Is it better to work for a large or small company?

I got my CDL last year and currently drive a 600 mile a day (4 days a week) transfer route for a east coast milllwork distributor. My long term goals are to eventually drive long haul, I'm just cutting my teath here getting experience.

My question is, Is it better towork for a large or smaller carrier. I'm sure both have their advantages. My brother in law works for a smaller carrier wich only operates 9 trucks and really likes it, but he has always worked smaller carriers.

Asking for your thoughts on either or both and why.

Re'

 

It really depends on what you're looking for from the experience. Your personality, lifestyle expectations, benefit expectations, and home time, will dictate which you choose.

BTW, you are aware that you have NO OTR experience for consideration and may be forced to second seat with a finisher/trainer at one of the majors ??

I prefer smaller operations myself. The larger ones treat you as a disposable commodity....not an employee.

 

I know I have no OTR experience. Where I am currently driving for actually helped me to get my CDL. I was the night time loading dock supervisor and the orginal reason my boss wanted me to get a CDL was to help pick up drivers that ran out of time. However the first tim I drove I was hooked and my plans changed.

One of my reason for possibly leaning toward a small carrier and local ones I have talked to seemed open to hiring me with no OTR experience while the larger carriers did not unless I was willing to train with them for what amounts to working for free.

Re'

 

All true. Smaller companies are more likely to get you home in a reasonable amount of time as well, even if they are OTR.

If you're fortunate enough to get hooked up with a smaller company that is the "core" carrier for a company that has steady work. That would be my path of choice. You can pretty much plan your life around your job. More so than the purely OTR companies, large or small.

But, if 48 state is to your liking. And being home is not a priority, your choices are unlimited.

 

I started driving with a small company. I was home almost every weekend.

The largest company was Landstar. All of the others had less than 300 trucks. Only 1 used DAC. It was not Landstar. It was the last company and it was the worst of them all.

 

SMALL in my opinion. Small companies need maximum revenue from each truck. Large companies believe in flooding the market with drivers to appease the customer. An individual driver means absolutely nothing to a big carrier. Some smaller companies are harder to get on with and tend to have higher expectations of their drivers.

 

It all depends on how you operate your truck and what you want from a company. I've worked for big companies and small. Biggest was Schneider, smallest is the one I'm at now (9 trucks). I'll give you my pro's and con's for each. These are my opinion, so others might think different and that's o.k.

Pro's of big company:

*Terminals. These are nice if they are all over the country. Typically you can find a place to park 24/7 (that's not true of truckstops in most parts of the country). They usually have free showers and drivers rooms and are fairly well secured.

*Larger customer base. The BIG companies usually have a customer they deal with on a semi regular basis wherever you are.

*More trucks. I'll tell you why this is a positive. If your truck is broke down and you need to get in a different one, you know they have an empty truck they can set you in. My truck broke down Tuesday of this week. I was able to get it back to Knoxville (has an oil leak and solenoid out of the starter) but I'm going to be out of it for a while. Luckily they have a truck sitting empty right now, so I'm in it. If it hadn't been for that who knows what I would have done.

Con's of the majors:

*Log book has to be 100% legal with most. The DOT is much more likely to go to a large carrier and audit all their drivers logs than a small company. They also look at the QualComm records and make sure they match. This can mean big fines to these big companies.

*You are a number. Enough said. (I'm sure not every big company is this way, but I imagine most of them are.)

*Cut-down trucks. Most of the big company trucks are well below the 65 mph mark. It's a pain in my opinion. Also, most of them cut their horsepower so far down that they don't pull worth a darn.

Pro's of a small company:

*Probably going to work with you more on your experience. Maybe not though. A lot of times, no matter how big the company, the insurance company makes these kind of decisions.

*More dedicated customers. I've been with this company a month and I've been to 3 of their local shippers. I'm always going to the same places to pick up our regular freight. It's nice because you know where they are, you know the people, you know how early you can pick up and deliver your load (no matter the appointment). At one place (the place I'm going Monday) I have the shipping/receiving managers home and cell phone numbers from being there before. That way if I need to pick up a load after hours I can call her and she'll come in and get me loaded on my schedule. Is that sweet or what? Doesn't happen as much with large carriers.

*Log book rules aren't as strict. I don't run 100% outlaw, but it's nice to push stuff out once in a while to get a few more hours to get home, etc.

*Trucks will run. These have better horsepower and will run. My boss wants us to stay under 75, but they will run faster if you want. Down in this part of the country where the speed limit is 70, it feels good to set the cruise at 75 and just eat up the miles.

*They know me when I call in, I don't have to tell them my name.

Con's of the small companies:

*Not as new of equipment as most of the big guys. This may or may not be true of every small company. Truck I'm driving now is an 02, which is the newest truck they own. All trucks and trailers were bought used so they've been through the mill. They aren't in bad shape (well, not all of them are in bad shape, we've got a couple rough trucks) but they aren't new either.

*Freight base isn't as great. I've been lucky in that they have worked really hard to keep me moving after I get empty. Been doing real well so far. One day sat 4 hours, another time after an hour I had a load, but it didn't pick up this the next morning (this is like 3 PM when I get empty). All other times I've had a load before I got empty. By the way, both of these times I was east of I95 in North Carolina (bad area for freight).

*Most of your parking is at customers or truckstops. I've been fortunate that most of the customers I've been to have allowed parking. It's frustrating circling the TS lot and not finding parking spots after 11 hours of driving. This is where terminal parking is nice.

*******

These are just some things I though of off the top of my head. Maybe some other guys on here can fill in some more pro's and con's of big and small companies.

Good luck!

 

Very well said ! I also have worked for both. I started with Schneider in 02 and worked for them until 05. An excellent company IMO back then because they allowed a good driver to excel. Now from what you see on Pmkindrver, it seems like the low miles are spread evenly throughout.

One big minus to working for a smaller company is finding the job in the first place. You have to go knock on some doors. In my opinion any company that has to advertise is advertising for a reason. Theres a cabinet company a few miles from my house that has 15 trucks and excellent benefits. I emailed them and they replied with a phone number to call. They don't currently need any drivers but I can expect a call when and if they do need another driver.

Irregular route trucking with a big company is just not a good job anymore. The big guys are creating a new LOW lower class. It's a shame but I'm very happy that Schneider gave me the chance to learn a trade that I enjoy doing.

 

You'll get more drop and hooks with a big company. Of course small companies can have that too depending on your definition of small. In my book anything less than about 300 trucks is small. The company I drive for has almost 200. Most of our drop and hook stuff are the loads in TN going outbound but we have a few places with loads coming back into TN where it's a drop/hook. Company driver insurance isnt the greatest but on par with or superior to many of the larger carriers. The problem I'd have with a 10 to 50 truck operation, if I was gonna drive a company truck, would be the insurance is probably either sucky or nonexistant and the drop/hook freight would be limited. A company with 100 to 300 trucks gives you the benefits of both small and large carriers in my opinion. You most likely won't be treated as disposable along the lines of the smallest carriers and the freight options are almost as good as a company with 1000 trucks.