From The Driver's Seat: Investing In Our Drivers

Welcome to From the Driver Seat, the Averitt podcast for all Averitt drivers to keep up with news and information across our network. Make sure to subscribe on your preferred podcasting app to make sure you're notified as soon as every episode drops. And now hosting from the driver's seat, director of driver services, David Royals. Hey, everybody. It's Dave Royals from the driver's seat. Hey. We're happy to be here today, and we got a guest today. Doesn't need any introduction. Been with been with us several times on podcasts. I know you're looking forward to hearing from him. I got Danny Crooks. How are you doing, Danny? Doing really good, David. How are you? I'm doing great. Good. Obviously, you know, things have gotten a little better in the freight world, I think, in the past couple three or four months this year. Right? Yeah. A lot of things have, played a part in that. We have seen a a turn, for several reasons, but, really began in the truckload world, about mid March, late March, and things begin to tighten up. And, there's a laundry list of all the reasons why you have, you know, the enforcement and some, English language proficiency and foreign domicile CDLs. Yeah. A lot of crackdowns there. So a lot of capacity came out or is continuing to come out of of the truckload market. So we've certainly felt that. And like I said, it started probably late mid to late March and and has progressed. And really in in May, we the demand really kick tick up. Capacity got really, really tight. Well, it's nice to be back in business again. Right? It is. It's it's it feels a little better. Know? It's it's good to to be struggling to to find trucks to cover loads for customers instead of hoping we get a load or or a group of loads in in a certain market. So, yeah, we we've certainly a different dynamic today. Fortunately, I think as a company especially, we did the right things during this downturn. We built ourselves, we're doing more efficient, we've done a lot of good things, but we've got now we've got to continue to grow. We've got to take advantage of the market now that the market's ready. We gotta be there. Right? The things are things are gonna have to change a little bit with how we're doing business now. But, yeah, we're now at a point where, as it improves for Truckload, it's also improving for Dedicated, it's also improving for LTL, and we have a lot of opportunity for drivers and historically have transferred a lot of drivers out of Truckload into LTL and and Dedicated and and other other opportunity, even maintenance and leadership. So bringing that back online, so to speak, or or or priming the pump a little bit and and getting more additional drivers on board. It's key for us. And I know LTL's got needs and, like I said, not to be redundant, dedicated as well. So we have a real need now for good Averitt quality drivers. We continue to do infrastructure, prepare ourselves for the upturn. But the other thing I think we did a good job of is keeping our drivers. We did all the right things to keep the drivers, the equipment. You talked about driver satisfaction with equipment, I think drivers are satisfied because we do have new equipment. And even last year was a tough year everywhere for everybody. And truckload, I think, gave probably a record raise last year. Yeah. It was. I think, if I remember correctly, it was about six point five percent. It was a five percent five cent per mile. Yeah. And I think that was early last year, maybe in June of last year. Yeah. June, July time frame. So pretty significant adjustment there. And and, you know, it's one that we felt like we needed to do at the time, and, you know, we want to remain competitive in pay and in all things, but our benefits are second to none in in truckload, particularly in the truckload industry. Our medical and dental vision, our profit sharing, even even down to uniforms and our PTO opportunities, we've got the best package in the truckload industry. You know, you mentioned profit sharing. I know you and I were in a meeting a lot long ago, they were talking about profit sharing over the past four years. Think it's been seven percent or higher for the past four years. I think sometimes people think, well, I need bonus at the end the year. Well, you're really getting one at seven percent of your salary is going in to profit sharing. Really significant. Right? It is significant. And it's true. And there's no limit to it's all driven on profits and the goalposts, they don't move. It's twenty percent of all profit dollars, whether they're zero profit or record profit, it's twenty percent of whatever that is. So, yeah, the seven percent is is is really unheard of when a lot of four zero one k's historically, you know, will match we being a company that will match three and a half percent or four percent. Right. And that's, you know, that's what it is. And even through this cycle and to to dwell on the the negative of the past, but, through this cycle, we've even large carriers suspended their four zero one k benefits. They they had won't call names, but some big ones said, you know, we're not we're not gonna contribute now. We're gonna try to control control our costs. So we certainly didn't do that, and and glad we did. I know I know recently you just announced for Truckload. You were we're gonna have another pay increase for Truckload. Right? Yes, sir. Yeah. Effective August ninth, which is a Sunday, we're gonna increase our our top out rate. In addition to the five cents last year, we're gonna go another two cents from sixty four to sixty six cents per mile on our top pay, which is a little more than three and a half three little over three percent Right. Increase on on the mileage rate. One other component we're adding this time that has not been part of the compensation package is a for hazmat. Instead of having a pay differential, we're gonna have a a an assessorial payment, and that'll be twenty five dollars if, as a hazmat hazardous material. If you have your endorsement, you're eligible for a hazmat load. If you haul a hazmat load, it's twenty five dollars. So if you do the little bit of math, if you got a four hundred mile hazardous material load, that's actually gonna pay six cents oh, a little over six cents per mile in addition to the sixty. Wow. That's looking like you're looking like seventy cents a mile is what the actual pay is. A little better than that. So yeah. And and then I if it's a shorter haul, you you can do calculator. You know? Yeah. It's two hundred miles. You divide that by twenty five, so it's even more per mile. But it's a flat rate per per per load. And to simplify it and make it, to make it easy for everybody and easy to administer and easy to understand, easy to forecast on our cost, build that into our our pricing models. And, yeah, that's something we felt and and really looking at it through the years, we at one point, we were handling a lot of Averitt LTL Alright. Remember those years. And over a hundred a day, Hundred dispatches per day. So there was a lot of a lot of potential for has hazardous material loads in the LTL world and still is. We do quite a bit of loads to the to the north with Pitt, Ohio. Right. We provide the line haul on that, and those typically we book those as hazardous because LTL load, twenty plus bills, chances are you may have a haz hazardous material shipment on it. But, anyway, that that is, it's about twenty loads a day. Just not a ton of it, but it allows us to to, secure that, though, that freight. We're at eighty plus percent. Eighty eight percent of our driving group currently is has hazmat endorsed. So that's a competitive advantage, competitive advantage if we, if we had that opportunity and and, get presented from a hazmat shipper, we we don't have to step back or we can we can be aggressive with that given that opportunity. That's awesome. Think if you think about that, last year was a nickel raise and this year's two cents, it's seven cents over two years. That's kind of unheard of in a truckload world, especially in today's environment, in the past environment where we were and where we're just now coming out of. Zero seven dollars a mile is huge and then you talk about all the other benefits that you talked about. I don't think there's anybody that really can compete with that. I don't think so. And I'm I'm like you. I'm a little biased maybe, but I I would put it up against against about anybody, particularly with you know, you you see a lot of advertise, you see a lot of ads, but you don't get the fine print, and it may be a higher rate per mile. And then as we're recruiting and as we're talking to to drivers and, you you come to learn maybe oftentimes it's not you're not home every week. Yeah. You might get, hey. I'm I need seventy cents a mile, but you have to stay out fourteen days Right. Or longer to get, you know, before you get home time. And then that home time is maybe a day or forty eight hours at most. So, you know, we're we're home weekly, and, that's that we're consistent with it. And it's something that's, you know, predictable, and that's one thing that we continue to continually hear from from drivers. You know? I wanna know what I'm gonna be doing, or I wanna be have consistency. And and we do the best that we can, to, you know, get when drivers do their part, you know, be available for dispatch in early in the week when we need them, Sunday, Monday, and then run through the through the end of the week, and get that that home time. But, it's weekly. It's not you know, we don't require, fourteen days or twenty one days like some of these, some other carriers do. So, you know, the devil's in the details when you when you start comparing compensation or benefits and that sort of thing. So you really gotta I think benefit compensation is big too. You know, I always hear drivers talk about their other benefits, and either the benefits aren't very good quality a lot of times is what I hear sometimes from some carriers. Or the benefits are twice what they cost for us, which is that's really big. Number one, the benefits would be big for me, making sure that they're quality benefits, which Averitt's quality, I think, is right up here at the top. But we have very affordable benefits. And that's that goes into a lot of what, know, what your income is. Sure. And and then we, you know, we try to stress that with with on our referrals, coaching our our educating our drivers to say, you know, that's that's part of that discussion, and it's too often it gets lost in, well, how many miles you get and what's the cents per mile? Yeah. Okay. That's important, but here's some other things. And if you're paying a hundred dollars more a week for your benefits that may or may not be equal to, what we have to offer, then, you know, gotta think that through. Yeah. And, you know, where we're at now is a lot different than where we were twelve months ago or even four months ago. Think, you know, now, You know, as we saw this change, this little evolution, I guess, in in in the market, the tightening of the capacity, we were pretty aggressive as we should have been to go out and secure rate increases for loads and customers that their rates were just sub subpar. And we, you know, we we were aggressive with that. Our our sales team did a great job as doing continuing to to do a great job in going out and negotiating, rates that that pay us, to cover our cost first and then also have enough margin that we we we have some operating income. And through that is where we invest, you know, we're we're all of our all of our investments come from earnings. Right. You know, we're not borrowing money to go go do this or that. It's we're gonna spend money, we gotta we gotta make the money in in profit. So I I think, our our guys, our team, has done a really good job. We're gonna continue to focus on that and also, increase our capacity where it makes sense. We're still, focusing on hiring within the core of our of our system and, you know, based on our customer conversations and meetings and things that we've had, there's a demand for for the for those Averitt trucks, and more of them would would be good. We're really gonna need help from our driving force right now. Yeah. This is the time when we need the drivers to really step up and help us. And what I mean by that is they need to find other drivers that would make good Averitt folks. Right? Yeah. And, ideally, that's the best hire we can usually, it's the best hire we make is a referral. Somebody that you know and and I won't say necessarily vouch for, but you are you know, somebody you are acquainted with is the best hire because because you as an Averitt associate know what it means to be an Averitt associate. You know? What we what we are, who we are, what's our culture. And, yeah, we really need the help of our existing drivers. All associates for that matter, but certainly a driver standpoint, certainly team effort, and and we can't do it without, you know, our professional drivers that are out there every day, day in, day out, you know, doing everything that's asked Yeah. Which is getting driving those miles, staying productive, getting as many loads picked up and delivered as you can and, on time and, stay doing it while being safe and Yeah. Conscious of our cost. Any last words for the drivers out there today? No. Other than try to always, you know, end on a safety note. Like, you know, we're in the summertime, and, of course, it seems like all seasons of the year now are are crazy out there on the roads that we're on today. And a lot more traffic, a lot Yeah. A lot more a lot more opportunities out there. So, yeah, just just being safe. And, again, doing doing all you can do to to help us recruit and secure some additional drivers for for our opportunities for growth and and to see that come to fruition would be would be good. And but, yeah, just thanks for all you do, and hope to see you out on the road real soon. Well, Danny, I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Appreciate everything. Appreciate y'all listening in. Thank you all so much. See you on the road.