A united trucking industry is a stronger trucking industry

Making New Year’s resolutions is not my bag. Never had much interest in dealing with my most undesirable traits. This year, though, I’m making a resolution for the Canadian trucking…

When shiny toys like Convoy don’t quite work

Convoy, the darling digital broker that promised to disrupt the supply chain, has closed its doors. It looks like eliminating the middle man isn’t as easy in trucking as it…

The boys’ club is getting old

Not long ago the only women at the Toronto Transportation Club’s annual dinner were the significant others of local trucking company execs. That’s changing. Last year, 35% of the attendees…

Game planning for a successful sales team

You know business is soft when you see carriers playing the sales equivalent of a neutral zone trap. They’re on their heels, protecting existing customers and slashing costs. Bye-bye, Winnipeg…

Remembering the Yellow Corp. of days gone by

Count me in as another Yellow Freight alumnus who painfully watched the 99-year-old icon close its doors for good. Yellow hired me as a sales representative in 1983, fresh out…

Protect your fleet from double brokering scams

Even a freight recession can bring new opportunities, new markets, new services, and new customers. But no one group is hustling harder right now than the scammers who use load…

2023 is a buyer’s market in trucking M&A

This has not been a banner year for the trucking industry. Economic conditions have erased the gains in tonnage and profit since the start of the pandemic. We are in…

Driver Inc. fight may be a lost cause

When I sold my trucking business in 2012, a one-page filing mistake landed me a seven-figure headache. Eleven years and three court dates later, Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) finally resolved…

What’s eating Canada’s trucking CEOs?

The TruckNews.com survey about the biggest challenges facing Canadian trucking executives in 2023 is a rich menu of column ideas. In the last issue, I covered two of them—people problems…

Trucking executives offered some words from the wise

As 2022 came to an end, TruckNews.com asked some of the country’s top trucking executives to list the biggest challenges they’ll face this year. My pal Scott Tilley, president…

Reasons to be happy after another year in trucking

What a roller-coaster ride the last 12 months have been. Let’s welcome 2023! At this time last year, the trucking industry was riding the tailwinds of the biggest freight boom…

Today’s spot market includes unique dynamics

For a long time “spot” was the dirtiest four-letter word in freight. Loads went to load boards and brokers after every carrier in the shipper’s routing guide had given them…

Customers trace shipments when they don’t trust carriers

When you’re a columnist, public relations folks send you emails pitching topics to write about. Most are quickly routed to the junk folder. Lately my inbox is filling up with…

Legacy carriers and newcomers have created two trucking industries

Earlier this summer I accepted a speaking gig at the Truck Training Schools Association of Ontario’s annual conference. The session, “Making cents (sense) of our industry,” was intended to be…

It’s time to end pay by the mile

No conversation about safety would be complete without a look at how we pay our drivers. Yet pay and safety are rarely mentioned in the same sentence. Many stakeholders, including…