"That's the one thing you see at all the shows. Everybody says, 'we're hiring drivers, we're hiring all drivers, we love all drivers.' That's a campaign. It's a thing that everybody does. You see it as you walk through MATS. You see it. But how true is it?" --operator and LGBTQ+ Truck Driver Network cofounder Bobby Coffey-Loy
Cliffside Transportation Services operator Bobby Coffey-Loy hauls in a team with his husband, Ricky, and in one of a couple dozen or so rigs Cliffside has dedicated to XPO Logistics freight in the network. In the quote above, part of this edition of the Overdrive Radio podcast, Coffey-Loy was speaking to the mission of his and cofounders’ LGBTQ+ Truck Driver Network, established within the last year and engaged in a variety of support efforts for operators all around the nation.
Ricky and Bobby Coffey-Loy haul pharmaceuticals in this 2020 Volvo VNL outfitted with a 156-inch big-bunk ARI sleeper, not the only one in the fleet at Cliffside Transportation Services. Since getting acclimated to big-bunk trucking, Bobby's found the rig to be something of a literal life-changer. He's gone from 300-plus pounds down to around 240 in a fairly short time, with a focus on cooking for himself, as detailed in the podcast.
In the podcast, sit in on a conversation I had with Bobby Coffey-Loy at the 50th anniversary edition of the Mid-America Trucking Show last month, where the LGBTQ+ network made its truck-show debut to the delight of plenty at the Kentucky Exposition Center there. The West Wing booth's Mardi Gras beads were a hit -- I saw scads of folks walking around the show floor wearing them, likewise network lanyards for MATS attendee badges you’ll hear Coffey-Loy talk about. It's all part of a mission in part to increase LGBTQ+ visibility among the trucking community, but also to make good on its "All Drivers Means All" motto.
[Related: Ride with pride: With changing times, LGBTQ truckers move more confidently]
Ricky (right) and Bobby Coffey-Loy
Also, more companies have stepped up to "become a part of the network we are creating and vetting ... as LGBTQ+-friendly places to work," he said. The organization adds such companies to this page. Hear more about all of it here:
Also in the podcast, we pause to remember an owner-operator lost. My own interaction with Randy Cunha through recent years wasn’t extensive, by any means, but I’ll say that when we spoke attendant to my reporting on heavy-specialized hauling in the Spring of 2020, just as Cunha was winding down his own business toward retirement, the man I spoke to then was clearly an incarnation of the very best in the business of trucking as an owner-operator.
He’d become that after a career that spanned five decades and ended on a nice high note -- with a run of very good years under his own authority, heavy and oversize permits and all. In the podcast, catch much more about that directly from a man who knew him much better than me, our own "Long Haul Paul" Marhoefer.
[Related: A hard year on heroes: Remembering longtime specialized owner-operator Randy Cunha]
