Driver Lifestyles

Friendships of the Road

The life of an expediter.

New places, new sights and new people to meet.

New people. According to the expediters surveyed for this article, meeting new people and developing lasting friendships are part of the benefits of the expediting lifestyle.

And, it's gotten easier to develop and maintain those relationships that begin on the road. With inexpensive cell phone rates and email, it's no sweat to stay in touch with those other expediters you might meet on the docks or at a layover location.

Expedited fleet owner Dave Corfman, a familiar name to ExpeditersOnline visitors, tells us, "In my case, I've met a lot of people through the Expedite Expos, the Expediter Workshops and so on."

"My wife and I met quite a few folks during our driving days and we stay in regular contact with them, as well as our former drivers. We might not see them very often but we talk to them on the phone frequently. We've known people in the business for a long time."

Loyel and Carolyn Hershberger run a tractor-trailer team operation and have both a truckload and expedite background. Loyel says, "You're more likely to develop friendships through expediting than in truckload because you have more time between loads."

"Sitting in the same location for a day or so gives you the opportunity to meet other expediters, especially from your own company. You'll see someone and say hi; you'll talk awhile, exchange phone numbers and develop a friendship that way."

He continues, "We've made some real good friends on the road who will stop by our house and see us when they're passing through our area and we'll do the same when we're around their home turf."

"Billie Johnson and Amy Richardson are two good expediter friends who we met on the road and have developed an almost 'family' relationship with. We stay in touch and talk on a regular basis."

"Sometimes when you're driving, and you just get bored, you'll run through the contacts on your phone and give them a call."


"I think that because expediting is a small industry (in numbers of people involved), it's a closer knit and friendlier community."


So what makes this segment of transportation "friendlier" than truckload or other types of trucking? Straight truck expediters Carrol and Dora Bean have a theory:

"In expediting we have more time to spend with people, we don't always have those back-to-back runs that keep us constantly moving," Carrol opines. "The truckload guys might not have the time to have coffee and socialize."

"Teams in expedite usually get together with other teams because the women like to get together, but the single drivers will blend in with a group of expediters very well. They've got families at home and they like to talk about them, too."

Dora tells us, "You develop quite a network of friends out here, with many of them from different companies. We talk to everyone because we're all in the trucking industry and we're all in expediting. We talk shop, share information about families and how things are going; we don't just talk business."

"Within our network of friends, sometimes we'll be out of contact with someone for a long stretch of time and suddenly, one of us will call the other or run into each other on the road. I think it would make for a pretty dismal life out here if we kept to ourselves and never met anyone."

For some expediters, their friendships extend beyond the truckstop reunions with old acquaintances:
Bob and Linda Caffee explain, "We've had friends from the road over to our house. Most of the time though, if they let us know that they're passing through the St. Louis area, we'll meet them at a restaurant."

"One time we were in Laredo and I thought I spotted a friend's truck. I called them and it turned out to be our friends. While I was talking to them, another couple who had seen our name on the truck came up and introduced themselves. It turned out that we had spoken on the phone to this new couple six months before and we had helped to recruit them."

She adds, "We find that our friends from the road help keep us on track. For example, one of our good friends is an expediter from California. Whenever we get out that way, and maybe have a question like, 'where's a good place to park?,' we'll give him a call and he gives us the info."

"A road friend of ours from Philadelphia has been an inspiration for us in learning how to run a truck in expediting. His good advice has really helped us in this business."


Rich and Mary Moore have developed a friendship that has stood the test of time:
Rich relates, "We've known Terry and Rene O'Connell for around 20 years. The four of us have vacationed together, we've visited each other's homes many times and we talk frequently on the phone."

"We start our conversations with shop talk, or as Mary says, 'You guys always talk about trucks!' We discuss sports, politics, current events and just about any other topic. They are great friends and we met them through expediting."

"There are other current and former expediters who we've met on the road and have remained in touch with over the years.
It's interesting that in this form of trucking, you meet so many people from so many previous occupations. One of my very good expediter friends, recently passed, was John O'Mahoney who was a New Jersey city policeman for 29 years. We remained in touch on a weekly basis."

"Of course," Moore says with a laugh, there are those people you meet who you can't wait to get away from."