Comments By penn99

Howdy, Penn / G ~!

Welcome to Trucking Truth, for sure!

Not sure if you've found it, but glad you've found Brett's AWESOME book; Here's a way to search all info (most, anyway) by tags;

You can just scroll down to 'Roehl' easily enough, and any other companies that may have piqued your interest :

All Topics by Tags

Hope this helps a bit, and congrats & kudos with your upcoming career!! Please keep us posted, and ask away with ANY future questions. (I'm the trucker's wife of the site, but am always around playing 'cheerleader/PR person' as well, haha!)

~ Anne ~

Thank you Anne!!

And... thank you, Old School. I appreciate your input. I am open minded and objective... and vibe here on TT feels good!! I am looking forward... to... moving forward!!

I will continue to do my due diligence... I have to look at all info) in which a fair amount of bad things have been said about some of Roehl's practices.

If you are serious about doing your due diligence, you will soon discover why this website was conceived. There is a lot of nonsense on the internet concerning trucking companies. This career is totally performance based. It helps to think of it in terms of professional sports. The players who are good at it stay in the profession. The ones who don't make the cut get cast aside. Trucking works the same way.

Now, if I want advice on which sports team I want to play with, I don't go looking for advice from the folks who didn't make the cut. They are going to be bitter and talking bad about the team owners and how they manage the team. Winners don't take advice from losers. I can promise you the folks on the internet complaining about any trucking company's practices are the people who tried to work for that company but for some reason, which you have no way of knowing, didn't manage to stay on the team. People who fail at trucking don't like to tell everybody the real reason why they got tossed out. It's a more acceptable practice to just come up with some outlandish tale of the company treating them badly. I've been doing this a good while, and I have never seen someone who was seriously doing a great job at it get fired for no reason. These companies need drivers badly and they are willing to give a lot of folks a shot at success. When a person doesn't demonstrate a proclivity for success at this that is when they lose their jobs. Most of what you read is not even true. Those online reviews of trucking companies are basically worthless. You have to read them as if the driver is telling on themselves, even if they lay the blame at the trucking company.

Here's my personal experience... I started my trucking career at Western Express. Try looking up some reviews for that company. The reviews are terrible. I was frightened. It sounded as if the devil himself was the CEO. None of it turned out to be true. What was true was that any trucker who could outperform his peers was treated like the star athlete on a team. I met drivers there who claimed they could never get more than 1,800 miles per week. That made no sense to me. I was doing over 3,000 miles each week. It wasn't a problem with the company, yet all of those drivers blamed it on the company. The problem lay with drivers who either couldn't take care of their business, or were just too lazy or hard-headed to learn to do the job in a way that was productive.

Roehl is a great place to start. Several of our members got their start there. They aren't going to treat you badly, but they will be expecting you to show them that you are worth their investment.

We also have a great many members here who work at the other companies you mentioned. I work for Knight, G-Town works for Swift, Pete B is a long time driver at Schneider. All of us are doing very well out here.

Hello forum family...

New to the concept of trucking as a career (umm... 2nd career for me) and relatively new to this forum. I live in the Phoenix metro area and I have been researching the 'best' companies for paid CDL training and inadvertently ran into this forum.... and thankfully so!! Great information here and I enjoy the positive vibe.

With this post, I will be a bit vague about myself and my current steps moving forward... however, as things do move forward, I suspect that I would start a thread in the 'diary' section once my direction is 100% confirmed.

In doing my initial research, I have come across several companies that have sparked a 'local' interest for me.... Knight, Swift, Schneider, and Roehl. And there are a few other companies that I may look at further.... Wilson Logistics, CFI, etc. As such, I made a few initial online applications... and my application with Roehl has progressed quickly and in a nice way.

I have scoured this forum for information specific to Roehl, flatbeds (fleet based out of Phoenix), and the trucker life. I have read numerous discussion topics and numerous diaries on this forum. I have also read many of the blogs and I have recently finished reading Brett's online book. I am currently listening to various podcasts by Brett.... and.... I intend to start the High Road Training Program today in an effort to obtain my permit relatively soon.

Thus far, I have read many positive things about Roehl as a company, as well as the training that Roehl provides. Unfortunately, I have also found on a different forum (sorry TT... I have to look at all info) in which a fair amount of bad things have been said about some of Roehl's practices. Although some of that info seems dated, it has been very disheartening to see.

And so... I am respectfully asking for a little feedback on any 'recent' experience with any (or all) of the following items:

1) Training experience with Roehl.

2) General work experience with Roehl.

3) Driving/working flatbeds with Roehl.

4) Your work experience specific to Roehl's Phoenix terminal.

I will continue to do my due diligence in digging through the TT website for more info.

Thank you in advance. G