willingness to think outside the box, to push the envelope to find just what's possible, for themselves. It's a quality Hosty made good on time and again throughout his 40-plus-year career at the helm of the Jaybyrd Express business he pilots behind the wheel of a Detroit Series 60-powered 2006 Western Star.

That's among many reasons Hosty, we're happy to announce, is Overdrive''s Trucker of the Year and will sit at that pinnacle for the next 12 months.

With a big congrats due to Hosty, we'll also invite you to put your business in the running for the 2024 award, which you can do via the form at this link: https://www.overdriveonline.com/page/toptrucker Owner-operators with up to three trucks are eligible, and if you've controlled costs and maintained revenues amidst inflation and freight-market difficulties in the last years, you’re no doubt a worthy contender.

Also read Matt Cole's April 2023 Trucker of the Month profile of Jay Hosty: https://www.overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year/article/15383689/frugality-focus-on-costs-pays-off-for-owneroperator-jay-hosty

The 2023 Trucker of the Year field was crowded and the gap between most of the contenders extremely small, even tighter between the top three finalists highlighted again earlier this week in Hosty’s Jaybyrd Express, Veterans Transportation Services of John and Sarah Schiltz, and Tim and Shelley Pulli's Pulli Express. Read about them, and the remaining contenders profiles throughout the last year, via the Trucker of the Year section of the website: https://overdriveonline.com/trucker-of-the-year

Other voices featured in the podcast: 
**Hosty's longtime friend from his time on OOIDA's board, current OOIDA VP Lewie Pugh
**Vice President of BCO Retention at Landstar, where Hosty's leased, Gregg Nelson

They said he'd fail, but he proved them wrong: Overdrive's Trucker of the Year Jay Hosty

Thanks to the Tompkins Square record label and the man behind the voice you hear in the song at the top here, Will Beeley. Beeley's new “Highways and Heart Attacks” record is the singer-songwriter and hazmat pressurized tank hauler's third. Today, Beeley lives in New Mexico, with roots in Texas. His story in music reaches back to his youth in the late 1960s, runs through an iconic record label in Jackson, Mississippi and extends on up into the present day, with his new record following 40 years after his last, called “Passing Dream.” Nashville-based music writer Edd Hurt views that 1979 slab as an overlooked classic in the American songbook. On this edition of Overdrive Radio, take a run through parts of Edd Hurt’s and my own interviews with Beeley attendant to a special treat in the day to day of this trucking-business writer back in September. Beeley was in Nashville performing attendant to Americana fest.

'Highways and heart attacks' to trucker Will Beeley's place in the American songbook

In what has been perhaps the toughest week for trucking as an owner-operator in the last decade, this edition of Overdrive Radio offers some diversion via an interview with Haley Fohr of Chicago-based "Jackie Lynn," whose new record proceeds from a conception of the character for whom the band is named as a long-hauler with a particularly spectacular rig -- a mirrored vessel that carries the weight of the world it inhabits. The record, called "Jacqueline," is the group's second, among Fohr's other songwriting/performing projects. Also: Our own "Long Haul Paul" Marhoefer offers two of his pensive, funny, and sometimes moving dispatches from the COVID-19 road, happy for the grocery, food and beverage loads but facing near impossible decisions in other ways ...

A tough week's diversion with music, trucking in pursuit of truth

Owner-operators Daniel and Phyllis Snow have been off the road refusing to run at a loss for going on a month now as rates and available freight volumes have fallen. The crisis spurred by the COVID-19 coronavirus' spread, though, comes after a rough year of its own. To put everything in context, Daniel says, on the same miles run in 2019, the Snows were able to gross only around 60 percent of revenue they brought in 2013. Market deterioration has been the rule the past year, and they're not the only independent owner-op carriers who feel like the spot market is just broken. The pair have been in spend-reduction mode as they try to hold on for some return.

Words to truck by: 'You will never, ever come out ahead running at a loss’

An owner-operator's over-reliance on the path of least resistance to freight will  like as not get him/her in trouble in a down market, notes longtime independent Artie Daniel, out of McKinney, Virginia. Not that he doesn't understand the attraction of today's online marketplaces and the speed and convenience they offer for freight. But he's built his business over time and through the years with a mind on serving a customer (whether broker or shipper) toward building a solid connection, with close communication and more. "You've got to build relationships with people who you can trust, to make it work," he said. If you don't have that, "you're at their mercy."  Plenty more from Daniel's history and about his 1982 Kenworth W900A, bought a few years ago from an original owner who'd put only scant miles on the unit over decades as his personal truck.

Sell service, haul value -- word to the wise of the next generation, from longtime independent

For today’s episode of the Overdrive Radio podcast, brace for a long run through the history of trucking with former household-goods-hauling owner-operator Finn Murphy, also a well-versed student of that history. Murphy is interviewed and much of the story is narrated by Overdrive contributing writer and reefer hauler "Long Haul Paul" Marhoefer. This brief history of trucking in America tracks the rise of the business from the 1920s up through today -– and the owner-operator's central role in it all. It was originally part of the Over the Road podcast series, Overdrive's 2020 coproduction with PRX's Radiotopia

We’ll hear form a past wildcatter about, among other thing, the Allis Chalmers "Purple People Eater" engine in one of his trucks; from Murphy about his post-deregulation career, made possible in part by the 1980 Motor Carrier Act’s removal of barriers to entry that kept many new ventures out of non-agricultural freight markets; and about the rise of the Teamsters in regulated markets from the 1930s on.

If you missed the original airing -- it'd be unsurprising, as it aired originally smack dab in the center of the initial surge of COVID-19 cases late last March that kept the entire nation on edge -- you're in for a treat. 

Also in the podcast, another special piece of history in Ohio-based Fred Bowerman's preservation of this 1978 Peterbilt 352, pictured during "That's a Big 10-4 on D.C." on the National Mall this past year, an event Bowerman's helped to organize three years running.

Find a distillation of owner-operator via this link to Overdrive Radio host Todd Dills' "Breaking Free" history, written attendant to Overdrive's 2011 50th anniversary: https://www.overdriveonline.com/business/article/14876086/breaking-free-owner-operator-history-upon-overdrives-50th-anniversary

A special series highlighting elements of Overdrive's and trucking's history attendant to our ongoing 60th-anniversay year is available via this link: https://www.overdriveonline.com/t/4406897

Hear more from the Over the Road podcast editions: https://www.overdriveonline.com/t/4405867

Subscribe to Overdrive's newsletter for daily updates five days a week: http://overdriveonline.com

The OTR 'Brief history of trucking in America' -- and this preserved 1978 Pete 352

The Overdrive Radio podcast is produced by Overdrive magazine, the Voice of the American Trucker for 60-plus years. Host Todd Dills -- with a supporting cast among Overdrive editors, contributors and others -- presents owner-operator business leading lights, interviews with extraordinary independent truckers and small fleet owners, and plenty in the way of trucking business and regulatory news and views. Access an archive of all episodes of Overdrive Radio going back more than a decade via this link: http://overdriveonline.com/overdrive-radio

Overdrive 2023 Truckers of the Year: The 'exit interviews' toward the finale, Part 1

Overdrive Radio

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