Driver responsibility with the cleanliness of issued trucks?

great suggestion !
Plus when they get older maybe become a driver. gives them a chance to be around trucks. if their family is not.

I washed big 4 axle wreckers when i was young. great chance to know the business side and appreciate the trucks.

 

There's 7 pages here...I read the first one.

It appears to me, you're splitting hairs here. Just tell the driver to run it through a Blue Beacon or other wash, and you pick up the tab. Don't be cheap, allow the driver to get it done right. Otherwise you're wasting your money and HIS time.

Better yet, hire someone to come into the yard and wash the trucks while the drivers are at home.

To expect your driver to care for YOUR truck as if it was theirs, is a lesson in futility. 80% of drivers out here, don't even know what soap is.

I don't care what you pay a driver. Unless he gets 100% of what the load pays, it's your truck.

I've heard this same arguement from another O/O (50 trucks), just before I quit the stupid SOB. 3500 miles a week, and home on weekends.

When exactly do I have time to wash this truck on my day off ??? Should I have made it a family fun day ?? And brought the wife and kids to help ??

 

When my kids were teenagers I had a mobile wash service . When my son was 17 he'd go on his own with a Mecedes straight truck with a 500 gallon water tank and 3000 psi pressure washer and service accounts like the New England Aquarium , Safety Kleen , wash trucks at Chelsea Produce Market and wash mobile homes , campers , and houses . He's in his 30's now and has been complimented on his hard work habits by all his employers .

 

There is no doubt in my mind that you are going to be a great success with your business. These folks who are making derogatory comments to/about you, apparently just don't "get it."

Any time a business owner realizes that he was not "born with all the answers, therefore he is so much smarter than everybody else," I've got to admire him. Your thoughts about gathering different ideas from folks who are in the business is a good one. I just don't understand why other business owner's don't do it.

It does not mean that you are going to follow every single bit of advice you get. You could not do that, even if you wanted to, as the ideas are too diverse. But you obviously have an open mind, and are willing to sift through other folks ideas, and get a view as to their perspective.

Well, you beat me by two years. When I was ten, a realtor, who was a friend of my dads, came to us and asked if my brother and I would be interested in keeping up yards in some vacant houses he had listed. We did this for a couple of summers. Then at 12, I went to work in a gas station, Saturdays and after school. At 14 I moved to a family owned "supermarket" and worked in the grocery business for several years, part time during the school year, and full time during the summers.

 

17 miles, East of Clarksburg on Route50, And yea, they are punching wells all over out here, within spitting distance of each other, its has really come to life out here with gas wells. On the selling fuel issue, How could a person justify putting there co. out of buisness just to make a few hundred dollars? They dont have enouph brains to figure out how much they are costing themselves in the long run, (like their job)!