00:08 Welcome to Six-Figure Trucker, the podcast where we share advice on how to be successful in trucking and have fun while doing so. We’ll share stories, news, and advice on how to earn six figures in trucking, and we’ll speak to guys and gals that are already doing so. Let’s get to the show. Hello everyone and welcome to the Six-Figure Trucker brought to you by Norton Transport. And if you join us each and every week, you know, this is a format where we elevate and celebrate the drivers of Norton Transport. Wouldn’t be able to make it without them. And you know, another thing we’ve done recently is we let you get to know the drivers, what they do on the road and off the road, those kind of things. Got a very special guest with us joining us now. That’d be Earnest Walker. Earnest, how are you?

00:56 Hey, I’m great, John. How about yourself this morning?

00:59 I’m doing great, doing great. Now, looking at the background of where you are, it looks like you’re at home.

01:05 Finally. Finally. Long time coming. Started out on Monday and, you know, I was ready to get home since I left Monday. So, I finally made it.

01:16 Okay, so five straight days on the road?

01:20 Yes, yes. Mhm.

01:22 Where did the road take you? Where did the road take you?

01:25 Oh, man. Well, well, actually, John, now that I think about it, I think I left on a Sunday evening because I left out and I went down to Houston, Texas. Then I left Houston and went to Kansas City, Missouri. Then I left Kansas City, Missouri and went to Roseville, Minnesota and went to Mobile, Alabama.

01:56 That puts you pretty close to home, right?

01:58 Yes. Yes. Yes.

02:00 Got you. You live in Indianola, Mississippi?

02:03 Yes. You’re born and raised in Hollandale, Mississippi.

02:06 Seen some hot temperatures— Okay. Okay. How hot is it gotten already this year in Indianola?

02:15 Highest we’ve seen already is about 80 80 85°. But it hadn’t hit us too hard yet.

02:25 Got you. Now we were talking about 5 days on the road and I was pulling up some statistics about Mr. Earnest Walker here and it looks like you do about 4,100 miles a month. Does that sound pretty close to your calculations?

02:42 Yes. Yes. Yes. Here lately the average probably went down because I took a break for a few months. Toward the end of the year from December to about late February.

02:57 Okay. You didn’t drive quite as much.

03:00 Yeah. Yeah. So so that average has went down. But it’ll be back up short. Don’t worry.

03:08 Got you. Well let me brag on you a little bit, Earnest. I was looking at your categories here and I’m going to tick them off here and get your reaction to them. You’ve got a 100% check-in completion check-in rate rather, 90% completion and for the year you’re on time 79% of the time. How do you achieve each of those stats?

03:35 Man, really by doing what I’m supposed to do. You know, you plan your route and do what you planned. You know, of course we understand sometimes inclement weather gets in the way. Which is some of the reason why the on-time delivery is down a bit. Cuz the earlier part of the year we had a lot of ice, a lot of stormy weather. We couldn’t really get to where you was going efficiently as I would like.

04:07 Right. I was going to say those are things you can’t control, the weather.

04:11 Right, right, right. You know, you know. And so, things outside of your control we can’t worry about, but the things you can control, you have to learn to be efficient at those, which is what you’re supposed to do.

04:22 Got you. I want to drill down a little bit more on that on-time percentage. Right now we are just starting into May, but in the month of April check this out, you were on time 100% of the time.

04:39 Yes. It’s always good when, you know, when I can be on time all the time.

04:48 Yeah. And of course, that being the first month of the second quarter, you’re on time 100% of the time here in quarter two. So, I know that’s something to be proud about for you, and that’s something we’re glad about as a company, and all of our customers are glad about when they get their trucks on time.

05:07 Right, absolutely, absolutely. I mean, I’m excited about that. Cuz, you know, the more things I do right, the more things y’all do right toward me.

05:17 I got you. I got you. Now, let’s do a little background on Earnest Walker. Earnest is a Class A driver, and you are certified with compressed natural gas, manual transmission, right-hand drive, have the specialty qualification, tanker, doubles, and triples. In short, you are a complete driver.

05:45 Absolutely, absolutely. Everything but hazmat, John.

05:52 Everything with a hazmat. You can drive just about anything.

05:56 Yeah, if it’s got wheels I can drive it.

05:59 That’s good. That’s good. How long have you been driving Earnest?

06:04 I’ve been driving this October make year 14.

06:09 Year 14, okay. I know you’ve been with us for a year and 4 months. Is this your first time in driveaway or did you work for another company or is this your first experience in driveaway with Norton?

06:23 No, this is my very first experience in driveaway. So, I got into this thing man because I was an owner operator and my truck broke down. And so, it was going to be a while before it got running. And so, I just do a little bit of little research on some things that I could do, you know, as a gap filler while I wait on my truck to get out of the shop. And man, I ran across driveaway. And boy, when I got into it, I got stuck.

07:02 I got you. Now, did were you recruited by another driving friend or did you just find us online or how did you come across Norton Transport?

07:15 Oh man, I just found you online in my research. I was watching YouTube and I can’t even remember his name. It’s been so long ago, but he was a single driver and then he switched over to big and you know, and then so he was doing a vlog on you know, how he handled what he was. And so, I just gave it a shot man and I reached out to you all. Y’all got right back to them and got on board and maybe we’ve been rolling ever since.

07:47 Got you. Now, you had mentioned before you got into driveaway that you were an owner-operator but your truck went down, you had to get some repairs done on it. Are you still doing the owner-operator thing or are you exclusively driveaway?

08:01 No, I’m exclusively driveaway now.

08:04 Got you. Now, I heard a sad story, sad for us that work on the singles side and have our trucks delivered by singles drivers. You’re about to move over to decks, aren’t you?

08:16 Yes, yes, I’m about to move over to over to decks. So, I transitioned over there yesterday actually. So, you know, we got some stuff started and got some stuff going and I’ll be heading out to Pulaski, Virginia this Sunday, tomorrow. And after church, of course. And—

08:37 Okay.

08:37 We’re going to get that journey started, man. I think of a vlog a little bit. I started recording some little videos and saving them on my phone going single. And so I believe I’ll start vlogging a little bit to give the public a little bit more insight into what we do over here in order—

08:57 I got you. Now, when you go up to Pulaski, is that where you start some training on the deck side?

09:04 Yes, yes. Yeah, I start some training with Western. And so, that first is going to go to Pulaski. I’m going to say to Front Royal, Texas, I believe.

09:15 Okay. Now, you know, I was joking with you I think it was last night we were talking on the phone. Going to make some real money over there in the deck side but you said singles have been pretty good to you, too.

09:27 Man, look, John. Now, let me tell you. And that’s why it was a minute for them to for you know, for me to be convinced to come over to Deck. Because, you know, with what I was doing, the right-hand drive CNG trucks, man, listen, those things was paying out the back to me, you know? They was covering my travel because, of course, it’s a good expense to get down in the Fort Payne. And on top of my travel, they was giving me some great incentives. But then, especially now, they have the extra incentives that goes on for your on-time delivery and for being a safe driver.

10:14 So, for my mistaken, I think I’m thinking I was a diamond status. Probably that was high as you can get. And man, the bonus the incentives was if the incentives are handsome when you’re in your upper tier.

10:30 Yeah, if you can hit the bonuses and the incentives and being a diamond level driver, you’re going to rake in some extra money. And of course, as you’d laid out there for us, doing the garbage trucks out of Fort Payne, there’s some travel and I think you get some free hotel in there, too, don’t you? Cover your hotel.

10:49 Oh, yes, I forgot about the free hotel. Yes, the free hotel.

10:52 That’s good. That’s good. Now, tell us now, moving from singles to decks, what do you think that transition’s going to be like?

10:59 But, you know, it’s probably going to start slow being that, you know, I don’t think I’m the best you know, new at the decking, but once I get the hang of things, I always make the best out of—

11:11 Got you. Now, I think we were joking about last night about you’re going to make some big money now, but you said singles has been pretty good to you, too. We were talking about all the incentives and things you got with driving the garbage trucks.

11:23 Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so, and recently, I just right before I transitioned, I had just gotten into the fire truck delivery thing and you know, they love me over there on that side, too. So, I got a call from Carson while I was on the road and she said, ” man, I don’t know what you did to them over there, but they love you.”

11:49 Now, you know, usually the way it happens on the here on the Six-Figure Trucker, brought to you by Norton Transport, when we select the drivers, a lot of them are recommended by their dispatch teams. And you— That’s what happened with you and they said, “Earnest has got a great personality. He’s always got a good outlook.” Now, tell us a little bit about what it’s like, the relationship between you as a driver and your dispatch team.

12:17 Man, I have an amazing relationship. But with each team that I’ve been with now I’m on my third team, but before my first team, you know, I was on Tanish’s team. They were amazing and then I transitioned to Carson’s team and her and her team was absolutely phenomenal. Now, of course, I’m on the bacon side. I’m with Lena and her team, so we’ll see, you know, how well they fit me over there and you know, as we get to know each other, I believe it’s going to be a great connection, a great relationship.

12:55 Got you. Now, I wanted to ask you this question as we wrap up as a driver, your time on the road what’s the craziest thing you’ve seen? 14 years on the road, a year and 4 months in driveaway, what’s the craziest thing you’ve seen out there on the road?

13:12 Oh, man. Oh, I was driving in Arkansas on I-40. I want to say I was coming through I may have just crossed over coming into Haiti, Missouri. And man, it was storming. And I didn’t I looked over to my left and the tornado dropped right down on the ground and it was me and a bunch of more other trucks, man, and the tornado swept across the road with us right in the middle.

13:46 Woo!

13:47 And so, you know, of course— Yeah, man, it was scary dangerous. So, you know, of course a lot of us had flipped over and turned to the side, but amazing though God blessed me to stay on all of my wheels. And as a matter of fact, my wife was on the on FaceTiming with me. I had my phone up in the windshield and she was FaceTiming and she noticed the background and she went to, you know, “What’s going on? What’s going on?” And so, all she could do was just go in the prayer for me. And it’s all I could say, man, all I could do was call on the name of Jesus, man, and—

14:30 Yeah.

14:31 So, thankfully you know he brought me out of that thing safely without a scratch.

14:37 That’s good. Sounds scary, but—

14:38 Unfortunately for a few other truckers who were on the road with me.

14:42 That’s good. Sounds like answered prayer.

14:44 Yes. Yes.

14:46 Well, Earnest, we certainly appreciate you joining us and we’d like to talk with you next week because as you and I have discussed in on phone conversations, you’re a busy guy off the road and I wanted to kind of hint at what we’re going to talk about next week. He’s got some passions. All three of these passions start with the same letter. Let’s not give it away, but can we talk with you next week?

15:13 Absolutely, Jud. Absolutely. I hadn’t even thought I thought about it like that.

15:18 All right, we’ll see you next week. Earnest Walker here on the Six-Figure Trucker brought to you by Norton Transport. Thank you very much, Earnest. Be safe out there on the road.

15:26 Yes, sir. Thank you, John. I will.

15:33 Six-Figure Trucker is brought to you by Norton Transport. Norton Transport is a driveaway trucking company that customers can rely on. It offers excellent independent contract driving opportunities to professional, courteous, and qualified drivers that can provide the kind of service we deliver. If you’re interested in learning more about Norton or just want to subscribe to the show, check out Six-FigureTrucker.com. That’s Six-FigureTrucker.com.