Afternoon folks. Looking to break into the industry this fall and trying to soak up as much as possible...this section looks like it will be helpful in trying to figure out some of the practical differences between megas, smaller companies, private fleets etc. Overall this site has been fantastic for somebody starting from scratch to ask a lot of questions. Micromanagement aside, from reading the posts in here it appears that the pay is pretty good with Walmart...was curious because at least back in the day, the perception of the company was low wages and lousy benefits. Has the company turned the corner on paying their employees decent, or was that perception overblown to begin with? Thanks! Dave
They treat their store employees very different than they treat their drivers. While there's always of large pool of folks whose lives haven't worked out as well as they had hoped willing to swallow their pride and don a blue vest (at least until they work up the courage to commit suicide) there is no substitute for having a pool of experienced, reliable CDL drivers when you have a large supply chain to feed. Walmart has been one of the better paying driving jobs for a while now. A few years ago they did try to get strange with the change - rolling back pay and benefits for drivers hired after a certain date. Shockingly, they found that few drivers applied for the reduced pay and benefits rollback and they had a hard time getting enough drivers to cover their stores so they went back to just paying a fair wage again and gave up on their global domination through underpaying drivers plan.
Thanks...very informative there. Do they generally require a few years' experience or do they ever take people straight out of CDL school?
From their Walmart Careers site: A minimum of 30 months experience working in a full-time Class A tractor/trailer driving position in the previous 4 years. While most jobs have a HUGE gap between what they ask for and what they're willing to take, I've NEVER heard of WM hiring drivers straight out of school.
