Arkansas Best Corporation Announces Its First Quarter 2011 Earnings Conference Call

Arkansas Best Corporation will announce its first quarter 2011 results, prior to the opening of the market, on Monday, April 25, 2011. A conference call with company executives will be held that day at 11:00 a.m. ET to discuss these results. Interested parties are invited to listen by calling (800) 772-0358.

Following the call, a recorded playback will be available through the end of the day on May 25, 2011. To listen to the playback, dial (800) 633-8284 or (402) 977-9140 (for international callers). The conference ID for the playback is 21518748.

This call is being webcast and can be accessed live on Arkansas Best’s website at arkbest.com. A replay of the webcast can be accessed at Arkansas Best’s website through May 25.

TCA Honors Vandenput, Boyd and Howland

Three ABF Freight System drivers have recently been named Truckload Carriers Association Highway Angels.

TSA has named Serge Vandenput, a professional truck driver for ABF Freight System, Inc. as its latest Highway Angel.

ABF driver sprang to action knowing that oncoming traffic could not see trapped woman.

TCA Honors John Boyd as a Highway Angel – Again.

ABF driver responds to an accident for the second time in one year

TCA Names David Howland as Highway Angel

ABF driver assists driver trapped between deployed airbags

In spite of lawsuit, ABF says relationship with Teamsters largely beneficial

It’s old news by now — Fort Smith-based Arkansas Best Corp. filed suit against the Teamsters union in November.

What might surprise some is that Arkansas Best still regards its relationship with the Teamsters are largely beneficial. Arkansas Best is the parent company of ABF Freight System, a less-than-truckload carrier employing about 7,000 union drivers.

ABF took issue with certain concessions given by the Teamsters to YRC Worldwide, an Overland Park, Kan.-based less-than-truckload carrier employing about 25,000 union drivers. ABF filed its lawsuit asking for $750 million in damages that it suffered due to the alleged competitive advantage YRC was given in the marketplace due to the concessions. The complaint was dismissed in December by U.S. District Court Susan Webber Wright (Eastern District of Arkansas) for want of jurisdiction. Full Story.....

ABF Global Expansion Reaches Into the Dominican Republic With Door Delivery

Continuing its global expansion, ABF is providing seamless, single-contact door delivery for customers shipping to the Dominican Republic. ABF expanded its Caribbean coverage in response to increased demand for shipping solutions from customers taking advantage of opportunities created by the United States-Dominican Republic-Central America Free Trade Agreement, known informally as CAFTA. The Dominican Republic also serves as a staging ground for rebuilding efforts in neighboring Haiti.

"As shippers look to ABF for innovative, global supply chain solutions, we will continue to expand our global reach and develop new ways to help customers excel in a global economy," said Roy Slagle, ABF senior vice president of sales and marketing. "Customers appreciate the predictability and reliability ABF brings to their global supply chains by providing a boutique of comprehensive, end-to-end, single-source solutions."

The CAFTA agreement eliminates barriers to trade and investment among its seven signatories: Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and the United States. The agreement opens new commercial opportunities for U.S. companies and U.S. operations of foreign companies with these Central American and Caribbean countries. CAFTA also enhances those countries' access to the U.S. markets and establishes common regulatory and environmental standards.

TCA Honors ABF Driver Stanley Gorczak as a Highway Angel

Driver helped a hotel clerk through a medical emergency

The Truckload Carriers Association (TCA) is honoring truck driver Stanley P. Gorczak as a Highway Angel for helping someone pull through a medical emergency.

It was August 8, 2009, and Gorczak had checked into the Carlisle Hotel in Omaha, Nebraska, where he planned to spend the night before continuing on his route the next day. A seasoned traveler, Gorczak had come down to the hotel lobby to fill his thermos with coffee before heading back upstairs to his room for the night.

Suddenly, a hotel clerk came running toward Gorczak screaming that Ashley, another hotel employee, had collapsed. Thinking quickly, Gorczak handed his cell phone to the clerk and told her to call 911. He then rushed to help Ashley, who was lying prone on the floor.

Gorczak’s first instinct was to carefully roll Ashley onto her back and check her vital signs. He checked for a heartbeat and looked at her eyes to see if the pupils were dilated. He spoke to Ashley, trying to get her to respond, but she was incoherent. Her eyes were moving left to right underneath her eyelids, but she couldn’t open them. Noticing she was shivering, he sat her up in a chair and covered her with towels. Then, he held her head up to prevent her from choking in case of a seizure. Gorczak patiently waited with Ashley until the paramedics arrived.

“I was just being myself, and I only did what I hope someone would do for me,” said Gorczak modestly. “I was in the right place at the right time to help somebody.”

Actually, this is the second time that Gorczak has helped someone while on duty for ABF. Earlier this year, he was eating at an Illinois truck stop when a customer began choking on a hamburger and fell to the floor. The man was too heavy to pick up, so Gorczak turned him on his side and managed to get him to cough the hamburger out.

Now that Gorczak has been accepted as a TCA Highway Angel, he will receive a Highway Angel lapel pin, certificate, and patch for the kindness he showed to Ashley. ABF Freight System, Inc., will also receive a certificate acknowledging that one of its drivers is a Highway Angel.

20 ABF State Driving Champions to Compete in National Truck Driving Championships

ABF Freight System, Inc., is sending 20 championship drivers from 10 states to the 72nd National Truck Driving Championships, August 18-22, 2009, in Pittsburgh. Professional drivers earn the right to compete in the National Championships by winning state driving championships and by maintaining an accident-free driving record for the past year.

Among the competitors representing ABF are nine repeat winners from 2008, including three former National Champion Drivers and three 2009 state driving Grand Champions. Two competitors, Paul Gattin and Ben Saiz, also currently serve as America's Road Team Captains.

Click here for the list of former National Champion drivers.....

Arkansas Best loses $15.4 million in second quarter

Fort Smith-based Arkansas Best Corp. posted a second quarter net income loss of $15.4 million, marking the third consecutive quarter the company posted a loss — and with those losses adding up to about $44.5 million in the past nine months.

It’s the economy.

The nationwide depression in the freight industry began in October 2006 and, obviously, continues. Arkansas Best Corp., whose primary subsidiary is ABF Freight System, a nationwide less-than-truckload carrier, posted second quarter revenue of $362.6 million, a per day decrease of 26.7% from the $498.5 million in the 2008 period.

The number of ABF shipments in the first six months of 2009 is down 16.2% compared to the same period in 2008, and the company’s tonnage shipped is down 17.3% in the first half of 2009 compared to the first half of 2008.

“The effects of lower freight levels and a competitive pricing environment that has intensified since the first quarter were the main challenges faced by our company in the second quarter,” Robert Davidson, Arkansas Best president and CEO, said in the earnings statement released Wednesday morning (July 22). “In addition, our results were affected by unusual increases in nonunion healthcare and pension, workers’ compensation and third-party casualty insurance claims costs versus last year.”

For the first six months of 2009, Arkansas Best has lost $33.6 million, compared to a net income of $24.6 million in the first six months of 2008.

Bob Costello, an economist with the American Trucking Associations, said in a June 29 report that the worst of the freight depression is over, but the trucking sector may not see improving conditions.

“I am hopeful that the worst is behind us, but I just don’t see anything on the economic horizon that suggests freight transportation is ready to explode,” ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello said in a statement. “The consumer is still facing too many headwinds, including employment losses, tight credit, rising fuel prices, and falling home values, to name a few, that will make it very difficult for household spending to jump in the near term.”

Despite the previous quarterly losses, Arkansas Best has little long-term debt and a $325 million line of credit. More importantly, the company has $191.4 million in cash or cash equivalents, down slightly from the about $200 million at the beginning of the year.

The company, with its relatively strong cash position, continues to investigate acquisition possibilities. The recession is creating fire-sale prices at transportation-related companies, Davidson told The City Wire in an April interview.
“This is the best buying opportunity I’ll ever have,” Davidson said.

However, the company continues to cut costs — personnel and equipment — to manage the downturn.

“ABF continues to manage its network resources, especially labor and equipment, to the level of freight moving throughout its network. As needed, additional reductions in system resources and costs have been made in the last few months,” Davidson said in the earnings statement.

Better times ahead for national trucking industry?

A national trucking economist believes the worst might be in the rear-view mirror of the trucking industry.

The American Trucking Associations’ advance seasonally adjusted For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index was up 3.2% in May, the first increase since February. Fort Smith-based ABF Freight System saw its first-quarter tonnage drop 15.7% compared to the first quarter of 2008. Its second-quarter tonnage through mid-May is down 17%, according to company spokesman David Humphrey.

Trucking, according to ATA, serves as a barometer of the U.S. economy, representing nearly 69% of tonnage carried by all modes of domestic freight transportation, including manufactured and retail goods. Trucks hauled 10.2 billion tons of freight in 2008.



However, May’s increase wasn’t large enough to offset the March through April cumulative reduction of 6.7%, noted the ATA statement. Compared with May 2008, tonnage contracted 11%, which was the best year-over-year result in three months. Despite the improvement from April’s 13.2% plunge, May’s decrease is still historically large.

“I am hopeful that the worst is behind us, but I just don’t see anything on the economic horizon that suggests freight transportation is ready to explode,” ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello said in the statement. “The consumer is still facing too many headwinds, including employment losses, tight credit, rising fuel prices, and falling home values, to name a few, that will make it very difficult for household spending to jump in the near term.”
Costello also noted that he doesn’t expect tonnage to deteriorate much further and that any growth in tonnage over the next few months is likely to be modest.

ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello said the month-to-month improvement was encouraging, but cautioned that tonnage is unlikely to surge anytime soon.

Donald Broughton, a trucking sector analyst with Avondale Partners, was cited in a recent Associated Press report as saying more than 3,000 trucking companies went out of business in 2008, which removed about seven of 100 trucks off the roads. He said about 480 trucking companies went out of business during the first quarter of 2009, which is less than 1% of the industry’s freight-hauling capacity and leaves too much capacity competing for the lackluster demand.

ABF Freight System competitor seeks federal bailout funds

A request for federal bailout funds from a national trucking company is unlikely to obtain a favorable response, but it does indicate the potential impact of the precedent set by federal bailouts of the financial and auto sectors.

YRC Worldwide, the nation’s largest trucking company and a primary competitor in the less-than-truckload sector with Fort Smith-based ABF Freight System, has requested $1 billion in federal bailout money (Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP funds) to help cover an estimated $2 billion pension obligation the company will owe in the next two years.

YRC CEO Bill Zollars said a portion of the pension cost is unfair because the multi-employer pension program pays the costs of retirees who never worked for YRC. ABF Freight System also contributes to the multi-employer pension fund and, like YRC, is supporting retirement costs for those who never worked for ABF.

“For our union employees throughout the country, ABF participates in, and contributes to, many of the same multi-employer pension funds that YRCW does. We are in a much better financial position than they are as we have minimal debt and our balance of cash and short-term investments was $209 million as of April 15th,” David Humphrey, ABF spokesman noted in an e-mail interview with The City Wire. “However, we understand the issues they are raising regarding the unfairness of contributing companies like YRCW and ABF having to fund the benefits of retirees who never worked for us whose companies have gone out of business. These efforts by YRCW should help highlight the unfairness of this situation.”

Chad Brand, a trucking sector watcher at Seeking Alpha, was critical of Zollars’ request.

“Awfully presumptuous of him, don’t you think, applying as a trucking company without any indication Treasury would ever widen TARP to include any U.S. corporation? I would be shocked if this were approved, and if somehow it is, TARP would be completely out of control,” Brand noted in this post [1].

However, YRC employs more than 49,000, with many of them belonging to unions. It’s the union component, or, more specifically, propping up a pension plan for union members, that gives the YRC request a wisp of political cover.

John Taylor, senior vice president of John Taylor Financial-Sterne Agee and a member of the board of directors at Fort Smith-based Benefit Bank, said he can’t “fathom” how YRC will qualify for TARP funds. Taylor does not have investments in YRC or ABF.

“If they (YRC) do (get TARP funds) this is another classic example of a company (ABF) that did the right things (no debt, cash on the balance sheet, good expense control) being put at a competitive disadvantage by the government to a company that did all of the wrong things,” Taylor said. “ABF already has a disadvantage versus YRCW due to the wage concessions granted by the Teamsters to YRCW last year. Now a company that is debt free may have to compete with a competitor that is funded with taxpayer money. This is just like the GM versus Ford deal that is playing out except it is in the (trucking) industry. What is next? Maybe Krispy Kreme versus Dunkin’ Donut?”

'Best of the Best' ABF Service Centers Recognized With President's Quality Awards

ABF Freight System, Inc., service centers in Spokane and Tacoma, Wash.; Amarillo, Texas; and Albuquerque, N.M., are the 2009 winners of the prestigious President's Quality Award, which represents the highest honor the company can bestow upon its facilities. The award recognizes those most exemplifying the ABF Quality Process and considered the "Best of the Best".

This marks the third time the Amarillo facility has earned the recognition. It is the second consecutive year for Albuquerque and the first year for both Spokane and Tacoma.

ABF service centers annually undergo extensive evaluations, including a nomination process, a quality awareness survey, an on-site validation audit, and scrutiny by the ABF Quality Implementation Committee. The comprehensive process gauges resource management, damage/loss prevention, customer satisfaction, and other key performance indicators for the previous year. Finalists are reviewed by ABF President and Chief Operating Officer Wes Kemp, who makes the final selections.

"We believe our customers deserve error-free service," said Mr. Kemp. "The personalized customer care ABF provides comes from the training, experience, and responsiveness of our local service center personnel. These employees have demonstrated what can be achieved when the principles of the ABF Quality Process are put into practice. Our company has prospered because of our dedication to serving internal and external customers in a helpful, efficient, innovative, and error-free manner. In this context, these four facilities have earned the distinction and I'm looking forward to my visit with each one in celebration of their achievement."

Mr. Kemp is scheduled to present the awards in Amarillo and Albuquerque on May 26, 2009, and in Tacoma and Spokane on May 27, 2009. Each facility is presented with a plaque that resides permanently at their location and a Quality Cup that resides only as long as a facility maintains the distinction. Each ceremony is attended by the ABF Quality Implementation Committee, local employees, and special guests.

Arkansas Best execs remain calm in the storm

Bob Davidson is supposed to be alarmed, concerned and dang-near worn out from the constant hand-wringing about a national trucking sector that has seen freight demand fall faster than the end-of-the-season hopes of Dallas Cowboy fans.

He’s not frayed in the least. He might be in the hot seat, but he’s careful not to let you see him sweat.

Davidson, the CEO of Fort Smith-based Arkansas Best Corp., is as non-plussed as the other executives at what is one of the nation’s largest less-than-truckload companies. The execs at the five-story corporate headquarters don’t get excited when the ledger posts black. They don’t get excited when the ledger posts red. No ups, no downs. They are the Lutherans of the trucking sector.

It’s not that they are arrogant and uncaring, or ignorant of the tough situation they face. Not at all. It’s that they’ve seen hard times before — although admittedly not this tough — and come out of each a little better than they went in.

Arkansas Best, Davidson stressed, has a management team with an average tenure of almost three decades with the company. They know the drill. You get on the bull, you get thrown off. You get up, and get back on the bull. Sometimes you last 8 seconds, sometimes not. Either way, there is always another rodeo. There is always another quarter. This too shall pass. Full Story.......

Arkansas Firms Send Four Truckers To National Competition

Truckers from several Arkansas companies are headed to Arlington, Va., for a national competition to be held Jan. 11-13.

The drivers are among 36 finalists vying to become captains of the American Trucking Associations' America's Road Team.

The drivers are:

• Danny Fuller of Jonesboro, Con-way Freight.

• Paul Gattin of Benton, ABF Freight System of Fort Smith.

• Gary Leu of Shelbina, Mo., Bentonville-based Wal-Mart Stores Inc. transportation division.

• Ben Saiz of Estancia, N.M., ABF Freight System.

A panel of trucking industry officials and trucking news media will judge the 36 contestants on knowledge of the trucking industry, dedication to safety, ability to communicate trucking's messages and overall safe driving records.

The three-day competition will result in new America's Road Team Captains, who serve two-year terms addressing trucking safety and professionalism issues with legislators, news media, civic organizations and the general public, according to a news release.

"America's Road Team represents the best of the best," said Bill Graves, American Trucking Associations' president and chief executive officer. "The 36 professional drivers selected as finalists all have impressive driving records, share a passion for safety and are engaged in their communities."

Drivers nominated to compete must be employed as either a company driver for an ATA member motor carrier or as an owner-operator leased to an ATA member; have an excellent safety record; and communicate his or her commitment to safety, courtesy and professionalism.

Arkansas is home to several trucking companies, including J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. in Lowell and PAM Transportation Services Inc. in Tontitown. Wal-Mart and Springdale-based Tyson Foods Inc. also operate trucking fleets.

State trucking industry workers earn an average annual salary of $29,561 and trucking generates more than $2.5 billion annually in payroll, according to a fact sheet from the Arkansas Trucking Association.

Trucks carry 87 percent of manufactured freight into and out of the state. Each day, trucks bring 303,692 tons of freight into the state and take 338,060 tons out, the state association said.