CRETE - A Year in Review

Crete Carrier announces new facility.

Karel Znamenacek, Executive Vice President for Crete Carrier, has announced Crete Carrier will invest $5.4 million and bring a total of 50 jobs to a new trucking facility next to Interstate 40 in Knoxville TN.

Znamenacek said the new site will include a maintenance operation, office and numerous amenities for drivers. There will be an eight-bay drive through maintenance facility for servicing trucks and trailers. The office staff will work with drivers and recruit new employees. And there will be numerous services for truckers, including a lounge, lunch room and even a bunk room.

Crete has 5,700 trucks and 13,000 trailers nationwide and is a Truckload Carrier. He estimated that an average of 75 trucks a day will use the facility. The 26-acre site next to the Roane Regional Business and Technology Park was sold in a private land deal that took place without any publicly-funded incentive package. Tax collections from Crete are expected to add some $42,000 per year to the Roane County tax rolls.

..well it looks as though CRETE hasn't hit on hard times yet if they can invest $5.4 mill on a new trucking facility!

 

Ive had the displeasure of meeting some people like this! You gotta wonder how they get through their day in one piece...

 

Id have to agree with you about 30% being more than enough. Without actual numbers, Id guess my average to be around 15% with Gainey and Crete.

I never had a chance to see the new lot at the Columbus terminal, but I did see them clearing the land for it. Ill bet there are more JBs out on the street now, than Cretes!

 

LOL...funny you say that..i was there about 3 weeks ago,its a nice terminal lots of parking compaired to the indinapolis yard.now i know why JB was parked in the street

 

I've heard that they are breaking ground finally. I guess the land they bought wouldn't pass the 'perk' test for the sewage system, and since they are so far away from the city, they have to use a septic system. It's no where close to city services.

You are lucky that you didn't go to Dallas. After leaving home Friday I del'd a load(the only load offered) of P&G to the W-mart in Palestine, TX. Once I got there, I was delayed because the braintrust in Lincoln gave me a duplicate drop number as was on a previous load. So I had to wait for them(Walmart, not Crete, I wasn't going to wait for weekend dispatch to try to figure it out) to get me one. And that D/C was excessively busy because it was routing disaster relief onto many different carriers, plus taking inbound. The next load was out of Arlington, but didn't pickup until Monday. So thru the Wilmer yard I went, the truck was overdue for a 'B'.... Wholly cow was that place packed, I guess all the southbound drivers were routed there until Monday to find out if the customers in the Houston vicinity were going to be open. I picked up my load an hour early. (actually a customer that made me feel like they were happy to see me....ahhhhhh. You mean I am human after all and not a dog? We get treated like dog's so much out here, it's getting so when guests come over, I'm tempted to sniff their butt instead of shaking their hand..... Woooof Wooof Woof) Once again the only load offered, but as busy as the Wilmer yard was, I was gratefull I had anything. This load didn't deliver/drop at Dollar General in Scottsville, KY until Wed. at 6 a.m. with a specific instruction that deliveries/drops on any date before appt. date would be considered by customer as a service failure. And once again the braintrust in Lincoln are at work again. No drop number, no delivery conf # and as of Tuesday afternoon, after numerous prompts from me to dispatch/ops, no phone calls were being returned to the CSR to provide one, they claim. These people (Crete operations - not the customer) couldn't hit the ground with their hat. They would screw up a free lunch...even if it was a simple soup sandwich. That's two loads in a row, that they...the carrier... couldn't get the delivery appointment info right. This happens to me here more than any other company I have worked for in all my years. How they stay in business is beyond me. I have had occasional delivery appt screw ups at other carriers, but nowhere near the level as here. As of the 24 of Sept, if I ever get to deliver this load that is, I will have a whopping 6717 for the month. All this after a 9200 mile month in August. And the majority of drivers (3 out of 4) sitting in Wilmer, were having the same problem getting miles. Surprisingly, some that were here only a year or so, so it's not just us old farts getting the short end of the stick. Needless to say, it wasn't a 'Crete friendly' crowd. But I bet the orientation class on Monday is filled to the gills with newhires for all this short freight we have available.

But it is good to see you back online, evertruckerr... Was beginning to wonder if you fell off the edge of the earth. A lot of people were probably going into 'good news' withdrawal. It seems as though you are in the minority when it comes to having good news working here.

 

That's a good one! I need to remember it

I have to say evertruckerr paints a rosy picture with his verse and I enjoy reading his posts immensely. Supersnackbar it is also good to hear the other side of the proverbial coin at Crete. Please don't take my comment the wrong way, but evertruckerr has a special attitude that keeps him in a positive frame of mind. I picked up on it early on in his weekly reports.

In my opinion, this is the best thread on this site for a noob like me wanting a fair and balanced view of what life on the road is like. So thanks supersnackbar for your posts as well. Not dog thanks but human thanks!

 

the most important thing with transport, is to learn to laugh. .if you hold the frustration in, it turns into an avalanche...

if you work on a positive outlook, then you will find this job much easier.
Perspective matters..

I recall an event where i was late, in an interesting spot hour wise, and the forkie dropped two pallets and knocked a few others over..
they thought i had loose screws laughing at something that cost me money..( lost time )... but you can choose to be pissed off or you can choose to be light hearted..

i found that after a while the guys would help me out a bit more, cause of my attitude and nothing is a problem..

so remember, a situation is what it is, you can be pissy Or you can try to be happy

 

good post! Yeah, there's a ton of b.s. to deal with out here, but I've had enough jobs in my life to know that it doesn't matter ones chosen profession...they're all a pain in the arse sometimes. It's all how you deal with the crap that makes the cherries taste so good.

doing pretty good so far at crete...about 3,025 per week since I've been here, but I've still got some efficiency issues I need to work on, could maybe push that up a couple hundred miles/ week when I get used to driving solo....big difference in trip planning as compared to team driving to be sure.

Thanks yinz for the great thread.

 

You should find Crete one of the better carriers out here for OTR.....Good Luck and DRIVE SAFE.