New To Trucking Cannot Decide: Advice Needed

BoxyBrown

Member
Hello All!

First-time poster here after lurking for a while. I’m a rookie with zero experience besides a 3.5 weeks training sesh with Western Express. Wasn’t the best experience but wasn’t the worst either. Drove a little under 10k miles. Most of the bad came from the fact I was sleep-deprived the whole time and not at 100% because I’m a light sleeper and found sleeping in the moving truck almost impossible. They have been trying to find me a truck to go solo for almost a week now. They basically kicked me out of my trainer’s truck and gave him a new trainee since there was a bunch of ppl waiting for a trainer. I feel ready enough to go solo but at the same time feel like a little more time with a trainer wouldn’t hurt either.

I’m considering leaving WE for another company though. Either Knight or Schneider. I’m leaning towards Knight. So my dilemma is:

Should I start over with a new company that is overall better, where I would be paid more, but would have to start the whole thing over and go through another month or so of sleep-deprived training hell?

Or:

Stick it out with WE since I’m familiar with them and the routes I’d be getting, but make less money and have to deal with their complete $***show of a terminal in southern CA.

Logic and horror stories throughout the net are telling me to leave for greener pastures before I get in too deep with WE. However, one thing about WE is that they are a very beginner-friendly company that’s nearly impossible to be fired from- whereas others are not so lenient. I don’t really see myself f***ing up that bad, but you never know what could happen to a rookie solo driver out there. It would suck to quit WE, be blacklisted by them, then get fired from the new company for whatever reason, then not have anywhere to go.

What do you guys think is my best option? I’m totally on the fence and experiencing a lot of decision fatigue.
 
i am not certain that any company will just put you into a truck with so little experience. you may have to go with another trainer, which means more sleep problems for you.

your best bet is a local company like any of the LTL companies, and work the city.

many of those companies might try to put you on at night, doing linehaul, but given your lack of skills right now, and the night time driving, that may not really happen.

anyplace you go, most likely you will start all over again.
 
Like the terminal managers were highly charismatic and sleeping with all the female employees, or what? CEO known to wear aviators and sleep with all the female higher-ups?
I think he means there's people that eat, breathe, sleep, and poop Orange.

And its not because of too many skittles.

Also some of the types that if they didn't have a set of rules to tell them what to do, they wouldn't know what to do. We have some of those here at Walmart. It's not a knock, as they're all usually decent people, just a little short on personality.
 
Their terminals also have that First National Bank of Evil vibe where you feel like the farmer going in for a loan wearing overalls.

But since all megas suck, Schneider to me is a better bottom than most.

Still high tail out of there as soon as you can do better, however you define it (don't let it be strictly about money).
 
Their terminals also have that First National Bank of Evil vibe where you feel like the farmer going in for a loan wearing overalls.

But since all megas suck, Schneider to me is a better bottom than most.

Still high tail out of there as soon as you can do better, however you define it (don't let it be strictly about money).
I suppose that's better than the Bloomington, CA WE terminal which is like an old, emptied out penitentiary with desks thrown in to convert it to a terminal. The felons they hire must feel like their right back in prison. The "driver lounge" is enough to make one shed tears.

How long ago were you with the cult and how long before you escaped?
 
I suppose that's better than the Bloomington, CA WE terminal which is like an old, emptied out penitentiary with desks thrown in to convert it to a terminal. The felons they hire must feel like their right back in prison. The "driver lounge" is enough to make one shed tears.

How long ago were you with the cult and how long before you escaped?
About 3 and a half years. The money kept me there until even that wasn't enough. I went from that to truck ownership. I was at another mega right before that for a year and a half.

Both were local jobs, home daily. Dedicated account for the first, rail containers for orange. Still doing rail containers.
 

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