Prime Inc. drivers star in ad campaign

The Springfield-based mega-trucking firm is beginning with a new TV ad campaign to tell the stories of three of its drivers – drivers who have traded white-collar jobs for the blue-collar world of trucking.

The campaign, called The New Face of Trucking, consists of two 30-second commercials shot Dec. 3 at Ozark Sound Studios in downtown Springfield. Bill Perkin of Perkin Marketing Services coordinated the spot, which Ruell Chappell wrote, Jeff Williams directed and Roger Jared filmed. The commercials begin airing Dec. 15 on local channels in Springfield and Joplin.

The common thread among the profiled drivers is a change in lifestyle. One commercial features Tony Weaver, a solo driver from Aurora, who came to Prime after working as a manufacturing supervisor in Monett.

The other stars team drivers Dawnya Hostetler, a one-time hospital billing technician, and Robert Gregory, a former jewelry shop owner, of Buffalo.

“These people had all gone through our apprentice-style training and are established here and are success stories within our network of people,” said John Hancock, director of training and driver recruiting for Prime Inc. Hancock declined to disclose the dollar amount spent on the campaign.

“Why we’re doing this is I realized people here in Springfield didn’t realize they could start here and get trained without a commercial driver’s license already, and that we could do an apprenticeship-style training from the ground up,” Hancock said.

The commercials also are a way to tweak the image of the industry, said Adam DeVizia, project manager for Prime Inc.

“We’re trying to (dispel) stereotypes and show the amazing potentials that people have to make here financially,” he said.

Stars

Hostetler and Gregory, who have been together for 13 years, now drive about 5,000 miles a week together.

“We’re (driving) in all 48 states and if we could figure out how to go to Hawaii we’d do that too,” said Hostetler, who had worked for six years in billing at Citizens Memorial Healthcare in Bolivar and helped manage its Buffalo clinic.

The couple’s decision to hit the road came after Gregory closed his jewelry business and Hostetler’s daughter graduated from high school and joined the navy.

Gregory had been a jeweler for 20 years, and owned The Diamond Shoppe in Springfield with his brother Andrew for the last eight years of his career. They closed the store in January, devoted a month to finishing the paperwork and selling the fixtures, and then Gregory started his 30-day training at Prime in March. To fight empty nest syndrome, Hostetler began her training in July and joined Gregory.

After 16 years with Miracle Recreation Equipment Company in Monett – the last nine years as a foreman – Weaver was unhappy in his job.

He had given trucking some thought for about seven years, entered Prime’s training program and has been with the company for a year and a half, driving anywhere from 2,800 to 4,100 miles a week through the United States and Canada.

Hancock said that current drivers come from a variety of backgrounds, including physicians, nurses, accountants and factory workers. “The range is all over the place,” he said. “Just about any profession you can think of.”

The new lifestyle has been a big adjustment for all three drivers. It involves fewer working hours for Gregory, who worked about 10 hours a day, seven days a week at the jewelry store. For Hostetler, trucking involves more hours than her four-day-a-week office job. “As far as the pros and cons of the hours and the pay, the pay is worth it,” she said.

Hostetler said that she has doubled her income, going from about $25,000 a year to about $50,000 a year. “That’s just for me,” she said. “(Rob’s) last couple of years in the jewelry business, it was basically all going back into the store, so we were basically living on my wages. You could say we were going from $25,000 a year to $100,000 a year.”

Weaver declined to disclose figures, but said his income has at least doubled.

Earnings for a first-year solo driver are at least $50,000, and for a team, it’s at least $100,000, DeVizia said.

But the hours are long. Drivers spend on average four to six weeks at a time away from home.

Industry

Prime, which has about 3,400 drivers, is always looking for new drivers, Hancock said. The industry average for turnover in trucking is 116 percent according to the American Trucking Asssociation, but Hancock said that Prime’s turnover rate is about 48 percent to 52 percent.

“The competition for (new) drivers is intense. There’s such a shortage that people are offering in some cases $1,000 to $7,000 hiring bonuses which is just over the edge. We think that that’s backwards thinking, if you have to bribe somebody to come to work for you. It’s better to take care of the people that are already working for you than to give a bonus to somebody you’ve never met,” Hancock said.

Hostetler, Gregory and Weaver all received training for their commercial driver’s license at Prime. For a $100 entry fee, they attended the 30-day apprentice program, were assigned to an experienced driver and received 100 hours behind the wheel.