CCJ

February 2018

Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal

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20 commercial carrier journal | february 2018 my local Birmingham, Ala.-based TV news broadcast. New York- based PepsiCo ordering 100 trucks from a California-based manufac- turer got airtime in Alabama. e previous week, Memphis, Tenn.-based Summit Truck Group inked a deal with JNJ Express for 500 International tractors. Beyond the industry's trade news outlets, not a word was mentioned elsewhere. JNJ Express hauls in Alabama, and its International LT order was five times larger than PepsiCo's, but it got zero seconds of airtime in Alabama – where you won't find a Tesla dealership – because it's not as cool. Trucking always has had a public relations problem. It's too practical and functional. It's needed more pop and sizzle. More cool kids. It's needed a tractor that partially sells itself based on its 0-60 mph time because that's a level of cool the world understands, even though it's a level of absurd that only trucking understands. More eyes are now on trucking, and it finally doesn't have anything to do with electronic logs or campaigns aimed at stripping back regulations. E -commerce. Vehicle automation. Uber. Electric trucks. At one time or another, each one has been crowned trucking's great "disruptor," a word thrown around so frequently to describe an innovation that it wouldn't bother me to see it banished from the English language entirely. Each of these shifts (or new technologies, or anything else you want to call them other than disruptor) is important with potential to benefit the industry, but electric trucks have shaken things up like few others. Most folks know what I do for a living, but it's rare that any of them ever ask about my day. Things changed when I got back from the Tesla Semi launch in November. It's like I was a returning war hero. e truck, and my experience there, was all anyone wanted to know about. Trucking was suddenly cool to a group of people who wouldn't know a Peterbilt from Peter Jennings. I even banked a few "cool points" from my 13-year-old daughter who understands as much about the trucking industry as I do about her taste in music. Tesla is the cool kid that, save for Burt Reynolds, trucking has never had. When PepsiCo announced in December its reservation of 100 Tesla Semis, it made PRODUCT REVIEWS, OEM & SUPPLIER NEWS AND EQUIPMENT MANAGEMENT TRENDS BY JASON CANNON BIGGEST DISRUPTOR: Electric trucks have shaken the ground like few others. PR PROBLEM: Practical, functional trucking has needed more pop and sizzle. VIABLE PARTNER: Tech companies are drawn by electrification's emergence. Trucking is cool now Tesla's presence adds pop to a dependable, boring industry

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