schneider would be my choice! just check out the related posts about them!
Best of Luck! See ya on I5!

I can't thank you all enough. I've taken your advice and my advisor at school is sending apps to the companies that most of you recommended. Monday I get behind the wheel for the first time and cant wait, the class is a little boring.

I still have 3 weeks to decide on a company so keep em coming

Thanks yall

Exactly! I am paid very well as a beer distributor. I work hard for it BUT, im home everynight, they paid for my CDL's etc....definitely has been good to me so far

Greetings to Michigan Matt and all others.

I am coming out of retirement to enter the wonderful world of trucking. I've been retired for 2 1/2 years after selling my company. As background I come from an engineering and finance background with a BS in computer engineering and an MBA in finance. Retirement isn't all it's cracked up to be, you can only play so much golf and read some many books. In returning to the working world I wanted to try something totally different from my previous world; and I absolutely didn't want employees or to sit at a desk. I'm getting plenty of raised eyebrows as well as a lot of encouragement from friends and colleagues who wish they could breakaway from their careers to do something they really wanted to as opposed something they have to do.

In regards to the new driver choosing a company to initially work for give serious thought to the financial health of the company and it's customer base. The US has been in a recession (probably) since the spring. Times like this are difficult for poorly capitalized companies to survive. Of particular concern should be those companies carrying excessive debt or whose customers are in tenuous financial positions. We should give particular consideration to companies with little to no long-term debt and those whose financial ratios indicate the staying power to emerge from this slowdown able to resume full operations. The strongest companies will undoutedly garner additional business as the weakest companies fail to survive this slowdown.

To that end I've been reviewing the annual reports and SEC filings of the publicly traded trucking companies. As you all know many trucking companies are privately held and doing meaningful fundamental analysis is much more difficult, although not impossible, for them (we need to review Dun and Bradstreet reports on the private companies). I have only done reviews on a couple of comapnies so far but I am impressed with Werner's financial position. Most importantly Werner has no long-term debt. Their earnings are holding up fairly well year over year, their customer base is varied and generally is in good shape. They have, what appears to be competent financial management and advanced technology.

I'm not a driver yet so I can't speak to their employee relations. However, the most driver-friendly company is no good to the new or experienced driver if it fails to survive this current recession.

Best Regards,

October Guy

Werner is probably one of the worst:

1. Ran a lot of older, bigger fuel-inefficient trucks and now upgraded at the worst time (ulsd issues with the newer engines) Must now fix the old and deal with the newer problems which are even worse.

2. Trailers are second oldest next to Schneider.

3. High driver turnover due to lower than average pay. =more accidents and less fuel efficient.

4. +positive: JB may be in worse condition than Weiner, but their trucks get better fuel economy. JB seems to have gotten smaller while Werner got marginally larger. Werner may grow out of their problems.

-not the best time to be investing in a trucking company unless you want to buy someone out.

Should be getting more pre hire letters this week, but despite what I've heard Werner is in the lead. The preferrred choices I had seem not to be hiring in my area at the moment. So if nothing else I'll get some exp with a company like werner, and eventually add to that turn over rate. But. . . maybe I'll be happy there. So far everytime I hear good stuff about a company, BAM I hear just as much bad, or vice versa.

October post what you learn, for I am not that dilligent

D3m3nted. . . your company hired you with no exp? if so that gives me some hope for local work, most here seem to want 1yr or more.

Thanks all, the more info the better! I hope this thead is helping more than just me!

I am a newbe as well and I thank all you guys for the usefull info!

What do you all think about working for a Distributing outfit? Like beer n ####? I wouldn't mind a little excercise, I am in good shape, and used to working outdoors and in the cold.

Does Dist pay good?

Please let me know what ya think and again thanks to all that have responding. This forum is great GOOOOOOOOOOOD job to whoever the boss man is here!

__________________
This is my rifle, this is my gun. This is for shooting and this is for fun!

Last time they were hiring at the local beer dist. There was an add in the paper to come to there office on a set day. They had no exp required, but prefered in the ad, and will train if needed.

I got there and there was a line around the block.
I left.
Heard later that 600 people applied. The vast majority of which did not have a CDL.
Beer and cold drink dist. pay very well, and the jobs can be hard to get.

the city where i live has bout 90,000 ppl.and a college town grrrrrrr anyhow the budwieser dist.pay's right at 16.50 to start with bennies of course becoz of union shop.However here they prefer have prior exp. like Coke or Pepsi to be able to get on.

Some Coke and Pepsi dist work until 11:00 at nite in some area's just depends the size of the city and how much territory that perticular dist.has.BOL