New CDL holder research

Advantage Swift ------->

Swift Transportation has a terminal right there, in Vegas:

Swift Transportation Las Vegas, NV Terminal

This would offer you several advantages -- especially as a new driver.

-- L

 

Pride Transport hires new cdl school grads from Las Vegas.
Ask about parking when you're on home time.
I think there's free, secured parking at Thermo King in North Las Vegas.
~
Get Paid for Truck Driver Training in Utah | Pride Transport
Hiring new cdl school grads from Las Vegas.
100% no touch Reefer - OTR - $1,480 weekly average gross
Our Full Training program is for brand new Class A CDL holders.

 

If you check out the Swift terminal in Vegas....& somehow don't like it -- then check out the Vegas terminal over at Knight Transportation:

Knight Transportation Trucking Terminal in Las Vegas, NV | Join Our Team!

Get your tractor serviced/repaired while doing home time -- & not out on the road when you're trying to make money ----> by signing up with a fleet that lets you park locally, on their turf (with a full blown service shop).

Both Knight or Swift....will offer a much better new-driver training program than the excuse I experienced over at Schneider....

-- L

 

Pride and Prime probably the best if you want those long coast-to-coast runs.

 

Run dont look back

 

Prime is the safest choice for learning this job. I don't like pulling refrigerated trailers, which is mostly what Prime pulls. But they have the biggest, most organized, paint-by-numbers for everything training and day-to-day operation. For someone willing to follow the rules, even if some employee doesn't take 9 hours to explain everything to you and wait for you to agree, you will learn the industry and how to work. If you think becoming an employee means you are also co-partner with the owners and managers and you'll decide how things are going to be done, then DO NOT go there. If you haven't driven OTR (Over-the-Road), you know nothing about this job. At first, you are not going to make good long-term decisions and find a better way to run that company which has operated many thousands of trucks with thousands of drivers for decades. You need to be comfortable being a gear in a big machine and then later you can have opinions about how things get done.

Prime has a longer than average 'ride with a trainer' period for newbies. I think it is based on miles YOU DRIVE. It could be 2-3 months of sharing a truck with a trainer. This is the time when you learn the job and learn to drive a semi-truck. So it's necessary and important. There's very little privacy and it's not easy to sleep in a moving truck, they ride like grocery carts and you feel every bump in the road. You have to be a rule-following son-of-a gun. If you are a woman and want to have a woman trainer, you may need to wait for one of the few women trainers to be available before you start training. Trucking is not like any other job you've done before. You have to plug yourself into an already operating machine, it will not adapt to you. Most newbies exaggerate the danger in this job a lot. IMO, many women exaggerate the danger of everyday life. It's pretty easy to be safe 24/7 in this job and most of that is accomplished by NOT being around drug user, drug sellers, people engaged in any crime, and keeping to yourself. Few women are interested in doing those first few things anyway. Almost everyone is too busy doing their job to have time to cause trouble for others. The biggest threat is the vast amount of frustration present in this job. Bad car drivers doing stupid things that almost cause a crash 5-15 times a day right in front of you. The customers wasting hours of your time and causing the delay for no apparent reason, and all customers, your company, and others claiming you are the cause of any delays when they caused it.

 

If your daughter likes Prime, then I would go with Prime. You know through her that the company is reliable enough, has the training process figured out. It's probably one of the most organized carriers in the industry. That appeals to me, I came from aviation where if it's not organized you don't do it. Some people don't want to follow rules. The problem you may have with any refrigerated carrier will be customer appointments and customers. They work 24/7 and that segment of the industry is famous for long customer delays. But, I suspect Prime customers don't mistreat Prime drivers as much as others, mistreatment meaning telling your nothing and doing nothing with your load for many hours while wait. Working at Prime you won't be asked to do almost any of the sketchy stuff that other companies would ask you to do. Prime and Walmart are like biggest lawsuit magnets in the industry because of their size so they have the procedures and policies that keep them from losing lawsuits in place. Aviation trained me to see rules as protection from blame. If I follow the govt rules and the company rules, then I buy myself protection from blame. Some people would violate any rule that applied to them just to show the world they are in charge. I preferred to go through life under the radar.

 

Out of all suggested, I'd go to Pride if it were me. You're gonna haul a lot of candy lol. They got that Hershey on lock in Ogden, UT. Prime is ok, but don't they force team driving now?

 

Trainees receive orientation, one-on-one instructor training, and then team driving with a trainer to gain real mileage. Upon completion of training and meeting mileage requirements, drivers may transition into solo or lease-operator roles.