Trucking companies are gearing up for National Truck Driver Appreciation Week next week.
Drivers often cite feeling underappreciated. They spend weeks on the road without seeing family; they deal with constant anxiety behind the wheel, worried about getting loads to destinations on time and the potential ramifications of an accident that could very likely not even be their fault; they struggle to live healthy lifestyles with limited food options over the road and so on.
What makes the job worth it? It’s not a swag bag with a T-shirt or a hat or a cooler bag or a tumbler with the company logo on it, I can tell you that.
I have accumulated I couldn’t tell you how many tumblers over the years with a multitude of different company names. It could be a nice Yeti cup or the most popular and polarizing of late: the Stanley. I can tell you how many I have right now in my cabinet, too: one. One that I bought a cute sticker for big enough to cover the logo that was on it. The rest ended up in the yard sale and ultimately some thrift store somewhere that I donated them to because nobody else wanted a tumbler with a company logo on it.
My husband cuts up T-shirts with company logos on them to use as cleaning rags down in his shop. My mother wears those T-shirts to clean in because a bleach stain doesn’t count on swag apparel.
Now, many companies do it up right. They’ll offer gift cards, free meals and/or cash, for example. But if your company is offering those items as prizes instead of the norm, that just feels like another hoop the driver has to jump through, and their knees are already aching from climbing in and out of a big rig.
I know I'm ruffling some feathers saying this, but it’s the truth.
If you give out a nice Carhartt jacket but stamp the company logo on the front, you’ve ruined it. To me, company swag screams “I’m gifting this to you as a gift back to me in the form of advertising my company so I can potentially make even more money, none of which you will see come Driver Appreciation Week.” Company swag should be free anyway. It’s bulk purchased at a lower cost, so keep in mind how that makes your drivers feel about their worth to your company.
If you’re a small company and just can’t afford much, a personalized letter of appreciation, to me at least, is more valuable. But I am from the South and highly value thank you cards. I send them for everything; it’s an etiquette thing, but it also just says something when someone takes the time to offer a personal, hand-written message.
Case in point: drivers don’t want another T-shirt to dig out of their waste-deep dirty laundry bag upon returning home. They don’t want a cup that they don’t even have a sink to wash in. And as the cliché goes: they don’t want another pizza party; they want a raise.
