Tuesday’s report on consumer confidence was a bit sour, even though the index was up a tad. “Overall, consumers remain apprehensive about the future,” said an official with The Conference Board Consumer Research Center, which manages the survey.

But, hey, that’s just a survey of how people feel. A report this morning shows that manufacturing, which has a more direct impact on trucking, continues to improve. One of the most active manufacturing sectors was transportation equipment, which includes trucks.

Factory activity expanded in August for the 13th consecutive month, and the overall economy grew for the 16th consecutive month, says the Institute for Supply Management. Its data is based on polling supply executives.

ISM’s Purchasing Managers Index for August registered 56.3 percent, an increase of 0.8 over July. A reading above 50 percent indicates that the manufacturing economy is generally expanding.

Eleven sectors reported growth in August, in the following order: primary metals; apparel, leather & allied products; transportation equipment; fabricated metal products; electrical equipment, appliances & components; miscellaneous manufacturing; computer & electronic products; paper products; chemical products; food, beverage & tobacco products; and printing & related support activities.

The five industries reporting contraction in August were: furniture & related products; petroleum & coal products; nonmetallic mineral products; plastics & rubber products; and machinery.

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You might have missed news of Union Pacific testing to see just how long a train can be. I didn’t know of it until reading a Wall Street Journal story this week. Writer Jennifer Levitz cites the train as an example of pressures in rail and ocean shipping, as well as trucking, to haul more freight per trip. The proponents in all three modes cite the potential for using less fuel, and thereby less pollution and lower costs for everyone.

As for UP’s so-called “monster train,” The Los Angeles Times account last January includes a video of it passing. It runs for more than 10 boring minutes, no surprise for a chain of cars that stretches for almost 3.5 miles.

The Journal presents a good recap of the current pushes for heavier trucks (Kraft, Coca-Cola Co. and other big companies) and for more doubles and triples (19 Western governors). It’s doubtful the truck initiatives efforts will go any further than they have in the past, given the strong safety lobby, which is a good thing. Highways are overcrowded in so many areas and getting worse. The benefits of heavier trucks don’t justify their safety consequences.

Furthermore, it’s doubtful that the savings of using heavier or longer trailers will translate into higher profits for owner-operators or company drivers, even though they are the ones who would have to handle them.

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Freedom of choice is one of the great things about capitalism. Its downside is there can be too much of a good thing.

Sheena Iyengar, a Columbia University professor, made this point in a recent <I>Money<I> magazine interview. In one of her best-known experiments, customers in a store sampled 24 flavors of jam, while others sampled six flavors. More customers liked the big assortment, but only 3 percent bought anything. Of those sampling the smaller group, 30 percent bought.

In other words, too much choice can paralyze. It’s not that big a deal when you’re shopping for jam, but when you’re shopping for a business partner, a lot’s at stake.

Driver demand is higher than it’s been in more than two years. For leased owner-operators, it could be a good time to get updated on compensation packages and other lease terms, especially if you’ve been with the same carrier for more than a few years.

If you try to examine every recruiting solicitation in trucking magazines and on the Internet, not to mention word of mouth from fellow drivers, it will overwhelm you. One bad outcome of that is the inability to choose.

The other extreme is rash decision-making. Do you jump to the fleet offering a handsome sign-on bonus? Or one with the highest pay per mile? The most sincere promise of home time? The best fuel surcharge? One that specializes in hauls to a certain region?

Of course, there is no simple answer. Nor is there one answer that suits everyone. It would be lazy to let one factor dictate this kind of decision. Begin screening potential carriers by single factors that are important to you, then move from broad categories to smaller ones, narrowing choices as you go. Kevin Rutherford explains how to do that in the August Overdrive Dollars & Sense column, about finding your ideal job.

He’ll conclude the process in September, but in the meantime you can learn more about finalizing a lease to a carrier by listening to our “Evaluating Prospective Carriers” webinar. It will feature Richard DeForest, vice president of fleet sales with ATBS, the financial services provider that co-produces our Partners in Business program. You can register now for the free event, Aug. 19.

Yes, the methodical approaches DeForest and Rutherford advocate can get tedious. Likely the last thing you want to do in your time off is raise your blood pressure while coaxing key information from strangers via phone and computer. It’s easier to talk to drivers, gather bits and pieces as you go, hurry to catch that next load, and think some more about where to lease.

“We like keeping our options open,” Iyengar says. “The important thing is to realize there are costs to doing that.”

In the case of your career, the biggest cost could be opportunities you’ll never know you missed.

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If you’re a fan of “The Graduate” (1967), you know well the one word of advice passed on to the new college graduate, Benjamin (Dustin Hoffman), by a friend of his parents:

Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.

Mr. McGuire might have seen July 2010 in his crystal ball. The Institute for Supply Management’s monthly report on factory output lists Plastics (with rubber products) as the fastest growing segment.

The news remains strong overall for manufacturing, which had its 12th consecutive month of expansion. ISM, in its survey of executives, found there was growth in new orders, production and employment for July. On the downside, supplier deliveries were slower and inventories grew.

As measured by the ISM index, manufacturing growth in July (55.5) was a little slower than it was in June (56.2), but it’s still close to the average rate of growth (56.3) for the past 12 months.

After plastics/rubber, the next top growth sectors, in order, were:
• Miscellaneous Manufacturing
• Paper Products
• Electrical Equipment, Appliances & Components
• Transportation Equipment
• Primary Metals
• Textile Mills
• Computer & Electronic Products
• Fabricated Metal Products
• Chemical Products.

The four industries reporting contraction in July are:
• Nonmetallic Mineral Products
• Furniture & Related Products
• Food, Beverage & Tobacco Products
• Machinery.

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The biggest venue for Pride & Polish, produced now by Overdrive’s Custom Rigs, is coming in less than a month. It’s the Great American Trucking Show in Dallas, Aug. 26-28.

This show always draws great rigs. You can view a quick sampling from the 2009 show in a music video on Overdrive’s video player. There are also truck videos from the last two Great West Truck Shows, another Pride & Polish venue.

Check our recent story for more info about the Dallas show.

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Overdrive has a big anniversary next year – its 50^th. Some of you were around at the time the first issue came out in September 1961. A lot has changed since then, both with Overdrive and trucking.

As we prepare for publishing 12 months of retrospectives starting this fall, we’d like to hear your memories, whether they date to the ‘60s or later years. What were trucks like when you started driving? How about the truck stops of yesteryear? How did troopers treat you? What noble things have been lost from trucking over the decades? What do you remember about Overdrive or founder Mike Parkhurst?

You can e-mail your thoughts to me at mheine@rrpub.com or send them to Overdrive, P.O. Box 3187, Tuscaloosa, AL 35403. We’ll be using readers’ comments online and in print.

Also, if you plan to be at the Great American Trucking Show in Dallas next month and would like to share your reflections with an editor, let me know.  

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Former Arrow Trucking drivers, as well as those disgusted by the company’s mismanagement, might gain some slight sense of vindication in reading the Tulsa World’s account of the foreclosure on the home of former Arrow Trucking Chief Executive Officer Doug Pielsticker.

The home, like Arrow in its final days, was way too deep in debt. Three mortages on the property exceeded $3 million, more than the home’s appraised value of $2.5 million, says the newspaper.

The company’s sudden closure days before Christmas, stranding drivers all over the country, was one of the industry’s biggest stories last year.

If you’re keen for details on how the bankruptcy is progressing, check the Tulsa World’s article from last month, “Assets of Arrow Trucking operations consolidated.”

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The recovery is still with us, note the factory-watchers at the Institute for Supply Management. The manufacturing sector expanded in June for the 11th consecutive month, though at a less heated pace than in May. The overall economy for the 14th consecutive month in June.

Of course, the housing and labor markets still suffer. The first affects flatbed freight, though flatbed seems to have enough other business to have started the year well. First-quarter data from ATBS shows that flatbed haulers’ income was on par with reefers and higher than dry van.

As for jobs, you probably know people who are struggling, but drivers are in demand. And that demand is going to get much stronger. To hear more about that, watch and listen to the one-hour webinar we did last week on “The emerging driver shortage.” You can download the free archived webinar.

Now back to the ISM data. Thirteen manufacturing sectors reported growth in June, in this order: Plastics & Rubber Products; Transportation Equipment; Printing & Related Support Activities; Computer & Electronic Products; Electrical Equipment, Appliances & Components; Paper Products; Fabricated Metal Products; Food, Beverage & Tobacco Products; Furniture & Related Products; Petroleum & Coal Products; Nonmetallic Mineral Products; Miscellaneous Manufacturing; and Chemical Products.

The industries reporting contraction in June were: Apparel, Leather & Allied Products; Wood Products; and Machinery.

ISM measures this with its PMI (Purchasing Managers’ Index). It was 56.2 in June, down from 59.7 in May. A reading above 50 percent indicates an expanding manufacturing economy.

“We are now 11 months into the manufacturing recovery, and given the robust nature of recent growth, it is not surprising that we would see a slower rate of growth,” says Norbert Ore, of ISM’s Manufacturing Business Survey Committee. “Expectations have been that the second half of the year will not be as strong in terms of the rate of growth, and June appears to validate that forecast.”

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Trucking has probably been more of a follower than a leader when it comes to adapting to the Internet, but a recent feature story in marketing tabloid BtoB shines a nice light on truckload and logistics provider Con-Way Inc. for its use of social media. (“B-to-B” is marketing jargon for business-to-business relationships.)

“Twitter application drives business for trucking company” focuses on Con-Way’s uses of Twitter and Facebook.

This month the company launched a Twitter feed that sends load listings, usually hundreds per day, to its followers. Since those messages can be received via phone as well as computer, the distribution method is well-suited to Con-Way’s drivers. This press release explains more about how the company is using Twitter for load-matching.

“Con-Way CMO Tom Nightingale has aggressively guided his company’s brand onto Facebook, LinkedIn [similar to Facebook, but for the business world], Twitter, Youtube and other social networks,” says the story. “He also uses blogs to scour the Web for leads — for both new customers and new employees — and as a thought-leadership platform.”

 
Con-Way also uses the HootSuite application “to listen and respond to posts about the company.” That’s a great idea for trying to manage a reputation, considering there is no shortage of online venues for drivers to vent, whether justified or not, about carriers.

You can find links to Con-Way’s initiatives with Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and an RSS feed on its site  

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