last saturday (the 22nd) on may across I-80 I stopped at the walmart in york nebraska ...And witnessed a Crete tractor pulling a reefer trailer ...So are Crete drivers now expected to pull reefer or is this just a rare occasion ?

 

Some Crete drivers have been pullig reefers for years, They call it the "meat fleet" from the olds when they hung the beef.
But now that they have combined operations who knows what will happen. I was told I would not pull a reefer but like I said....... :?

 

I'm pre hired at Crete and have the ok for orientation there as well as a few other companies right now , But have no desire to haul a noise box behind me so the potential hauling of reefer is not a selling feature , but I'd be comming in at 3 years experience which is .43 cPM which is an attractive feature...However the opti idle /century class tracors are not . CFI keeps trying to push Team Con-WAY dedicated on me as I live in Colorado ...nice trucks decent pay ,but Team driving is not a selling feature for me . Knight has a terminal here in Auora CO they run good equipment and appear to have a decent payscale ...But before I jump I need more real world investigation into these companies as well as others I have not yet explored ,As I don't want to jump just to jump again in 3-6 months...

 

I believe Crete has also re-absorbed Shaffer back under the Acklie umbrella. I've seen red tractors with shaffer reefers and blue tractors with crete dry boxes over the past few weeks.

 

reefers aren't that bad. i was also one of those who swore to never pull one of those things. all last week, i was pulling reefers for walmart out of casa grande, arizona. yeah, i got to turn the thing off after the deliveries were made, but the overall experience was different and not so difficult. it's a bit noisy, so what? when you get backed into a spot or a reefer truck or two back in next to you. you'll have to endure the noise while you're sleeping. you may as well get used to it.

i'm now trying to get on to the dedicated walmart fleet out of there. it's more rapid, disciplined, and really no sitting whatsoever. i enjoyed being on the go during all last week.

oh, and the company i drive for is the one getting slammed lately with all the rumors of possibly going under, swift. i don't really see anything that makes me believe they're in deep shit, financially. whenever i am at the phoenix terminal, i keep seeing more brand new daycab pro-stars, new flat-top volvos, more new otr pro-stars, and freightliners.

they are firing the idiot drivers who are constant screw ups, ones who are idle-holics, and the such.

ignorant and stupid people will believe anything they hear as long as it's something they hold a bias against.

 

I did trans am for a month, reefer isnt that bad, you might hear it start up and thats about it.

 

Bingo.

I believe Crete's parent company owns Hunt (flatbed). I've seen Crete pulling Scheaffer reefers for along time. Makes sense to keep the drivers rolling. In hhg, when United didn't have tonnage, I'd be hauling Mayflower orders 8)

 

What u mean "re" absorbed Shaffer back under the Acklie umbrella?

First Crete bought aquired Shaffer & Sunflower-- since Sunflower was closer (York, NE) Crete first started "cherry picking" all the Meat contracts and created their "meat fleet" bought some new Reefers and started using Shaffer/Sunflower trailers too<---- whatever they wanted to confiscate(it's good to be the King!" Since Shaffer had still many Strong high dollar contracts with Hershey and ties as well as a yard in Pa.....the Sunflower name got dropped-- their drivers/equipment merged with Shaffer, now phase 2 or 3- centralized consolidated operations in the corner room of Lincoln, Ne. Where right now, the final "cherry picking" is going and they are moving all the dry loads over to Crete( these used to be some good backhauls for Shaffer- no longer-- we've got to go 100% temp now-- and try to find new loads to replace those moved over to Crete. Soon, they'll drop the Shaffer name completely.

 

Crete also pulls dedicated reefer out of the Walmart DC in No.Platte, NE.
These are mostly plain white reefers.

 

There goes that mystery; I was wondering why those crete trucks were pulling white reefers.