Any Recommendations On Roehl?

I recentlyngot my cdl permit herein south Alabama and been researching the best companies to go on board to train with or get cdl on my own and go out. Roehl has been recruiting me hard. Anyone tell me anything about their company? I also have a 12 year old daughter I want to ride along. Thanks.

Roehl is a great company. You cannot go wrong with them. You will have to ask them about your daughter. But most have an age restriction at 13 yrs old.

I appreciate your feedback. They will allow my daughter on after 6 momths. So that makes me happy. Saw some crappy reviews on them as well as some great ones. I understand everyone will have difference of opinions or bad days. We all have bad days but reviews based on your bad day shouldn't be a review of a company. Being self employed 28 years I know a little bit about what it takes to make money.

Roehl is a great company. You cannot go wrong with them. You will have to ask them about your daughter. But most have an age restriction at 13 yrs old.

Saw some crappy reviews on them as well as some great ones. I understand everyone will have difference of opinions or bad days

When it comes to the major carriers the review is really more a matter of the quality of the driver giving the review than the company itself. Trucking is performance based. The top performers get the best miles, the best runs, the best equipment, make the most money, and get some special favors from time to time. The lower performers get less of everything, and therefore are far less happy with their situation, which of course they blame on the company instead of their own poor performance or inability to get along with people.

The major carriers are the very upper 1% of the companies in this industry. They're the elite. They all have fantastic equipment, tons of perks, a variety of opportunities, and all the miles available you can handle. If you can't figure out how to be a top performer at a major carrier you're not going to figure it out anywhere else either.

So don't worry about reading opinions about the major carriers as "good vs bad". Show me a driver who thinks that any of the largest, most successful carriers in the nation is a lousy place to work and almost without fail I'll show you a lousy driver. I've worked at every type and size of carrier imaginable and I can't think of one single, solitary advantage to working for a small carrier.

Send a great driver to any major carrier in the nation and they're going to be earning top wage, top miles, and great treatment in short order. Do the same with a lousy driver and they'll be miserable in no time.

Welcome to our forum Randall!

I was logging on just to give you some advice about reviews of trucking companies, but Brett already covered it. He's exactly right. We always read those reviews as a driver's review of his own shortcomings. This business is so misunderstood by the newcomers. Most of them don't even realize how clueless they are, but it's obvious to those of us who are out here making it work everyday. There's nothing beneficial you can learn from reading those reviews - basically they're useless.

You said one thing that really interested me about you...

Being self employed 28 years I know a little bit about what it takes to make money.

I honestly think people who've been self employed have a leg up as truckers. They don't equate time with money. They know that results and productivity equal money. They already know about commitment and sacrifice just to get the job done.

Check out this article, I'm hoping you'll find it helpful.

Top Tier Drivers Operate Like Great Business Owners

Brett and Old school You guys are making this alot easier on me. I have had to run my business with as many as 6 full time employees to as little as just myself. Not because I didn't treat them right, but because I have a standard of excellence that I pride myself and my quality of work on. Don't show up hung over,high, 2 hours late, etc. I'm very hands on with my business. We don't cut corners. Do the job the way I taught you and there is no return trips to the job sites. I'm gonna be in that top 1% I assure you. I'm a worker and know nothing but work. Started at age 14 with my business and built a small empire. I have the same goals once I get in my own truck and get experience I plan on owning my own

I have the same goals once I get in my own truck and get experience I plan on owning my own

I suspect your business experience will help you figure out that owning a truck is not a business you want to be in. Everyone considers it, those who are really business savvy come to realize there's no worthwhile money in it, especially when you consider the capital expenditures, financial risk, operational risk, and quite honestly the comparable gravy train you'll have as a company driver.

Top Tier Drivers have the best of everything at a major carrier - tons of miles, a variety of opportunities, top level pay, special favors, the very best equipment - you'll be very well taken care of.

If you go and buy your own truck you're basically thrown into the shark tank as an entity of one in a commodity business where those with scale can haul freight so cheap the average profit margins are only 3% - 4%, which of course means half the trucks on the road don't even make that.

I'm confident you'll figure this out for yourself once you start running the numbers though.

Then again, you said you've "build an empire". If you have so much money that you're not buying a truck to make more money, but buying it because it's a cool toy to own, then have a blast. More power to ya.

Otherwise, when you compare everything a top tier company driver at a major carrier has to that of an owner operator you'll see there's no way you'll want to buy a truck.

Brett, small empire. Not big empire. Been told by truck owners after 2 years that is the way to go. However after owning a business I too disagreed and said i would be fine working as an employee and let someone else have my headaches. You just re assured me of that

Brett, small empire. Not big empire. Been told by truck owners after 2 years that is the way to go. However after owning a business I too disagreed and said i would be fine working as an employee and let someone else have my headaches. You just re assured me of that

Without a doubt, not every business is a good business to be in. In fact, most of them probably are not. That doesn't stop people from trying though. Unfortunately most truck drivers do not have very savvy business minds and they tend to buy trucks based on pride and vanity rather than earning potential. Sure, they all want to believe they'll make a lot more money and some of them probably do believe that, at least for a short time. But it's mostly about wanting to be the big boss man and having those bragging rights that you own your own rig.

I'm convinced that if you told them before they bought the truck that they weren't allowed to tell anyone they owned the truck, 90% of them wouldn't buy it in the first place.

you'll see there's no way you'll want to buy a truck.

Randall, this is something Brett and I have always agreed on. We've caught plenty of flack over this, but we're both business owners who don't think it makes financial sense to be an owner/operator in this business. I originally was going to get a little experience and then by a truck. I've owned big trucks before, but not for the freight business. I've always been "the boss," and I like it that way.

Once I got good at running a truck and making money, I realized I was the boss. Recently my dispatcher said something to me about some person at Knight (that's where I work), and he referred to them as "our boss." I realized I've been here almost five years and never even seen this person or heard of them! You'll find that Top Tier Drivers get treated special, make great money, and get extra perks that other drivers never dream of. I took the whole month of December off this year for some eye surgery. Nobody complained about it. They told me take care of what you need and call us when you're ready to get back at it. There's no way I could have afforded to do that while trying to take care of the overhead expenses involved in owning my own truck.

I've written a lot of paychecks in my life. I love having somebody writing me one every week!