Consolidated Freightways Files For Bankruptcy

AP via MSNBC ^ | Sept. 2,2002 | AP

[LibWhacker]

Surprise, surprise . . . You treat your people like sh*t and you go broke.

[norraad]

I deal with them all & lately CF trucks have been looking real bad, no maint. whatsoever.

[earplug]

I wonder how much the recent diesel regulations (EPA) had to do with CFW deciding to quit the business.

[dalereed]

No, I put in 13-14 hours 6 days a week and usually took Sunday off.

I'm a 5th generation So. Calif. and wouldn't think of living where they had snow.

I did walk to school until I bought a bicycle when I was 8 to do my paper route but I threw it in the trash on my 16th birthday when I could drive my newly built 40 coupe.

That doesn't deserve an answer!

[USA21]

Free Trade is not FREE

[USA21]

I wonder how much the recent diesel regulations (EPA) had to do with CFW deciding to quit the business.

U.N diesel regulations

[USA21]

Legal help for green causes judges from the United States help for green making laws for America

[cookcounty]

"I can't understand people that bitch about having to work 40-50 hours a week, I put in 80+ hours a week for 40 years. "

Dale, you're not another one of those executive martyrs by any chance, are you?

If you started work at 7 EVERY day, after subtracting out your lunch and dinner (We'll let you count swappin' tales at the 19th hole, since you're usually doing this with a client (such suffering!)---you'd still have to AVERAGE staying on the job 'til 12:30AM every nite to hit "80 plus."--then you can drive home. Then if you spend ANY TIME AT ALL with your family between sunrise and 12:30AM , you'll have stay even later! Ditto for any community service (or FR time!)

The fact is I've never met anybody who consistently "worked" 80 hours a week, and neither have you.

[Kevin Curry]

You post inspired me conduct a quick web-chase of the bios of the CEO's of Consolidated Freightways. Just three years ago a septegenarian named Curry (no relation) had the job and was being toasted far and wide for his business savvy. A few months later he retired and was replaced by a 30-year "home grown" Consolidated Freightways employee named Blake. Blake lasted two years and was retired in favor of Brincko, a business "turnaround" expert.

It appears Consolidated Freightways has been on life support for awhile now; the board of directors has been desperately looking for a miracle doctor to revive the company.

[dalereed]

Actually I started work at 5:00 am and got home around 7:00 pm 6 days a week and my office was 10 minutes from home.

Now that i'm 65 and have closed my business and only work for myself directly for owners with no employees I only work 8 or 9 hours a day but do put in 7 days a week if I have the work.

[dtel]

I was joshing ya a bit.
Having strung together several runs of 7 days a week 12-14 hour work weeks, I know it takes a toll after a while.
If you could do it for 40 years, you were pretty tough.

[Joe Hadenuf]

This is just that confidence in the economy we have been hearing about....

[dalereed]

I just hope that i'm as tough as my dad was, he retired on his 80th birthday and was still putting in 9 or 10 hours a day.

On his 80th birthday he came into the office at 7:00am, packed up his personal belongings and announced that he wasn't coming back, that "this game is getting too rough for me!"

[Joe Hadenuf]

Apparently the lower the managers keep payroll....the more they are rewarded with bonusus.

This crap is going on in many companies. They continue to cut more and more employees, so the employees that are left have to work twice as hard for the same money, with less help, while the managers sit back and collect bonuses for keeping payroll down......Many employees that remain are totally over worked.....

[nicollo]

Thanks for the better article.

It's been a while since I've been in the shipping business, but I recall hating LTL service: expensive and unreliable. I always filled a warehouse locally and shipped my own trailer rather than bring it to destination piecemeal. Waay cheaper.

I'm thinking this is market change more than the economy. Guessing here, but I'd say that less freight is going to small customers. Large buyers don't need LTL service, and/or demand rates chapear than LTL can profitably provide. I bet this is a reflection of changes in retail as much as the economy.

Furthermore, seems to me that Fedex/UPS/US Mail have been encroaching on the LTL business for some time. Finally caught up. Certainly there's a need, but I'd bet over-supply killed CF.

And I don't miss the LTL sales-creatures.

[Jeff Chandler]

Actually, there have been rumors floating around about CF for some time. Of course, in the transportation business, if you haven't heard a rumor in the first hour hour of the workday, it is your obligation to start one.

I'm thinking this is market change more than the economy. Guessing here, but I'd say that less freight is going to small customers. Large buyers don't need LTL service, and/or demand rates chapear than LTL can profitably provide. I bet this is a reflection of changes in retail as much as the economy.

You're guessing wrong. There is more need of LTL shipping than ever before, because very few retailers, even among the big warehouse stores, that stock up on merchandise. Everyone utilizes the Japanese "just in time" model of purchasing and shipping. Also, Fedex/UPS/US Mail have almost zero effect upon the the LTL end of the shipping business. They're in a different niche.

I don't know how much of an effect this has on CF's demise, but about 20 years ago their ownership spanned a new non-union trucking company, Conway, which competes with the union CF. Conway is still around, and CF just bit the dust.

[Jeff Chandler]

And I don't miss the LTL sales-creatures

LOL! By the way, they prefer to be called "Account Executives".

[nicollo]

Thanks for the lesson. Then I guess CF just plain screwed up.

I still think LTL is expensive. But if you say it's cheaper than money, then today's players know more than I. Aside from labor, what went wrong, or, rather, what's going right in the competition?

[Pining_4_TX]

They also said that if the minimum wage went up as much as CEO's salary has for the last two years, that minumum wage would be over $21.00.

This is so phoney baloney. I don't notice too many broadcast news anchors mentioning their own fat paychecks. It shows that people don't understand that prices and salaries have meaning. You can't just arbitrarily set them. If the minimum wage helps people earn enough, then why not set it at $100 an hour?