Crete Carriers - Considering The Company

I mentioned in another thread I made not long ago, that I have been considering leaving Schneider. I did end up putting an application into Crete Carriers and talked to a recruiter which answered all the questions that came to mind. I am currently waiting for them to verify my work history and all those things. I have heard a lot of good things about Crete, I had the chance to talk to a few of their drivers while I was OTR and simply liked what they had to offer. Schneider is a great company, and besides a few polices I don't agree with; I have nothing bad to say at all. I have had nothing but good experiences here and everyone has always been friendly. I did end up staying with Schneider for a little over a year which is recommended to do, and I simply feel it's not a company I want to stay with long term for no one specific reason, more of personal feelings I suppose.

Nothing is set in stone yet, since they are simply going over my application and verifying my driving experiences, previous jobs, etc. But so far everything sounds good.

I don't plan to up and leave Schneider without any type of notice, I plan to put a two week notice(if I am 'hired' at Crete of course) in for many reasons. Two of those reasons are - 1: Schneider has been good to me, so it's the right thing to do. 2: There are only 5 drivers on this account, so it would put a strain on everyone if I just up and quit without notice. At least it'll give them two weeks to get another driver down here or hire someone.

Decided to post an update on here, just to let everyone know what's going on.

Jamie

Hope you get the job you want. I have seen a lot of Crete trucks out and about. They seem to have nice looking equipment. I suppose I could search for the answer, but I will ask, what do they haul?

Best of Luck Chris

Jamie I agree it's important to part-ways with Schneider professionally, which you are doing. No need to burn any bridges in this industry.

I was looking in this thread for what you hope to gain by making this move, I couldn't find anything of substance. What do you expect to improve by going to Crete?

Your answer will be helpful to someone who is perhaps in the same place with their current employer, especially since you mentioned this in a previous thread not that long ago...

So I have been thinking of going with another company that offers OTR flatbed. Right now, it's just a thought but we shall see.

As far as I know, that "box" cannot be checked with Crete. And to the best of my knowledge, neither can the "tanker" box be checked. Hmmmm...

So my curiosity peaked after I read further into the other thread and saw this...

However I'm not very interested in doing dryvan again if I was to go back OTR, at least not anytime in the near future.

Isn't the Crete OTR job running dry van? Then there was this...

That's one thing that has probably kept me here (Schneider) this long (besides completing my one year contract), is how things will be run differently at different companies which of course I know. I like how Schneider handles a lot of things but no company is perfect.

So let me understand this... you are moving from a company that you like the majority of how they handle things to one who by your own admission is not going to be perfect because no company ever is, and one that you won't know how they handle things until you are already there. So,...at the expense of repeating the same question; "what exactly do you hope to gain by going with Crete?"

I think Brett hit the nail square on the head when he replied to you with this observation and advice:

Jamie, it's hard to advise you because you contradict yourself sometimes and you don't seem to have a clear vision of what you want.

When you first joined this local account you said it was because you wanted to be home with your family more often. Now you're saying you want to return to OTR and that the time away from home wasn't a problem.

You said you would make double what you were making running OTR, and we called BS on that. Then you rescinded that statement but said you would make way more on this local account than you did OTR. Now you want to return to OTR where apparently you made less money and had less home time with your family? So you want to make less and be home less often?

You've spent a lot of time talking about how difficult certain items are to strap down and that you don't want to take the risk of something falling off the truck. But then you say that's not the reason you want to change jobs; that you simply want to return to OTR. You have the option of OTR with Schneider running dry van or tanker, and you say tanker sounds interesting too, but you're not sure if you want to do that.

Are you after the best pay? Do you want to be home more often or not? Do you like pulling a flatbed, but only if the loads are easy to secure? You're all over the place. You clearly don't know what you want. I'm not sure how we can help you when you have no clear vision of what you're looking for.

What exactly do you want Jamie?

what do they haul?

That question actually slipped my mind, since it was dryvan it didn't really bother me as much I guess?

What do you expect to improve by going to Crete?

I really don't know what to expect or how to answer that question honestly.

Isn't the Crete OTR job running dry van?

Yes I am going back OTR doing dryvan with Crete(if hired), which isn't what I planned originally when deciding to switch to another company.

What exactly do you want Jamie?

Again I cannot honestly answer that question, besides by saying I really loved over the road and Schneider is a good company. But I didn't like spending the majority of my time in the North East. That's is mostly why I didn't want to go back OTR dryvan with Schneider, because they simply have a lot of freight in that area, so a lot of solo drivers tend to stay in that part of the country the most.

Okay, fair enough.

Good luck. Hope it's what you are looking for. Ummm Jamie (spoken like Peter Falk in Columbo) just "one last question"...

Has it occurred to you that approaching Schneider with what you'd like in a job, might yield a positive, yet unexpected result?

And maybe you have... but please take this to heart...last year there was a risk of Swift losing the Walmart DC where I am assigned. Clearly my ideal job is "Walmart"... I had many conversations with them so I had a place to go, and they also knew where else I was looking and why. I kid you not, they absolutely went out of their way to communicate what was going on, and kept me up to date on other opportunities that might be appealing, including Albany NY. Fortunately they renegotiated their contract with more favorable terms and everyone is happy in Coal Valley. Keep in Mind (for all of you naysayers), Swift has over 17,000 drivers...I never once felt like a number in a very large crowd, I digress.

My point is...you go to Crete, you might be missing out on other really cool opportunities with Schneider if you do not have that conversation, and further to the point, don't expect Crete to bend over backwards to please you if 30 days in you decide it's not what you want. Things change with the bigger companies as they are always taking in new business...that might favor your desire for the future.

The devil we know, is many times better than the one we don't know.

I would recommend doing what G-Town started above. Talk with he people at Schneider about what you’re looking for, since you’re already there. I would also let them know that you are unhappy with what you encountered while OTR , and this is why you may be leaving to go with CCC. See what you hear then.

Jamie, I drove for Schneider for two years, operated out of the Lebanon (TN) OC and stayed almost exclusively in the Midwest (IN, IL, OH, WI) areas.

When I wanted different areas, I got the okay to run west to CA, CO, AZ. When they needed drivers to handle some Target dedicated out of VA, I did it. Same with Walmart in PA @ OH.

Please consider talking with your OC leadership team. I ONLY left SNI for better hometime. If you leave them just for the sake of leaving, you must start over proving yourself. That’s often easier said than done.

I did the Northeast runs when I had to, but I didn’t stay there. Maybe some discussion with your team could land you with more of what you want without losing what you’ve built.

I hope this helps.

Has it occurred to you that approaching Schneider with what you'd like in a job, might yield a positive, yet unexpected result?

Before I switched to this local account, I did take the time to talk to my DBL and the person right above him(forgot the correct position), but there wasn't much that could be done since they said something along the lines of it's about lucking out, since they have a lot of freight in the North East. Now that isn't exactly what they said, but it was the gist of it since I don't remember word for word. Due to my area I live, job wise there wasn't much to choose from, OTR/Regional/Local(port and the account I am on now)/tanker OTR and the family dollar account. I didn't want to team, so that limited my options a bit.

My point is...you go to Crete, you might be missing out on other really cool opportunities with Schneider if you do not have that conversation, and further to the point, don't expect Crete to bend over backwards to please you if 30 days in you decide it's not what you want. Things change with the bigger companies as they are always taking in new business...that might favor your desire for the future.

It might be worth mentioning again as maybe things have changed since I switched to this account, so before I up and leave; I'll contact a few people within Schneider to discuss those type of things.

Jamie, I drove for Schneider for two years, operated out of the Lebanon (TN) OC and stayed almost exclusively in the Midwest (IN, IL, OH, WI) areas.

When I wanted different areas, I got the okay to run west to CA, CO, AZ. When they needed drivers to handle some Target dedicated out of VA, I did it. Same with Walmart in PA @ OH.

Please consider talking with your OC leadership team. I ONLY left SNI for better hometime. If you leave them just for the sake of leaving, you must start over proving yourself. That’s often easier said than done.

I did the Northeast runs when I had to, but I didn’t stay there. Maybe some discussion with your team could land you with more of what you want without losing what you’ve built.

I hope this helps.

I had a completely different conversation regarding my time spent in the North East, I am out of the West Memphis, AR OC and when I was OTR my time generally went like this: I was usually sent to Texas the first few days, but then I'll get a load going to Ohio or something like that, and then it'll send me to PA, NJ, NY, NH, ME and those states where I will generally spend almost all my time in, until it's close to my home time, then they'll start sending me back mostly to the northern states to get me closer to Arkansas, then slowly make my way down here. I have talked to my DBL and the person right above him about the time I spent in the North East and how I didn't really like spending the majority of my time up there.

But it might be worth mentioning again, Schneider makes you wait 6 months minimum I heard when you want to switch between 'jobs' such as dryvan , flatbed, etc. But I shall see what they might say.

Jamie, you really have ants in your pants. You're handling your career the way I choose what flavor of ice cream I want at the store.

"The last time I was here I had chocolate, and I liked it, but I don't want chocolate again. Or maybe I do because it was really good! Nah, not again. Let's try something else. Oh, here's vanilla. That's a classic. That's always good. Nah, now that I think about it I'm sick of vanilla. Oh man, that guy over there just said something great about vanilla. Man, maybe I do want Vanilla! Well, I think I might. I wasn't going to get vanilla but that guy makes it sound so good. Yeah, I'm gonna get vanilla. It's a classic."

You're seeking out change for the sake of change. I've seen people who are always miserable so they're constantly looking for something else, but you're not like that. You're happy, but you constantly feel compelled to do something else - anything else - as long as it isn't what you're doing now.

You don't have any clear goals, preferences or specific dissatisfaction. You just always want to be doing something different from what you're doing now. I'm that way with ice cream, but not my career choices.

I think you should change your nickname to "Potluck" because you make career choices like you're playing Pin The Tail On The Donkey:

Definition of Potluck: used in reference to a situation in which one must take a chance that whatever is available will prove to be good or acceptable.