From the Driver's Seat: OTL Development Program

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. Got another podcast today. Got a great podcast. Got a guest that's been with me for several times. I'm looking forward to that. Before we get into that, I wanna talk a little bit about the culture, Averitt culture. And one of the things that's vital to our culture is our uniforms. And the reason I say that, wanna encourage you to make sure you're using all your allotment as fast as you can because we need to make sure we're looking sharp. It is what defines Averitt. One of the things that defines Averitt is different from the rest of the folks is our uniformity. That's part of our culture, so it's really important. So take advantage of your allotment, spend all the allotment, get new uniforms, get rid of the old stuff, make sure you're wearing new stuff. That way you're always looking sharp. I know you all always do, and you keep the trucks clean, but it's really important that that happens as much as possible. So use all allotment. Let's get new uniforms and make sure they're out there. I got Scott Averitt. Hey, Scott. How are you doing? I'm doing well. How are you? Doing great. Scott, I guess everybody knows you're with Ontour Logistics. Right? You've got the black shirt with the OTL. Of course, I got the red, so it's a little different, you're still Averitt, right? Still Averitt, one hundred percent. We've had a great success since we've been to Logistics over the years now, and it keeps growing every year, right? It does. Busier every year. Busier every year. And we know the opportunity is there for us to gain more business every year, but the key to that is drivers. That is it. That's the key because they are the machine that makes it happen. Yeah. And we say, you know, we have to find drivers to get to get to come to OTL, and part of that is transferring drivers from other local other other places and bringing them into OTL. That's really how we built OTL. It's basically been inside. Right? Ninety nine percent of it has been inside Averitt Associates, and to me that has been the key to it, to the success of it. Yeah. And I go to transfers. That's really our culture too. It's not just transferring to OTL, it's transfer to dedicated home daily positions, to LTL positions. There's all kinds of ways to transfer at Averitt. But the key to that is on how we transfer into OTL, and it's not necessarily that those jobs are listed on the transfer opportunities on the My Portal. OTL, we're always looking, but we have to be we have a we have a process that we go through to transfer a driver over to the OTL group. Right? Correct. We are part of Truckload. And if like I said, it's we just have open positions because the way the touring business is, the, you more drivers we have, the more business we can take on. So we're always hiring. For drivers that might not know, which I hope everybody knows what OTL is, but for drivers that don't know what OTL is, what is it? What's the job of an OTL driver, for We haul the equipment for a live event. It's not necessarily just a concert. It is a live event. If it's got audio or video or a stage or anything like that that deals with a live event where a crowd is going to show up, we haul it. And so, yeah, most of it is a concert, but we do everything from church events to fourth of July events to conventions. Like I said, anything that's got a crowd and it's got a sound system or a video system, that's what we haul. Well, I noticed this past year, we even got into doing a little bit of football. Right? We Yes. We we did some work with, some colleges and hauled their equipment. We got Tennessee Tech here in town. We got Kennesaw State out of Atlanta working on a few others, so we do all of their away games. I can remember we used to do, I know we did monster trucks at one time. We did wrestling. We did AEW wrestling. We did Monster Jam. We did Supercross. We're doing Ringling Brothers now and Disney on Ice. A lot of things like that. So a lot of opportunity, a lot of different things. And I think the the other thing about OTL is, you know, just stay in in the southeast. You know, it's not just southeast. It's basically forty eight states plus Canada. Right? We're we're all the lower forty eight in Canada and wish we could go out further, but that's where we're limited to. But what's the normal let's take a month, for instance, in a driver's life in LTL. What do they do? Typically, let's just say like on a concert tour. You know, a country tour, you're gonna work mainly on the weekends. And if you're further out west or in the northeast, you'll stay out and go to the next weekend. But, you know, like Supercross, Monster Jam, the Disney stuff, there's usually a show almost every night sometimes. You might be in a location multiple nights. So there is kind of no rhyme or reason. It depends on what the event is. But somebody there's a live event somewhere almost every night, and we get the gear to each location every day. And talk about the opportunities in OTL. One of the myths is, I think, I heard talk to somebody about OTL, but they said, Hey, I got to stay out when I leave in March. I don't come back till November of the year. Right? That's not really true. Right? That is not true. I everybody the possibility is there. But the more you are willing to be gone, the more opportunities you'll have. But a typical concert tour, you may be gone a few weeks. It could stretch into a couple of months. And but there are breaks in between. And depending on where you're domiciled from, you might be near your home. So you could go home for a few days if needed. All of our equipment and most of our tours are based out of Nashville, and there are some breaks in Nashville. We try to get everyone home as much as possible, but are you going to be gone for nine months? I haven't seen it yet. Not yet, right? But I've seen some drivers that wouldn't mind it. They they they like to stay gone. When I talk to when I talk to OTL drivers, that's the nice thing. You know? They love it. When you talk to a driver that's been in OTL, they love it. And I think a lot of that's got got the camaraderie part. Don't you think that's part of what it is? It is. They love the family part of it. And the crew people on the road, from the artists down to the crew to the band, you know, we mainly deal with the production side. It's a family out there. And we have tour we have one truck tours, ten truck tours, all the way up to forty five truck tours. And it is a big family. And you're out on the road together for days and weeks at a time, and that turns into your family, and they love it, and they enjoy the atmosphere part of it. You're not just a number out there. You're your name, and they rely on you to get the job done. And I think that's the part that I've enjoyed about it the most of all the years that I've been doing it. And, you know, sometimes some weeks you might drive two thousand five hundred miles, and some weeks you might drive five hundred miles. Right? Correct. I mean, there are some stadium tours that you do. You know, you pack up on Sunday, you drive to the next stadium, and you sit there for four or five days at a time. And there are sometimes, like if you're on a West Coast Swing, you might sit somewhere for ten or twelve days at a time. The good part about OTL is you're not chasing the miles. You're on a salary, so you're getting paid to sit there. What does a driver do during those You talked about the West Coast tours, maybe down ten days at a time. What does a driver do for ten days? That that sitting in the truck for ten days? We encourage them to go out and responsibly go see and do things. Go sightsee. Go have a little fun. Enjoy the the cities that you're in, especially if you've never been there. And, you know, we always tell everybody you're still getting paid. You're still doing a job. Be responsible, of course, but go enjoy yourself. Go see the places that you've only seen in pictures or read about. And because you will be in all the lower forty eight, most of Canada, and there's some amazing places to go see. Is there any special requirements that a driver needs to think about, hey. I think I might be interested in OTL. Is there any special requirements the driver has to have in order to transfer into OTL? No. If you're just a you know, we are part of Truckload. So if you meet all the Truckload requirements for Averitt, you can come into OTL, go through the training class, and you're in. Okay. I'm a driver out here. I've never heard of OTL, I'm watching the podcast. And I say, yeah, I think I'm up front for OTL. Okay. What's my next step? We can get you in touch with a couple of ladies at OTL at the corporate office, Kayla and Crystal, and they can give you more information. And let's just say class doesn't happen for six to eight weeks later. We can actually send you videos and all kind of different information that you can kind of get a better idea before you come to class. That way, you're not coming into class totally cold and not have any knowledge of anything. There's a lot on the Averitt and OTL website, but we can show you different videos of how we do things, how we load a truck, how we unload it, the process that happens on the day of a concert. So we have a lot of information that we can send you before coming to class. What happens next? Obviously, just don't get a black uniform and start driving the truck. Right? Something's got to happen there. What do we do next? After we talk to you, we'll find out, make sure that you meet all the requirements. We'll let you know when the next OTL training class is. We do that at the OTL facility in Nashville. We'll bring you to class, and then that's the starting point. Bring you to class. Okay. When I do that, am I committed at that point? I'm definitely going to be an OTL? Or what do we do in the class? You were not committed. That is more of, we like to talk to you, see where you're at, let you see the process, see what you think about it. And then if you want to commit, great. We'll get you started from there. But we do have a lot of people that come to class, and we give them one hundred percent all the ins and outs. We're fully transparent on it. And if they don't like it, you're okay. You're still a neighborhood associate. You still can go back to Truckload or wherever and what division you're a part of, and we do have that happen sometimes. Some people will raise their hand and say, you know, this isn't for me. That's okay. We have some that don't have a lot of over the road experience because you will be over the road with this, of course. And we might feel that, okay, you need just a little bit more experience of being over the road, or other reasons. We have some that come in and I need to take care of a few things in my life about this. Then I can join and be one hundred percent committed. So really, you're taking a look and saying, The old driver looks at it and says, is OTL a fit for me? And OTL is watching the driver and saying, are you a fit for OTL? Right? So it's really basically a job interview in a sense. Right? To a certain degree, is because it is a lifestyle change. It's not just truck driving. It is a complete lifestyle change, and we want everyone to be aware of that. And it is different than hauling general freight, of course. There's a little bit more responsibility to it. A lot of other aspects of it that people don't necessarily see. So we try to fill them in on all those aspects so they know they have everything one hundred percent in front of them when they get through with the training class. That's all evolved over the years. I think we've we've really fine tuned it to it. It's really it's a good machine at this point. It is. I mean, the industry has evolved. We've had to evolve with it. We have changed how we do the training class a little bit. You know, as Averitt has evolved, we we have changed things too, and I think, we've made it better every single time. The industry has changed a little bit, especially post COVID, so we've had to adapt to that, and and that's always gonna be the case. So we're just gonna keep moving forward with it and try to have our drivers, you know, and our fleet the best that we can get it. Right. And our drivers that you know, drivers are thinking, wow. They don't have to unload the freight. And it's not really it's freight, but it's not freight in in the sense. Right? And we're removing product, but it's really not freight. It's it's tell them what what what what's on the truck? It's what we like to call it gear. You know? Don't not necessarily freight. Right. Ninety nine percent of what we haul is on wheels. It has to be moved to the stage or the event area. So everything has to be strapped in, and we use straps and load bars. It is all hand loaded and unloaded. Now, there will be union labor, local people there, or crew people that that load it, and the drivers in charge are basically supervising that. And their main job is to secure the load because everything does roll, has to be secured in the trailer. That is their main job, but they will be in the trailer. They will be active in the trailer, but it's more of a supervisory role at that point. Right. And I think that's important. Drivers understand, hey, you're not out there. You're not sweating and lifting stuff and moving stuff all the time, but you are making sure you're responsible for that. You've to make sure everything goes in the right place and strapped down. Right? Correct. Your job is to make sure that it's loaded correctly because once the door is closed, it's your load at that point. And a lot of stuff that we haul is extremely valuable, so it does have to be secured properly. And we cover all that in a training class. We try to prepare them the best they can. A lot of it is hands on, so they need to be prepared for that. But are they going to be physically picking up a one thousand pound road case? No, they're not. But they will be supervising to make sure that it's loaded correctly. I think that's important too because we have a reputation of taking care of the equipment that's on the tour. I think we've done well with that. We've really got a niche in the market now, we're way bigger than what we started out, obviously. How many drivers we're going have this year do you think? I think we're going to land at around one hundred and fifteen to one hundred and twenty by the mid summer and could use more. It could take on more business, but I think that's the number that we're probably going to land at. We stay around one hundred and fifteen to one hundred and twenty year after year. Well, I really appreciate it. There's drivers out there listening today and they're saying, I think I might wanna do that. And, so I I would encourage them to call their leadership, like you said. I would encourage them to look at places on in in the inside Averitt. Study Ontario Logistics, but make the call. Find out if it's, you know, what they're looking for, wouldn't you? Absolutely. If you see an OTL driver wearing a black shirt, stop them. Ask them questions. You know, all of them have business cards, or they can give them my number or or Jennifer's number or Kayla's number, anybody at the corporate office and just call. Ask questions. That's the most important thing is just find out all you can. You know, we're almost thirteen years into it now, so we're Wow. That's the one that's been that long. I'm ready for the next thirteen. So It doesn't seem like it's been that long since we had Dollar Bills starting there. I know. That was the fall of two thousand twelve. Was it really? Time flies, I guess. It does. But it's it's a great business unit. We're looking to grow it, and so I'm excited about that. But any last words you want to tell the drivers? Just if you want to join LTL, like I said, just give us a call. Find out. It is exciting. It is fun. I grew up in the business and still enjoy it, still have fun with it. And that's what most of our drivers say. It is fun. It is a job. It is challenging. But most of our drivers that we've had since day one doing this, we've got several drivers from class one. They don't wanna do anything else. This is all they wanna do. So that means a lot to us. It does. Well, you do a great job. We appreciate you, Scott. Thank you so much. And, you know, if you're out there and you're thinking about this, take the opportunity to call. And you're not committing to anything, and you're not committing to anything till you actually you get to you get to the class. And, so you spend three days, and you learn a little bit, and you find out what's going on, and that's when you can make the commitment that, hey. Yeah. I wanna join LTL. I wanna I wanna be part of this. And it's not like you're signing up for life either. You know? If you get into it for a year or two years and you say, hey. I wanna go back and do something different. You also you have the opportunity to transfer again. You know? It's like any position at Averitt. You're not locked into that position for life. You have the opportunity to transfer anywhere within the company, and I think that's important. Again, that's what that's what our culture is all about. So it's very important that you do that and take opportunities for that. We appreciate everything you all do out there. Take you know, when you when you're talking to other drivers and you're out there and you see drivers, and you never know when you talk to that driver, hey. You might be able to come to Averitt. You know, we have a company called we have a part of the company that's called OTL and explain to them what Ontrue Logistics are. That may be what drives that that driver to come to work for Averitt Express, and we continue to grow that way. Use this as a tool when you're out using the People Like You program. It's obviously great. Appreciate everything y'all do. We'll see you on the road. Thank you so much.