Overcoming obstacles

Getting smoked out of Oregon JDT Trucking founder James Davis with some of his driver team (from left): Chris Cooper latest hurdle for small-fleet owner (who also works as a mechanic), Ed Davis (father of James), Robert Hall, James Davis, Chet

Mitchell and John Boyd.

BY MAX HEINE “I’ve always enjoyed challenges,” said James Davis, owner of JDT Trucking. As any small“I took that kind of mindset to the business side of things,” Davis said. “I wanted to do it right or not do it at all.” Champ in August. Basic good service drove the growth. “They do an incredible job of getting fleet owner knows, the nature of the job That translated into getting an attrac- trucks where I need them, when I need brings enough of them, like it or not, tive bundle of insurance and retirement them,” said Chris Loucks, product though Davis hasn’t minded adding a benefits that most small fleets couldn’t manager for Huttig Building Products in few high bars of his own. afford. northern Oregon. “For a relatively small

One was his vision for rebuilding Achieving those and other goals, as company, they seem to have a huge fleet. a 1993 Peterbilt 379, one of about 14 well as growing steadily over a decade, They usually have a truck or can make custom trucks in his Oregon-based fleet making extensive contributions to his one available.” that specializes in construction materi- community, diversifying into trucking- As of September, JDT had 23 comals. Not only has that favorite and others related businesses and remaining stable pany drivers, three owner-operators and won many show truck awards, but their during predictable and unpredictable five trucks leased through Davis’ father. availability also accounts in part for slowdowns were factors in JDT being “The drivers are always personJDT’s strong recruitment and retention. named Overdrive’s 2020 Small Fleet able and in good moods,” Loucks

said. “They’re not grumpy old farts. The trucks are always in impeccable condition.”

Communication with JDT staff is excellent, Loucks said. Davis traveled upstate to meet him when JDT first started hauling for them “and has come up pretty much every year since.”

Less than three weeks after Davis had bagged the small-fleet honor, he was thrown an unusual curveball: wildfires that plagued Oregon and California.

“We got out of the smoke for 10 days,” Davis said Sept. 25, after returning from a resort in Mexico’s Baja peninsula, where he’d taken his family. “Luckily a lot of customers notified us in enough James Davis credits his success in part to the counsel of his father, Ed Davis (left), and his mother, Rayven Davis (seated), based on their business experience. He and his wife, time that we got the drivers stopped.” Heather, are joined by two of their five children, Liv and Ethan Davis. Only one truck had to turn around in the middle of a job. At 16, he began training in mechani- He bought two trucks in 2011. By

Some drivers had a few days of down- cal work and learning to drive as he 2013, he had five trucks and leased three time, but most were able to stay busy moved trucks around the yard. At 18, owner-operators. He moved the busiduring September. In many parts of he went out with drivers, soon got his ness into a facility, hiring three people the state, “it looked like an apocalypse,” license and started driving on his own. for non-driving positions. The building, Davis said. Even with an air system set Unlike owner-operators who put in which had an office and one truck bay, to recirculate, “every once in a while, years as a company driver before buying was expanded last year. it smelled like a campfire inside your a truck, “I bought my first truck before The 2013 transition in itself was a big vehicle.” I turned 19,” in 1998, and leased to Tri- enough job, but at the same time Davis

Davis, 42, traces his trucking work to West. The truck was about as old as him eyed a “huge stepping stone” toward gethis early teens. His father drove for Tri- — a 1978 A Model Kenworth long-hood ting and keeping the best drivers: health West Transportation of Albany, Oregon, with a 3408 Caterpillar. insurance. He landed a plan through later serving as a dispatcher. “I started By 2000, Davis had his own author- Blue Cross Blue Shield, which also inwork there when I was 13, polishing, ity. Shortly before then, Tri-West had cludes vision and chiropractic plans. “It waxing and detailing trucks,” Davis said, folded, and Davis, having delivered to felt like a huge accomplishment,” he said. as well as filling potholes and doing some of its customers, got in touch and “A year later, we added retirement.” JDT other maintenance. landed some business. now also offers dental coverage. Perhaps more importantly, JDT has done well at keeping its drivers on the road, and not just during the wildfires or the coronavirus pandemic. During other economic downturns that usually put the brakes on the construction industry, and even milder seasonal dips, the fleet has kept steady and, over time, added trucks. “It seems like when one market slows The Overdrive Small Fleet Champ award is sponsored by the One9 Fuel Network, down, the other one picks up,” Davis which is geared toward small fleets and owner-operators, offering credit and fuel stop said. Makers of beams, decking, rebar options. One9 is produced by the Pilot Company. As winner, JDT Trucking received this and other construction materials “will championship belt. stay very busy from May/June up to

September/October.” Then makers of cabinets and other internal building components pick up in the winter.

This past winter also brought the coronavirus. “February, March and April were very difficult months,” he said. “We were really having to outsource to outside brokerages and just doing the Truckstop.com thing.” Looking for freight apart from its usual customers put JDT “outside our comfort zone,” and like most other small fleets, it was faced with rock-bottom rates. Nevertheless, JDT kept its drivers mostly busy and helped “supplement their pay to keep it where it should be.”

One of the biggest challenges Davis has faced during his fleet’s decade of growth had nothing to do with a downturn. Instead, it was a crisis of growth itself that came during JDT’s 2013 transition.

“That was a huge step of learning to delegate, because we went from five trucks and three owner-operators and me doing all the maintenance, all the billings, dispatching, driving a truck myself” to hiring “one full-time

Joel Sodorff drives this 1995 Peterbilt 379 extended hood. The Pete is powered with a 550-hp Caterpillar, a 13-speed transmission, a low-air leaf suspension and an air-ride front end.

SPINOFFS: BROKERAGE, MAINTENANCE AND PARTS

One distinguishing accomplishment of Oregonbased JDT Trucking has been owner James Davis’ ability to branch into closely related enterprises.

Through JDT Logistics, Davis keeps the loads that fit JDT Trucking’s core business, construction materials. “We get offered a lot of freight,” he said. In the last three or four months, there are “a lot more loads than there are trucks out there, at least on the West Coast,” he said in September.

JDT has developed good rapport with other carriers and offers those fleets the freight it can’t handle.

Those relationships also provide a customer base for JDT’s other spinoffs, including maintenance. His shop usually stays busy on JDT trucks, but “we offer those services when we can,” he said. “It’s got to fit within our timeframe.”

Likewise, JDT’s network of carriers has shown interest in buying parts. “A lot of people on the West Coast like the look of our trucks,” said Davis, whose fleet keeps about 14 customized trucks. “We’re dealers for Dynaflex, Lincoln Chrome, 12 Gauge, Hogebuilt.”

Customized items also are available. “We’ve done our own steps, light bars, deck plates,” thanks largely to having a metal fabricator across the street.

The customized trucks might be the initial draw for many of JDT’s drivers, said Joel Sodorff, who drives a company-owned 1995 Peterbilt 379 with a stretched wheelbase and a black-and-copper paint job. “But what has kept me and kept such a good group of drivers is the people. … You enjoy who you work with as much as what you’re doing. I think that’s how he keeps most of us around.” dispatcher, one dispatcher/broker and also a mechanic. Not long after that, I hired someone in payroll/accounting. It was a lot of releasing the reins.”

Even with all that responsibility distributed, Davis didn’t retreat to a private office. “I still sit on the floor in the middle of everything.” He said that while some leaders warn that no one else will do parts of your job as well as you would, he’s learned that as long as you hire the right people for each job, it works out. In JDT’s case, he said, “It shows for itself in the way we’ve grown.”

At the same time, the changes were hard, and there were times of high anxiety. “Luckily, I had a friend, Jim Oldland. I would meet with him and discuss my frustrations.” Oldland, of Oldland Distributing, counseled Davis that if he would learn from Oldland’s mistakes, Davis would be “years ahead” of him. He also got counsel from his father, who’d worked in different trucking capacities, and his mother, who had managed people at a fairgrounds.

His immediate family, too – his wife, Heather, and their five children – have been a constant support, as have his JDT colleagues. “My work family has stuck together over the years of growth, experiencing change, and stayed right by my side.”

With his parents and Oldland, in particular, “I had some people I could turn to and pick their brain and try not to make too many mistakes,” he said.

One mistake, though, crept in about 18 months ago. “I got comfortable with having a great staff, and everything seemed to be just going good,” he said. Then he realized, “I wasn’t watching the numbers as good as I always have.”

One of the key numbers was operating costs for his shop. “I’d always told the shop not to sit on too much inventory,” especially since JDT’s facility was close to original equipment dealers that had all the parts the fleet needed. “We were

ordering lots of parts, and they were not For example, if Davis hears a driver’s getting installed.” subject to unreasonable detention, “he’ll

Part of resolving the problem was contact the customer directly and basirehiring the mechanic, Thomas Fisher, cally demand more money for making he’d hired in 2013 but who’d since us sit there,” said company driver Chris moved away. “He’s really good,” Davis Cooper. It’s not unusual for Davis to said. “He orders all the parts. As far as text drivers about something other than managing the numbers inside the office, business, Cooper said. “It’s more of a I’ve just got to pay more attention.” personal relationship than a boss-em-

Another element Davis believes criti- ployee relationship.” cal to the success of JDT: how drivers are That personal touch has extended treated. “Being one of the guys doesn’t more broadly to the community where hurt,” he said. His drivers see him get JDT is based, Center Point, a suburb of behind the wheel for the occasional Medford. Citing a passion for “shop loload. If Davis springs for the lunch tab cal, support local, stay local,” Davis supwhen he’s out with another driver, “it ports many local causes. These include gives them a smile,” he said. the Hearts and Vines Association, The

“James built this thing from the cab of Boys and Girls Club, The Crater FFA, the truck,” said Joel Sodorff, a JDT com- Abraham Elementary School, American pany driver. “He’s a driver at heart. He Truck Historical Society, Brooks Anunderstands what we’re going through. tique Truck Museum and Rogue Valley He relates to us on a different level than Soccer Club, along with parades, charisomeone who’s not actually spent time ties, car shows and school functions. out here.” The good driver relationships, which CCJ AutoDeck 2020 Ad.pdf 1 9/1/20 8:59 AM go a long way toward recruiting and retaining the best drivers, also have translated into an outstanding safety record. The Oregon Trucking Association awarded JDT first place for safety last year for a 1 million mile fleet. The company earned Great West Casualty’s Platinum Award, which is bestowed to less than 1% of the insurer’s clients.

“We have worker comp through [the State of Oregon’s State Accident and Insurance Fund] and have one of the best ratings in the industry for the state,” Davis said.

Given the uncertainties with the pandemic and the economy, “I just don’t see growth in the near future,” Davis said. Even when things become more stable, growth likely would be easy, but he’s not sure he’ll pursue it.

“I still enjoy coming to work,” he said. “I want to keep it that way.”

– Jason Cannon contributed to this story.