Star Transportation (Nashville, TN)

Hello All,

I will be attending Star Transportation's orientation later this month, and was hoping to hear from someone who has attended recently. Any advice would greatly be appreciated! Everyone has a negative experience to share, so if you wish to vent, please do it under the "BAD" forum. I know a lot of folks warn of this company, but I don't care. Just gonna drive my ##s off and not look back. See you out there.

 

I just completed my first day of orientation at Star Transportation in Nashville, TN, and my overall impression was very positive. Keep in mind that I am new to trucking, for this is my first gig and I just got my CDL last weekend.

I traveled from my home town in NJ via air from Philadelphia to Nashville (on my dime...declined the free bus so I could be home for my daughter's birthday) and Star provided a shuttle to the hotel. The hotel is a mediocre Days Inn in a semi-dumpy part of town, but overall not too bad. We were to have double occupancy, but for 25 bucks out of pocket, I chose to have my own room.

The hotel double shuttled the 13 of us at 6:00 am to the terminal, which was about 2 miles away. Out of the 13, two of us were students, 1 had 6 months prior OTR, and the rest were "experienced."

We spent the morning filling out paperwork, doing physicals (if you have your long form with at least 12 months left on it, you can skip the DOT physical), urinalysis, and the physical abilities test: 10 squats, 3-30 lb. shoulder high lifts, 3-50 lb waist high lifts, pull backs, push forwards, climb into trailer simulation, and squat 360 degrees X3; your heart rate is checked after each set. They also did BP, height, and weight.

They bought us lunch from a nearby Italian place, and it was pretty good.

The afternoon consisted of more paperwork, a brief video and presentation on the QC 200, a briefing from Payroll, and a 1.5 hour presentation from Safety. They issued their handbook and an 80 question open book test due tomorrow.

We were told to check out of the hotel tomorrow morning and plan to hit the road after doing a road test and a personal interview. The students will go with their trainers, and the experienced guys will be assigned their trucks. They are trying to get me a trainer in my area, and require 4 weeks and 8500 miles of training time, which is not run as a team (trainer is awake and instructs).

I Hope to give updates in the future, but we shall see. If this helped any of you, please let me know, for I don't want to plug up the forums with unwanted banter!

 

Update....

Finished orientation today. All were hired but one (not related to anything that happened at orientation). We road tested in the morning, were bought another lunch, received presentations on delivery/pick up procedures and benefits, then had interviews in the afternoon. All experienced were assigned trucks on the spot, and myself and the other student were assigned trainers and will head out from here in 2 days. The other student got a trainer that lives within one hour of his house, and I will switch to trainer after Thanksgiving at home that is closer to where I live. Star Transportation has been doing a great job so far, and everyone I encountered was really nice. I am looking forward to working with my trainer; he is the one who road tested me today, and he seems like a fair guy. No complaints, I have a job!!!

 

I grew up in Hunterdon. Hometime policy is to try to get drivers home every weekend, but they told us this averages out to about a 80 to 90 percent success rate. I'll take it! I will be running NE regional/I-95 corridor, so I expect a couple of mid-week layovers at home from time to time (I live 1 mile off of exit 4). If it doesn't work out to be quite that good, I have no complaints; I am brand new in trucking and landed a regional position with no experience, and am not in one of the big "starter" companies...my best advice to everyone is to do your own research! Talk to drivers in the truckstops (not the lizards), talk to your instructors at school, and call that old forgotten uncle that might have a brother in law's friend who knows someone running dump-trailers at the quarry. You never know...

 

Update....I started with my trainer 2 days ago. He is an "old school" driver with 38 years in trucking, and is a very good trainer. He has a wealth of knowledge and answers all of my questions (and there are a lot!), and is very patient when I find a gear to grind...We are driving a new Cascadia, and WOW, what a step up from the Columbia I drove in school. It's nice to drive something that has good power steering and a gearbox that works! We started out in Nashville, ran to Lansing, MI - layover - then back to Nashville where we did some empty shuffling and were loaded for tomorrow's run...same deal, he does it twice a week for Nissan. My trainer is home for the weekend (trucker's weekend) and Star put me up in a nice Days Inn in Cave City, KY. We will head out at 11 am tomorrow. I can't wait to get back on the road!

 

They do have a terminal in Orlando, however they aren't hiring that area for company drivers, just O/O. They are looking for northeast regional and OTR drivers right now...Good luck to you Gimmpy.