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September/October 2019
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FEATURES
Class 8 Update..................................................................................... 6
Owning The Wheel............................................................................. 8
Sudoku Puzzle.................................................................................... 14
Advertisers
Coal City Cob Company..........................5
ContainerPort..........................................15
FedEx..........................................................9
Merit............................................................5
New Waverly............................................13
P.I. & I Motor Express...............................4
Star Freight...........................................3, 12
Tran Stewart.............................................10
UPS Freight..............................................16

Class 8 Update
A couple of
Class 8-related
news items to note:
New Class 8 truck sales continued to soar in July,
but orders spiraled downward
Sales of new Class 8 trucks in the U.S. reached
record levels in July while the number of new
trucks being built reached new heights for the
fourth month in a row. At the same time, orders for
new trucks plummeted, indicating
that the torrid sales
and build rates can’t last
much longer.
July sales reached 25,607
for the month, making it the
best July ever. Sales grew
by 7.1% over June numbers,
when 23,900 units
were sold. Compared to July
2018, sales grew by 21.4%.
Of the Class 8 trucks sold
in July, 18,927, or 73.9%,
were road tractors, up 8.4%
from June sales of 17,455
and up 18.9% over July
2018 sales numbers.
Vocational trucks, those
equipped with dump bodies
or other non-fifth wheel applications,
made up 26.1%
of the July total with 6,680
sold. That number was 3.5% ahead of June sales
of vocational units and 16.0% better than July
2018 sales.
For the first seven months of the year, 163,266
trucks have been sold, outdistancing sales during
the same period of 2018 by 29,692 units, or a
22.2% increase.
Orders for new trucks showed an entirely different
picture, falling from 13,100 in June to a dismal
3,127 in July, a decline of 76.1%. Compared
to July of last year, when 33,160 trucks were ordered,
new orders fell by 90.6%.
Dealer inventories are also at high levels, indicating
market saturation. Buyers are, for the most
part, taking delivery of the trucks they have ordered,
but they aren’t ordering more. At the dealers,
shoppers are scarce.
It’s a situation that can’t last. In July, the backlog
of trucks ordered but not yet manufactured
dropped to about 5.4 months from a wait period of
nearly 12 months in November 2018. The backlog
will continue to shrink as sales continue to
approach 25,000 per month and orders number
nearly 22,000 less. “This order-to-build imbalance
has caused backlogs to tumble since their
October 2018 peak,” said ACT President and Senior
Analyst Kenny Vieth. “Unfortunately, without
a catalyst in sight, it is a trend that we expect to
continue.”
At some point, OEMs will undoubtedly announce
production cuts if not line closures and
possible layoffs. That has already happened in
Springfield, Ohio, with Navistar’s August 15 announcement
of reduced production rates at that
medium-duty build facility.
For the present, however, carriers are still taking
delivery of trucks ordered.
6 I Job Opportunities

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• Huge Earning Potential –
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• Sign-On Bonus
• Fuel Discounts
• Breakdown assistance
• OTR loads (90% customer loads
not brokers)
• Majority drop & hook
• Year round work
• Family-Owned company located
in Ontario, California
• No trailer fees
• Flexible schedule
• Hablamos Español

Owning the Wheel
By Cliff abbott
Linda Caffee and husband Bob run
expedited freight throughout the
Lower 48.
Linda Caffee knows how to get things done. “It’s
a case of being organized and knowing what
you’re doing,” says Women in Trucking’s July
2019 Member of the Month.
Being organized, however, isn’t as easy as it
seems when you start with a team over-the-road driving
job then throw in bookkeeping for the business,
holding a position as president of Trucker Buddy International
(and communicating with two overseas
classes), writing multiple blogs, moderating an Internet
forum, appearing in four or more truck shows
plus WIT events each year and making instructional
videos for new drivers. Oh, and she cross-stitches in
her spare time — “when I want to relax,” she said.
Caffee is a former director for
WIT and remains active in the
organization. She and husband
Bob are leased to Landstar Express
America and run expedited
freight throughout the Lower 48.
They are among a select group
to have a truck stop bearing their
name. As 2014 winners of the TA
Petro Citizen Driver Award, the
North Las Vegas, Nevada, Petro
is known as the Bob & Linda
Caffee Center.
Freightliner is their brand, and
the couple are Team Run Smart
Pros for the manufacturer. They were still awaiting
their new truck, a 2019 Freightliner Cascadia with
120-inch ARI Legacy Sleeper, when she spoke with
The Trucker.
“We do a lot of loads where we don’t have access
to showers, so the new sleeper will be great
for those,” she said. “It’s also equipped for use as
an RV. We can find a campground that allows commercial
vehicles and hook up electric and sewer like
any camper.”
The truck was due for delivery in March, but it was
caught in a hailstorm that swept through northern Indiana,
causing considerable damage that required repair
before the keys could be handed over. The wait is
over and the Caffees have taken delivery. Linda posted
a video tour of their new road home on YouTube
with a link from their Facebook page.
To stay productive until their new truck was ready,
the couple drove a tractor trailer for the Dale Coyne
IndyCar Race Team. While she enjoyed the work,
she missed the 100-inch sleeper on their old truck.
The refrigerator in the Western Star tractor was
smaller, there was no porta-potty, and without an inverter,
Linda couldn’t make coffee before beginning
her driving shift.
When they take possession of the new truck,
things will feel more at home.
“We’ve gone from a 96-inch factory sleeper to a
100-inch and now, 120-inches,” she said. “It’s only
another 20 inches, but it will probably be like we’re
living in a castle. It’s definitely a step up.”
Linda’s trucking career started early, with a fascination
for the trucks she saw on
local highways. But her dream
took a back seat to the responsibility
of raising her two daughters
while she worked at a data
processing job at the local courthouse.
But the time came when
she obtained her chauffer’s license
and worked as a relief
driver for the company where
Bob was a diesel mechanic.
Once their younger daughter left
for college, she and Bob hit the
road, eventually choosing expedited
freight after attending an
Expedite Expo conference. They
soon bought the first of several
Freightliner straight trucks. Linda joined the Expediters
Online forum (expeditersonline.com) to learn
the business and share experiences. Today, she’s a
moderator of the forum with nearly 6,700 posts under
her belt, and writes a regular blog titled “It’s a Team’s
Life.”
Her experience with WIT began in much the same
way, at a truck show, “I think in 2006 in Louisville,”
she said. “I met Ellen Voie at the Women In Trucking
booth and things went from there.” At first, Linda had
reservations, wondering if an organization focused
on women might be counterproductive to efforts to
fit in. “If it’s the same job for everyone,” she said,
“do we want to single out women as different? But,
after I thought about it, women are different and we
think differently, so it makes sense to have a womancentered
organization.”
Along with Bob, she plans to share her knowledge
and expertise for a long time to come.
8 I Job Opportunities

THETRUCKER.COM

Sudoku puzzle
Sudoku
How to play: You must complete the Sudoku puzzle so
that within each and every row, column and region, the
numbers one through nine are only written once.
There are 9 rows in a traditional Sudoku puzzle. Every
row must contain the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8,
and 9. There may not be any duplicate numbers in any
row. In other words, there can not be any rows that are
identical
There are 9 columns in a traditional Sudoku puzzle.
Like the Sudoku rule for rows, every column must
Difficulty: Medium
also contain the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9.
Again, there may not be any duplicate numbers in any
column. Each column will be unique as a result.
A region is a 3x3 box like the one shown to the left.
There are 9 regions in a traditional Sudoku puzzle.
Like the Sudoku requirements for rows and columns,
every region must also contain the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4,
5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. Duplicate numbers are not permitted
in any region. Each region will differ from the other
regions.
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14 I Job Opportunities