Thanksgiving at Home
by
Phil Madsen, Expediter
(Written November 25, 2004. Edited November 29, 2005 for publication on SuccessfulExpediters.com)
Last year, as rookie truckers, Diane and I spent Thanksgiving on the road. That was a very-cool event that we've since talked about many times since (See: Thanksgiving On The Road).
As Thanksgiving approached this year, we wondered where we would be when it came and how we would celebrate. We planned to stay in service over the holiday. Our hope was that we'd be under load on a nice, long run. A lot of expediters go out of service and head home for Thanksgiving. It was a safe bet we would be busy because of that.
Tuesday morning we delivered a load near Green Bay, Wisconsin. We headed to a rest area and took a two-hour nap as we waited for our next load. We were a little surprised we had not been pre-dispatched. It had been really busy in the last few months. Predispatches have become common.
For non-truckers reading this, pre-dispatch means you are assigned another load before you deliver the load you currently have on your truck. Expediters generally serve one shipper at a time. Unless the shipper has ordered multiple stops, you pickup and deliver one load at a time. When a run is complete, you wait for the next one, which could take you across town or across the nation. When you are pre-dispatched, you don't have to wait for your next load. You already know what it is and where it will take you.
When noon came and went, and no load offers came in, we got nervous. Thursday would likely be quiet since shippers and receivers generally have the holiday off. We wanted to be under load. We decided to deadhead (drive empty at our expense) to Chicago, where the chances of getting a load would be much better.
Normally, we'll wait in an area twenty-four hours for a load to come our way. Most times, one does. Staying put saves you the expense of deadheading. This time, we didn't want to wait. We wanted to be loaded before Thanksgiving. Chicago was just a few hours away.
Five minutes on our way to Chicago, a dispatcher called and asked if we planned to stay out over Thanksgiving (meaning out on the road, available to haul freight). When Diane said, "Yes." the offer was made; pick up in Minnesota early Wednesday morning and deliver near San Francisco Monday morning.
"Take it!" I said, and Diane quickly did.
The pickup was just 50 miles from home. After picking up the freight on Wednesday, we would not have to leave Minnesota until sometime Friday to make the California delivery on time. This year, we will be under load on Thanksgiving and at home too.