We use cookies to provide you with a better experience. By continuing to browse the site you are agreeing to our use of cookies in accordance with our Cookie Policy.
  • ::COVID-19 COVERAGE::
  • INDUSTRY PRESS ROOM
  • ABOUT
  • CONTACT
  • MEDIA FILE
  • Create Account
  • Sign In
  • Sign Out
  • My Account
Free Newsletters
  • MAGAZINE
    • Current Issue
    • Archives
    • Digital Edition
    • Subscribe
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • TRANSPORTATION
  • MATERIAL HANDLING
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • LIFT TRUCKS
  • PODCAST ETC.
    • Podcast
    • Blogs
      • Analytics & Big Data
      • Best Practices
      • Dispatches
      • Empowering Your Performance Edge
      • Logistics Problem Solving
      • One-Off Sound Off
      • Public Sector Logistics
      • Two Sides of the Logistics Coin
      • Submit your blog post
    • Events
    • White Papers
    • Industry Press Room
      • Upload Your News
    • New Products
      • Upload Your Product News
    • Conference Guides
    • Conference Reports
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • DCV-TV
    • DCV-TV 1: News
    • DCV-TV 2: Case Studies
    • DCV-TV 3: Webcasts
    • DCV-TV 4: Viewer Contributed
    • DCV-TV 5: Solution Profiles
    • MODEX 2020
    • Upload Your Video
  • MAGAZINE
    • Current Issue
    • Archives
    • Digital Edition
    • Subscribe
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • TRANSPORTATION
  • MATERIAL HANDLING
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • LIFT TRUCKS
  • PODCAST ETC.
    • Podcast
    • Blogs
      • Analytics & Big Data
      • Best Practices
      • Dispatches
      • Empowering Your Performance Edge
      • Logistics Problem Solving
      • One-Off Sound Off
      • Public Sector Logistics
      • Two Sides of the Logistics Coin
      • Submit your blog post
    • Events
    • White Papers
    • Industry Press Room
      • Upload Your News
    • New Products
      • Upload Your Product News
    • Conference Guides
    • Conference Reports
    • Newsletters
    • Mobile Apps
  • DCV-TV
    • DCV-TV 1: News
    • DCV-TV 2: Case Studies
    • DCV-TV 3: Webcasts
    • DCV-TV 4: Viewer Contributed
    • DCV-TV 5: Solution Profiles
    • MODEX 2020
    • Upload Your Video
Home » New Swift CEO follows in footsteps of other "New Turks" of truckload
newsworthy

New Swift CEO follows in footsteps of other "New Turks" of truckload

September 9, 2016
Mark B. Solomon
No Comments

For the second time this year, a large and venerable truckload and logistics carrier with powerful family connections has tapped a highly regarded executive in his mid-40s, and outside of the family orbit, to run the business.

Late yesterday, Phoenix-based Swift Transportation Co., the country's largest truckload carrier by sales, named Richard Stocking, its president and COO since 2010, to become co-CEO with founder Jerry Moyes, who announced he will retire Dec. 31. The two will share the CEO role for the rest of the year, though Stocking has immediately assumed all day-to-day responsibilities, Swift said. Effective Jan. 1, Moyes, 72, who founded Swift in 1966, will become its chairman emeritus and a member of its board.

The Swift announcement comes almost four months ago to the day that Omaha-based Werner Enterprises Inc., a company dominated by the founding Werner family for 60 years, named Derek J. Leathers, who had been president and COO, to the CEO's role. Weathers succeeded founder Clarence L. Werner, who had come out of retirement the year before to run the company after the retirement of his son, Gregory.

The parallels between Stocking and Leathers are striking. Both are 46. Both spent years climbing their firms' corporate ladders; Stocking started at Swift in 1992; Leathers joined Werner in 1999. Both succeeded aging titans who entered the trucking field before it was deregulated in 1980, and each of whom started their companies with one truck that they drove. Stocking and Leathers could have written their tickets anywhere in trucking, but chose to stay with their long-term employers. Both represent the new wave of U.S. trucking leadership: executives who know nothing of regulatory protection and everything about a fiercely competitive open market.

Stocking and Leathers are "the two top leaders in the truckload space right now," said C. Thomas Barnes, president of logistics technology firm project44 and the former president of Con-Way Multimodal, which booked billions of dollars a year of freight with multiple modes, especially truckload carriers. The old Con-Way unit is now part of Greenwich, Conn.-based XPO Logistics Inc., which one year ago today announced it had bought the parent company for $3 billion.

Other trucking executives have followed similar paths. Michael Gerdin succeeded his late father, Russell, the late founder of North Liberty, Ia.-based truckload carrier Heartland Express Inc., as its chairman and CEO. Paul Will succeeded the late Stephen Russell as CEO of Indianapolis-based Celadon Group Inc., a truckload carrier which Russell founded. The four CEOs "collectively represent the generational shift taking place within truckload and in transportation broadly," said Benjamin J. Hartford, transportation analyst for Robert W. Baird & Co. Inc., an investment firm.

Stocking was considered a virtual shoo-in for the top job at Swift, and his ascension was just a matter of waiting for Moyes to retire. As president and COO, he oversaw solid growth in the company's core truckload segment, especially in the turbulent years following the Great Recession. Stocking is known as being very process oriented, with a sharp focus on eliminating waste. From the end of 2010 through the second quarter of 2016, Swift's debt levels have been cut in half, according to Baird data.

"Moyes was a visionary, as is Stocking. But they have different types of visions," said an industry executive, who asked to remain anonymous. Moyes' vision, and the strategy that accompanied it, may not be in step with what Swift needs to compete in today's market, the executive said.

Stocking takes the reins during another difficult period for freight transport providers. In its third-quarter update, released today, Swift said that contract pricing for truckload services remains weak, while overall revenue, excluding the impact of diesel-fuel surcharges, is down 2.5 percent year over year. Refrigerated transport and intermodal loads continued to be flat to down. The segment dedicated to services for specific shippers was the only relative bright spot. Despite the seemingly subpar data, John G. Larkin, lead transport analyst at investment firm Stifel Financial Corp., said the numbers actually came in better than expected.

Moyes, who grew Swift into a giant partly through the acquisition of 13 trucking firms since 1988, took the company public in 1990. He left the company in October 2005 after a Securities and Exchange Commission probe into alleged insider trading, in which Moyes did not admit or deny wrongdoing. In May 2007, Moyes took Swift private for $2.4 billion, only to take it public again three years later.

Today, Swift has nearly 20,000 trucks and about $4.2 billion in annual revenue.

Transportation Trucking Truckload
KEYWORDS Celadon Group Inc. Heartland Express R.W. Baird & Co. Stifel Financial Corp. Swift Transportation Werner Enterprises XPO Logistics
  • Related Articles

    Gut-wrenching week for transportation ends with Port of New York/New Jersey closed; other ports reopen

    Unit of truckload carrier CRST sued over charges of condoning harassment of women drivers

    Congdon to leave Old Dominion CEO post after decade of historic outperformance

Marksolomon
Mark Solomon joined DC VELOCITY as senior editor in August 2008, and was promoted to his current position on January 1, 2015. He has spent more than 30 years in the transportation, logistics and supply chain management fields as a journalist and public relations professional. From 1989 to 1994, he worked in Washington as a reporter for the Journal of Commerce, covering the aviation and trucking industries, the Department of Transportation, Congress and the U.S. Supreme Court. Prior to that, he worked for Traffic World for seven years in a similar role. From 1994 to 2008, Mr. Solomon ran Media-Based Solutions, a public relations firm based in Atlanta. He graduated in 1978 with a B.A. in journalism from The American University in Washington, D.C.

Recent Articles by Mark Solomon

Coming together for road safety: interview with Joshua Girard

Off the rails

Freight rate spikes shaking up the C-suite

You must login or register in order to post a comment.

Report Abusive Comment

Most Popular Articles

  • Relaxed regulations for drone parcel delivery to take effect in March

  • Gartner survey signals increased investment in resilience over the next two years

  • Increasing Urgency for Vaccine Supplies Drives Launch of New Vaccine Manufacturing Resources on Thomasnet.com

  • What Level of Automation is Right for Your Warehouse?

  • Old Dominion adds nine freight service centers to handle business growth

Now Playing on DCV-TV

20210226acd usa vs

MAX Mobile Workstation in action in leading 3PL improves efficiency in operations. Watch it now!

DCV-TV 4: Viewer Contributed
MAX Mobile Workstation, from ACD USA, Inc., is ideally suited for data collection and many tasks that workers handle throughout the Distribution Center, Manufacturing Plant, Cross Dock, and more.  This customer testimonial from Goldhofer shows the high quality industrial design and functionality of MAX, which is...

FEATURED WHITE PAPERS

  • Time to rethink your lift truck power

  • Warehouse Management System Project Toolkit

  • Solving Talent Management Challenges Now and In the Future

  • Shaping Up Last Mile Delivery to Surpass Customer Expectations

View More

Subscribe to DC Velocity Magazine

GET YOUR FREE SUBSCRIPTION
  • SUBSCRIBE
  • NEWSLETTERS
  • ADVERTISING
  • CUSTOMER CARE
  • CONTACT
  • ABOUT
  • STAFF
  • PRIVACY POLICY

Copyright ©2021. All Rights ReservedDesign, CMS, Hosting & Web Development :: ePublishing