The End Of A Once Great Company To Work With: Anderson Trucking Service (ATS)

Discussion in 'Report A BAD Trucking Company Here' started by seawind, Apr 13, 2014.

  1. seawind

    seawind Medium Load Member

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    For many years we have been joking about the day we all would be working for one of only a dozen or so companies. Buyouts and mergers are happening at a faster rate than I was aware of recently. It's all very sad.
     
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  3. jldilley

    jldilley Medium Load Member

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    Pete, the securement instructor at Landstar was just telling a few of us how he had the chance to go to ATS' heavy division, but declined to do so because of how far they had fallen in the last 35 years. Apparently, they used to be an excellent company.

    This is a microcosm of extreme capitalism that Marx talks about in Das Kapital. A market grows and grows and at the same time becomes controlled by a relatively small group of corporations, all the while struggling to maintain profits. Revenue increases as wages decrease and conditions get worse and worse. Eventually, the bubble that is the transportation indusrty is going to burst.
     
  4. Anonymousproxy

    Anonymousproxy Road Train Member

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    Pretty much what what happened at a couple of places I worked at...and then there's the owner taking back control of a company, getting back on its feet, then those same greedy kids either sell it out from the owner or shut it's doors.
     
  5. Victor Sapienza

    Victor Sapienza Bobtail Member

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    ......what you describe is what's going on at the vast majority of truckload carriers today - most of the drivers today are either too inexperienced, too young, or too stupid to remember what trucking was like before all of this garbage started taking over the industry within the past 5 to 10 years......they have no clue. The only way these new morons in management can be stopped is if enough drivers report them and make it clear to them that their crap won't be tolerated by other drivers....
     
    jldilley and superflow Thank this.
  6. ethos

    ethos Road Train Member

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    So did you drive for a year 5 -10 years ago?

    Drivers are the same today as they have ever been. Good God had the internet been around in the seventies the guys who started in the fifties would have been on here complaining about "drivers these days". My dad was a trucker and I remember riding with him in the summer and aside from a lot more c.b chatter and pay phones not a great lot has changed. No, other drivers didn't stop when a truck was on the side of the road, they had appointments to make. New drivers still couldn't back well, they couldn't trip plan well. Drivers called other driver idiots and there was always that one guy on the radio talking about the "back when I started" crap. It was the same game, be on time and don't hit anything.

    The generalizations about this industry kill me! Every company I have been with has had great younger drivers, terrible younger drivers, great older drivers and terrible older drivers. Everything evolves and changes over time. I try and stay vigilant because I don't want to become that old guy in a rocking chair yelling at the "kids these days" They were yelling that back in the day and what do you know different old guys are yelling it now.

    Also, aren't you that guy who thought I was a manger at Bay and Bay or something?
     
  7. ethos

    ethos Road Train Member

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    What bubble? Is the moving of freight and overvalued asset being held up by loans people can't afford? Is the need for moving freight going to increase or decrease? If you have ever read any report on the long term outlook you would see this business will be going strong for a while. I'm on the bulk side of trucking and customers are screaming for more capacity every day. They can't ship our jobs to China and for the foreseeable future a robot can't do it.

    Companies grow and grow? Schneider used to have over 15,000 drivers in van alone, that number was way down when I left a year ago. They use to have over 1500 in bulk, we had less than 800 when I left. You can be too big, everything grows and shrinks. Companies make moves when they feel they can and scale back when they can't maintain. Constantly feeling for that sweet spot, which is itself constantly changing. They have been predicting the end of capitalism for a very long time my friend. Bet against it at your own peril.

    Companies get run into the ground every day. Companies are formed and grow every day. It's a cycle. It's business, it's life. Hardly a bubble which is in dire straights and about to burst.
     
  8. Meltom

    Meltom Road Train Member

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    Get off my lawn!!!!
     
    rickybobby Thanks this.
  9. bzinger

    bzinger Road Train Member

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    i talked to a recruiter at ats last year and he kinda gave the vibe like he didnt give dam whether he hired a driver or not so i never called back and glad i didnt .
    i was at dart from 87 to 92 and they are proof positive of how the next generation can take the helm of a good company and run it into the ground ...also saw the same thing when i was at cornhusker moter lines RIP .
     
  10. rcelmo

    rcelmo Medium Load Member

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    I agree on the third generation running the company into the ground, seen it many times.

    I have also seen many first generation companies fail.


    The common problem I see in both cases is does the boss actually still drive a truck?
    When the bosses ask drivers to drive trucks they themselves won't drive there are problems.
    In many of the "problem" companies I see the management has no real concept of what they
    are asking their employees to do. When employees complain the complaints are dismissed
    because the boss doesn't really understand what the driver goes through.


    I am not personally aquainted with the ATS company but based on the reports I have
    seen I suspect the original owner actually drove a truck. I bet the younger generation
    no longer drives, and if they do they have their own special trucks and choice loads. I
    also suspect the majority of the office staff has never driven.
     
  11. rickybobby

    rickybobby Road Train Member

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    get off my lawn!!!
     
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