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July 2018 Chairman’s Column
Chairman's Corner
By: Alan Freese |
One, two, three…Cancun. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to take off to Cancun like basketball players when eliminated from the playoffs? How nice it would be on the 1st of July to say I’m done and headed to Cancun! Now that the mess we call June is over, we all step back and figure out how to get through it next year. It’s crazy that the Military has a 12- week “Peak Season,” but in all reality, it’s more like six weeks. We all know the drill, pack and pick in June, then deliver in July. This summer has been especially difficult because the shortage of drivers is really taking a toll on local agents. Everybody I talk to has the same sad story, no drivers, using alternate transportation methods and RDD’s are a thing of the past. With the mandate of the ELD and hours of service changes, not a lot of people are diving into the transportation industry, let alone the moving industry. There is talk of the minimum age for driving being lowered to 18 by the Trump administration. I see this as great news. I have felt for a long time that our industry suffers from kids coming out of school not being able to take a career path in the interstate moving industry until they’re 21. In that three-year gap, these kids find other means of work and/or career paths. If they’re old enough to hold a gun and defend our country, they should be allowed to drive a truck. It might be nice to get a driver into our yard that can communicate with both our office and customer – yeah, I know I’m dreaming, but we can’t give up.
By the time you are reading this, the 4th will have passed and August is only a few painful weeks away. Let’s not forget that we live in the best country there is, where we have the freedoms like no other. We all have the opportunities to better (or worsen) our lives. Good, bad or indifferent, we all make it happen – albeit not as always planned, but still find a way to be standing when the smoke clears. I’m looking forward to the executive board retreat in August. It is a great time to get together and share some pains and joys of the summer. It’s like therapy, knowing I’m not the only idiot with all of these problems that we know as the cost of doing business in the moving industry.
Congratulations to the Golden State Warriors. I know all six of you Kings, Lakers and Clippers fans are hating it right now, but tough schnitzel. Warriors’ fans have endured for years to see this come to life. Let’s see if LeBron can put some rivalry back out on the west coast. In closing, I would like to recognize the efforts put forth by Special Counsel Jay Casey. He truly is a remarkable human being that is often imitated, but never duplicated. The man, the myth, the machine, Jay Casey!
That’s enough of my B.S. for now, hope you all had a great 4th of July and the summer hasn’t beat you up too bad and if it did, I hope you at least got paid well for it.
Cheers, Alan.
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