Advice for a potential immigrant trucker

The cross border market is strong in Manitoba. I live here and can give you the companies to avoid. Biggest thing is deciding how much you want to run.

 

stay away from southern Ontario (Toronto) it’s over saturated with drivers a lot of them new immigrants . Company driver rates suck and no one is hiring right now especially newbies with no experience . Once a month we get newbies asking who’s hiring new drivers with no experience. Even the big boys aren’t hiring newbies everyone wants 1 year experience and like me who has almost 17 years experience can’t even get a call back right now .

I do know some of the bigger companies will bring you over and i’ve heard help get citizenship . I think Kag canada is one and maybe Arnold brothers , but be prepared to be used and abused for a few years

With Orange man in office on the other side of the border threatening tariffs i think it’s going to get worse. Your only chance is out west Manitoba Alberta etc etc

Another thing is housing and rent is ridiculous here in Ontario i’m a hour north of Toronto and rent for a 1 bedroom basement apartment is close to 2k a month . unless you live in the middle of nowhere a house is close to a million bucks . good luck buying one on a truck drivers wage

 

House prices aren't that bad out west. Even in BC, which is expensive AF, the houses aren't that bad. Friend of mine out there bought one recently right in the middle of a major city for under $500k.

 

When I got into this in 2016, after being laid off from my O&G/Trades career, I was also told you need to do OTR, to get "experience". I can tell you now, that is 100% ########. Lots of guys started in dump, shunt truck, roll off, grain hoppers, fuel tankers etc etc etc. It all comes down to the company, and their insurance.

So just keep that in mind, and don't even think about going to Bison lol.

 

Take his advise. Don’t touch them. Slipseat, sign a 2 year contract and they will abuse you. Lots of options here… hauling potatoes to the simplot plant an hour west of Winnipeg, or to the mc cains plant a little further west. Lots of potash loads from sask to the states, lots of options other than van. Fuel hauling, ltl, etc.