That’s Delivered Podcast
Welcome to “That’s Delivered” – your ultimate destination for all things trucking and beyond! Here, we take you behind the wheel and dive deep into the world of trucking, delivering stories, insights, and experiences designed to inspire, educate, and entertain.
Our podcast isn’t just about transportation; it’s about reliability, accomplishment, and fulfillment. “That’s Delivered” reflects the sense of completion that comes with meeting promises and exceeding expectations—whether on the road or in life.
Whether you’re a seasoned trucker, a logistics enthusiast, or just curious about the backbone of our economy, this is the place for you. We’ll explore life on the road, uncover how technology is reshaping the industry, and break down the latest regulations impacting drivers and businesses alike.
So buckle up, hit the road with us, and join a community that understands the journey is just as important as the destination. From personal stories to industry insights, “That’s Delivered” brings the best of trucking straight to your ears, promising every mile together will be worth the ride!
That’s Delivered Podcast
Standing Strong Inside UPS – Union Steward Chuck Bryan Returns
In this must-hear follow-up episode, Chuck Bryan—veteran union steward at the Chicago Area Consolidation Hub (CACH)—pulls no punches as he returns to That’s Delivered. From exposing UPS’s internal policy changes to sounding the alarm on automation, Chuck offers a rare inside look at the ongoing fight for workers' rights in a corporate-driven world. It’s a deep dive into leadership, loyalty, and what it really means to be part of the Teamster brotherhood.
Key Takeaways
✅ Record-High Worker Engagement
70% of workers participated in the latest steward elections at CACH—a powerful show of solidarity.
✅ Corporate Policy Misfires
New rules on where drivers can fuel their trucks have led to confusion and unfair disciplinary action, all for the sake of cost-cutting.
✅ Profits Over People
UPS beat financial projections by $450 million—while still laying off workers across the country.
✅ The Illusion of Automation
Chuck questions the practicality of autonomous trucking, pointing out that real-world conditions don’t match the perfect test scenarios shown in promo videos.
✅ The Power of Union Brotherhood
“It’s not just a Teamster organization—it’s a Brotherhood,” Chuck explains, urging members to think long-term and protect future generations through strong contracts.
✅ Words of Encouragement
“Don’t let the grind grind you out. Stay with it, be positive.” Chuck offers grounded advice to those feeling overwhelmed by corporate tactics.
✅ Why You Should Listen
This episode isn’t just for union members. It’s for anyone who wants to understand what’s really happening behind the scenes at America’s logistics giants—and why it matters.
🎧 Tune in now for a bold, unfiltered look at the modern labor movement from someone who’s living it every day.
Interested in being a guest on the podcast? Click here to join the conversation!
📅 This is your chance to hear directly from the FMCSA about what’s changing—and how to stay ahead.
🗓️ Thursday, July 24, 2025
🕐 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM CDT
📍 Register here: https://events.descartes.com/hub/events/2291441c-6479-411d-b2ca-5f2644c3fb7b/landing
Built for drivers. Powered by grit.
Bold, smooth, and crafted for the long haul 3-Axle Coffee keeps America moving, one cup at a time. Whether you’re hitting the road or hitting deadlines, this is the brew that never brakes.
Strong. Steady. 3-Axle Ready.
Try it now at 3AxleCoffee.com
Get your discount for Truck Parking Club click: here
Get your Trucking Ray merch to show that you roll with Trucking Ray and That’s Delivered Podcast! click: here
What's going on. Everyone, welcome back to another episode of that's Delivered. I'm your host, truckin' Ray, and we have a great show lined up for you. I'm excited to bring back a guest that you guys love and you guys really liked the episode the first time around. So now, if you ever wondered what really looks like behind the scenes of UPS or just the trucks moving freight about the union work, problem solving and the leadership, this is the episode for you, because today we're welcoming back Chuck Bryan, a seasoned union steward out there at Chicago Area Consolidation Hub, catch.
Speaker 1:Chuck has given us a powerful look into the world last time of logistics with UPS logistics, managing the dynamics between members, management and representing his people and trying to stay rooted in union principles. So that was that time. Now we're going to go even deeper. We're going to talk about some things that you guys want to know more about and what the future looks like. So let's bring him in. Like so, let's bring him in, chuck. I'm glad to have you on the show, man. It's been a privilege to have you on. So how are you?
Speaker 2:doing today. I'm good brother. Thanks for having me back.
Speaker 1:Nice. Yeah, it's great. Just try to catch up a little bit. I know you've been busy. There's been a lot of things going on with finding the union steward and putting together the right team to represent the union members out there, so give us a sneak peek about how that was going for you. I'm sure there was a lot of work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we, you know, we had, every three years, like everywhere else or most places, we had a steward election at catch and you know there was a group of us that ran Um and so we, uh, so we ran a campaign. Fortunately, not everyone in our group was elected, but, uh, you know, I think it's a, it's a good practice to um, you know, bring issues to the members and and try to uh raise uh participation, get people more engaged even if they don't vote for you. Um, you know it's, it's uh, you want as many members involved as possible and so, uh, you know, I think we had, uh, I think we had 1,040, somewhere in there eligible voters and the total count was 709. So about 70% of the eligible members that had previously served in last term. And then we got two more stewards, two newer stewards, elected. So, you know, time to serve another three years to the membership and try to do the best we can against the company. That is not always very easy to deal with.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean a lot of changes going on this year alone and more to come in the future. It looks like anything's going on at Catch that's new or on the horizon that many people have questions about or want to know.
Speaker 2:We haven't had. You know, kets were kind of in a unique position because we're a large hub. You know we share the building with Local 705 out of Chicago as well, so we're not your traditional hub where you know we're bringing in feeder and we're sorting and it's just local work and a few overnight runs. We're exclusively feeder and so we don't have package car positions for 710 at catch. Uh, we don't have any inside people. Those are all local 705 um. But because we're a consolidation hub, uh, in the middle of the country, um, a lot of what's going out going on out there at other smaller hubs across the country, I'm not going to say it doesn't affect us, but it doesn't affect us in the same way that it might an end-of-line hub or a smaller facility somewhere in the country that's experiencing layoffs and things like that.
Speaker 2:They paused hiring for a time at catch, a very short time. The problem is at the bottom of our board. We have quite a bit of turnover on the bottom of our board because of course they hire people and you may or may not get work for two or three months, and so it's difficult for people at the bottom of the board to hang in there when they're not working for a long time. So currently, right now, we had a lot of Amazon stuff the last couple of weeks been moving on. They had, I guess, amazon days, and so there was a lot of extra work, a lot of people working extra shifts.
Speaker 2:Board was exhausted. They were asking sleeper teams to go out when they came back to try to cover all the work. My understanding is they did get all that covered and got everything moved. But yeah, it's been busy lately and then obviously I think this has affected all the sleeper teams across the country. But corporate is now, you know, nitpicking teams a little bit more on't allowed at all to fuel anywhere but a hub, and so it's been an adjustment to kind of figure out what it is that the company wanted and they weren't real clear on their policy. So trying to communicate to them and make sure that our members know what they can and what they can't do and what the procedure is. But I think we've got that pretty much figured out at the moment. So hopefully we won't have any more issues with members, you know, being pulled into the office and harassed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, there seems to be no end to that, so education is the best way to prevent a lot of that pain.
Speaker 1:So thanks for doing that and helping them out. Representing for the members. I mean that's a huge thing, kind of looking back a little bit, kind of digging a little further. What's one thing you said last time that stuck with me how important it you know stewards and the knowledge of the contract. Dig in a little further. What's one thing you said last time that stuck with me how important stewards and the knowledge of the contract. One thing that would probably clarify or help people reiterate that desire to know the contract it's not just a quote but it's a reality to understand it.
Speaker 2:Stewards like in 710, I mean, yeah, so you know, stewards like in 710, for example, we're not, you know, under the bylaws we're not a representative of 710. We don't represent the local. We're basically a liaison. We're elected and, yeah, we do represent the members. We do it at the behest of the executive board of 710. But really our goal, you know, our goal as stewards should really be to educate members and you know when new things come up, where the company is enforcing you know this rule or that rule, or they've made up a new, brand new rule. It's about getting clarification from the company on exactly what they want and how they want it done and how they want our members to, you know, do whatever it is that they're demanding at the moment so that we can keep our members safe from discipline or or even if there's a contract dispute. You know having a conversation about, well, this is what the contract says. You know, just because the contract says something doesn't necessarily mean that UPS follows it Right and there might be some dispute between your local union and UPS about actions that the company's taken towards their members. You know communicating to members that, hey, the locals working on this, you know your locals are trying to fight the company on this. They're having conversations about what's negotiated in the contract, but in the meantime we can protect ourselves by doing this.
Speaker 2:You know you can follow work directions and then you can file a grievance later. You can. You know you can do something that is sure you're irritated about, or you know you don't think it's part of your job to do something. Do it, file a grievance. Protect your job. Your job is the most important thing. You know to be able to come in the next day or the next week and, um, you know, clock in and go, do, uh, your job and provide for the people that you're, that you're working for. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, um, you know that's uh, that's a tough thing to do and there's a lot behind that than just those words. I mean that's how do you? How do you? Maybe it's something that maybe other locals can adopt to help educate people. What's a good practice that you could probably put in place that you're already doing? I know you got a lot going on on Telegram.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean we have our, we have our Telegram groups and know we have. We have several of those because our safety, uh, uh department, our chsp, you know, runs a few pages. A lot of those are around. You know whether you know we have a lot of sleeper teams to catch, so we have like a weather and info page with weather throughout the country. You know things to look out for, and, and our uh, our CHSP does a really good job of being consistent in what they post at the beginning every week, kind of getting an idea hey, you know I'm I'm going out West and there's a, you know there's a huge heat wave or maybe in the winter time there's a winter storm moving through. You know things that can help you plan your week. And then there's general chat groups where you know, let's say, you're going into a rail yard and you can't get past the kiosk because you don't know how to log in and what am I supposed to put in and be able to have real-time help from other members to help you. You know help. You do your job out there when you're, when you're, uh, in the middle of something and maybe experiencing something you're not, you haven't done before.
Speaker 2:Um, and then the page we run is more about, uh, we do all of those things as well, but you know, our more, more of our focus is what your rights are, what your obligations are, cause you know, the contract's not just about what you get, it's about what you're obligated to do for the company. You know it's a two. A contract's always a two-way street, you know. So, like I mentioned the fueling, you know, if you look at our contract, you know it talks about if you're scheduled for a fuel here or there.
Speaker 2:And I was getting guys calling me saying, well, they don't have any right to tell me where to fuel. Well, yeah, they do. You know the contract says they can schedule your fuels and so if they want to schedule your fuel at a hub, that's completely within their right to do it, you know. And so, making sure guys don't assume I think we've all had those conversations where somebody thinks the contract says one thing and it doesn't really say that. And we want to make sure, before people make decisions, that they're doing it based on based on the rules, so they don't find themselves in the office. You know, starting progressive discipline.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. That's not good, because I mean, once you affect your livelihood, you know things are a lot more than the contractors. A lot of things that you know we don't want to, you know, hurt our family. You know that the insurance and being there for them, I mean that's a huge deal. So that's good, absolutely. I like that, yeah, yeah. So now real talk when it comes. You know what do you do when it's on paper but it doesn't really match what's happening out there in the dock or yard, and maybe it'll help people with that. How do you walk that line between staying loyal to the contract but keeping the job running without blowing it? You know, blowing it all up.
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, yeah, you want to. Again, a lot of disputes are going to be contractual disputes between the company has some interpretation that the local doesn't agree with. So, as disheartening as it is and difficult because you know members are upset a lot of times what we're doing here is we're following our directions right, we're given a work assignment and even if we don't agree with those things, our number one goal as a union is to protect livelihood of our members. So we don't, you know, I don't think there's any local out there that's going to tell you, hey, be insubordinate when they tell you, they tell you to do something, just do whatever you want. Anyway, you know there's not a business agent or anybody who's going to tell you that Generally, you know, even if we believe, as a local, that it's a violation of the contract, generally the instruction is from your business agent, workers directed file afterwards.
Speaker 2:And that's difficult for some people because they're upset, right, they're. You know, hey, this is BS and they've never done this before, and you know, and they're upset about it and you just kind of have to, uh, you know, have some empathy from where they're coming from. Um, certainly, I can understand why you're upset about this and I understand why it. Maybe it costs you more time, or you know you're going to get home a little bit later, but you're going home. You know you're going home with a job, number one and and there's just a process that we have to follow in order to um, you know, address these situations through the grievance process. And the grievance process by nature, right, you, you're filing a grievance because you believe that the company has done something wrong to you. So it's, it's in nature, reactionary. Um, you, you have to be wronged in some way to file a grievance. You don't file a grievance when you haven't been grieved. You have to give the company the opportunity to do the right thing and then, when they don't, because you've been wronged, you're filing a grievance.
Speaker 2:So I know that part of that part is frustrating for a lot of people. Where they think, you know, they want to get out ahead of it and sometimes locals do a good job of that where you know, let's say, we see something that's going to be an issue, we see something that's going to be an issue. And if your business agents have a, have a, or even your stewards have a relationship with manager that maybe they can get, they can have a conversation before something becomes a problem. Sure, you know, you get it taken care of and it's not an issue going forward. But a lot of times, all as all of us know at UPS, a lot of times it's a long period of time where we're going through the grievance process and it can be slow and it can be frustrating.
Speaker 2:And just know, companies sometimes use the grievance process and the ability to drag uh things out as a way to kind of um, as a, as a way to divide and get union members against one another. Um, you know, we've heard it with the fuel stuff this week. You know, um, there's a lot of union members who, oh, you know, I heard this guy had 4,000 mile run and he's fueled 10 times and that's why I can't get fuel anymore and it's a little. You know, and I'm not saying that doesn't happen, but when I talk to management it's, it's uh, hey, this came down from corporate. This is something where they want to make more money.
Speaker 2:Most of the time, what UPS, everything that UPS does, is money centric.
Speaker 2:They're doing something to make more money and I don't think the fuel is any different.
Speaker 2:You know, there's a lot of union members out there who take it as an opportunity to say you know, we're, we're in this position because of this person or that person or this member did something wrong and now we're all stuck with this. And, uh, I think they do it, not realizing that you're, you're you're dividing the local. You know you're dividing the union, you're you're being divisive in the way that that you look at something when it's when the you know, when the company is clearly doing it, when it's coming from corporate has nothing to do about some individual guy at catch or Minneapolis doing something wrong, and then they make a blanket you know, a blanket directive for the whole company. That's not how it works, and so it's a little bit disappointing, but it's again another opportunity to have that conversation about why are we really in this position, why is the company really doing this, and kind of highlighting the fact that we have an opportunity to come together over an issue instead of taking the bait and dividing one another over it money negotiating fuel prices.
Speaker 1:But then if we go off of that contract, if there is one between that relationship between the fuel company and UPS, why do we got to give you such a low rate? That's where I kind of go and sympathize with the money part of it, because if we're able to get gas anywhere, why would this particular company subject themselves to a lower fuel price?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, if anybody wants you know the last, what was that? A couple months ago, they had the shareholders meeting right, and we've got feeder drivers and package car drivers all over the country that are laid off. We've got inside people who have lost their jobs completely to automation or, you know, in buildings that are shut down while they automate, got all this stuff going on and UPS goes to the shareholders and says, oh yeah, we happen to outperform our projections by $450 million, $450 million. So you know this isn't about you or I as a driver. It's not. You know this idea that UPS does things to.
Speaker 2:You know I always love the advertising about. You know how great of a place it is to work and how well they treat people, and it's like all you got to do is watch the news or listen to. There's plenty of people out there. They're pretty famous within the industry for their treatment of their people and so they're not doing anything for you or I. You know this is driven by shareholders. This is driven by dividends. They're not trying to make a better life for you. This is all about money, money and it generally is. And if you look at things, if you look at the things companies do and you translate it into money, you get a better understanding of what they're at, what they're actually doing. Um, you can see it with a clear light.
Speaker 1:Right, I can. I can agree. I mean, there's a lot of talk out there right now about you know busting the union and these contract or numbers that are being thrown out there, about you know letting go early and maybe getting a buyout. What's your takes on that one? I know you've heard some of that, probably out there too on that one.
Speaker 2:I know you've heard some of that, probably out there too. Yeah, I know the IBT came out really strong against it and said that they believed that it was a violation of the contract. It's hard to comment a lot because I've not seen there's rumors that the company is going to bring this stuff out. I've not seen the actual program, I've not seen to whom or how much they're offering and how that affects their retirements or their ability to take insurance in retirement or anything like that. You know, so I'm not sure, I think clearly again translate it to money when you get rid of top-scale long-term members presumably a lot of whom are educated and strong union members at top scale and you get rid of 25,000 of them and you replace them with 25,000 people off the street and progression that you can pay a diluted wage to for the next four years, you know, and you can uh uh, talk to them about the union in a different way than maybe you can. That guy that's been there 30 years or that gal that's been there 30 years, um, you know, I think they would be very hard pressed. I think the idea of UPS deserting is dream, I'm sure. I'm sure they'd love to do that, but the to do that, they would have to do that probably at a national level. I don't know that they'd ever be able to be successful in that. Again, I think it's a lot to do about making money and if you do the, you know you do the. Look at the payouts when they come out on the program and I would bet that you multiply that out and then you take an average wage week to week with a new person and I bet they make a profit on the wages that they would have paid the top scale member who had been there and over the course of a three-year or four-year progression throughout the country, they obviously are going to make money off of that.
Speaker 2:The bigger concern is, you know, the, the job guarantees. You know, is the company going to try to say, oh well, we hired 25,000 people so we've upheld our, our job creation within the national? I think the international made it clear that they would fight very hard against that, that those aren't additional jobs. Those are. You know, you're just replacing that many people. But it'll be interesting to see how the company lays it out, how lucrative those payouts are. How many people actually take them up on that offer. Take them up on that offer, cause I can't imagine too many people will. If it affects their ability to you know, if it affects their, their pension or their health benefits or anything like that in a significant way, I wouldn't think a lot of people would take them up on that. So we'll you know. I'm kind of waiting to see what the program is and read about it and go from there. But I think it's certainly again about money. It always is with UPS.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and for those listening out there too, I mean we can speculate all we want, but until we actually have something concrete to look at and really look at those numbers, like you said, this is, you know, just based on our opinion. Our opinion, you know your experience and what you've seen over the years, so I appreciate you sharing that with us.
Speaker 2:Sure, and there's. There's a lot of people out there, there's guys on TikTok, hey, this is what it is. And there's, how do you know what it is? You know, until they release the program you can't really talk about what the company's offering, because we don't know, we haven't seen it.
Speaker 1:There's a lot of speculation that possibly the company is going broke because of the contract. What's your opinion on that?
Speaker 2:They outperformed, like I said the last shareholders meeting, they outperformed their projection by $450 million. I mean this company continues. I mean, if you're a feeder driver out there that pulls one load a week, you're paying for damn near your full year. That's the type of profits that they're making. You think back, even coming out of COVID, hundreds of billions of dollars in profits, and that's after they wrote off everything they could write off. Their profit margins in small packers are so big.
Speaker 2:Um, this idea that we can price ourself out um is, uh is comical really. If you, if you look at what the revenues are and we're the ones that create those revenues, um, it's uh. You know they could get rid of every division manager your hub. They could get rid of every division manager at your hub. They could get rid of every, you know every specialist and every on-road at your building. And we all know how to do our job. You know, other than needing a trailer number and hey, where did you load this? At Us as employees of theirs. You know, we know how the systems are run. We're the ones that move those packages. You know whether it's the package car driver picking that stuff up or it's the part-timer on the dock loading or unloading, or it's a feeder driver taking it from one hub to the other, locally or coast to coast. We're the ones that that, that deliver those packages. We're the ones that uh, uh, that create that revenue. Um, and you know, we should take pride in that, because that's what those are, the revenues when they have 450 million. That's that's what we did.
Speaker 2:We did that, um, it wasn't management, it wasn't uh, you know, it wasn't a lot of other other uh, you know, I can't think of a time where I came into work and I wasn't sure what I was going to do and a manager told me what to do and allowed me to do my job. You know, that's just not, uh, not something that generally happens. So, no, I don't think they're losing money. I think they're. You know, I think they're investing a lot of money in automation to try to eliminate Teamster jobs going forward, and that's again, that's money related. That's to increase um dividends for shareholders and everybody else, cause that's the focus when you have a company that's publicly traded like this. It's not about you, it's not about your you know your ability to buy a house, or buy that car you want, or send your kid to college. It's about the guy that owns a million shares and him getting the dividend that he wants on his investment, and that's how this company runs. That's that's how we uh, you know how they measure success, so uh.
Speaker 1:So yeah, that's good to speak on that, because there is a lot of fear monger that goes on that next contract we're going to be stooped where we can't ask for anything and start taking things from us, and that kind of helps people to not want more.
Speaker 2:I'm not saying they need to be green. What did Carol Tomey come out right afterward and say, oh, that was easy, right, we thought we were going to pay a lot more, you know. And now they want to. Now they want to cry broke. And and look there's, we have members who always think the company's gone broke, scared to death to ask for too much, always think they're going to. You know that the company's going to go out of business If you ask too much.
Speaker 2:Um, just go back and look at clips of Carol Tomei on, on, on, uh. You know CNN or Fox or you know whatever your chosen news network is. Uh, right after the contract in 23,. What was she saying? Boy, we got off cheap. We didn't pay what we thought we were going to pay, um, and they're not. They're not offering us, um, they're not offering us more money than they can afford to offer us. Quite frankly, there was a threat of a strike, but it's not like they had to come with two offers. We passed the first, the historic contract that we have. We passed it on the first go around. It's not like we pressed them for extra money. This is what they offered. Then went around afterwards and said that was easy. Glad we got off so cheap.
Speaker 2:So to come back now later and say, and for anybody to really think, or even the company to be taken seriously, to say, boy, we're really struggling, um, when, when they're outperforming all of their own objectives as far as earnings goes, I mean that's you know. I don't think it's realistic to really talk about them losing money. They're not losing money. And if they're losing money, I mean we have 500 specialists in an office with 300 bids. You know we've got people.
Speaker 2:You walk in and there's new people in there every day that are I'm not even sure what they all do. You know they're just part time and full time office people. You know if they're not contributing anything to the bottom line, you know, if I'm a, if I'm the company and I want to, I want to shore up more money, it's not you or I that I eliminate. You know it's, it's the people that don't produce revenues, you know. So I just don't think it's, you know. I just don't think it's a reasonable thing to think that we've outpriced ourself or the company's losing money because they're paying us too much. I just don't think that's true.
Speaker 1:What about the relationship with the rail? I mean they weren't using that as much before, but COVID is a priority. Now they can use the rail.
Speaker 2:I think rail is always a problem, one of our, one of our, one of our issues. I mean, it wasn't, it wasn't looked at in our contract either, but one of the things that we really pushed and one of the, you know, the things that we wanted to see was we wanted, we wanted to see rail included in subcontract, where everybody at our building is working before you can put something on a rail, you know, and, and that didn't happen. But you know, I think we've learned. If we've learned anything we, I think we can always learn something about, about contracts, and I hope what we've all learned is that we can look, we can go out there and get inside workers one hundred dollars an hour, but if they automate their job, what does it matter? You know, if you don't have a job and you don't have job protections, how does it help you long-term? You know, sure, we want, we want the money, but the language of the contract matters, your job protection matters and that's, I really think, what the membership should come together in, because, yeah, I'm not an inside worker and I'm not a, but I, you know, I have no problem last contract going out on strike for my brothers and sisters on the inside because they deserve what they deserve.
Speaker 2:You know I go in there. You're a feeder driver. You go in there. You see those guys working. So you know, work their ass off. You know package car guys. God bless you. I don't want to do that. You know I want to get in a semi and run across the country. I don't want to have a thousand stops and being badgered all day by management. No thanks they. They work their ass off for their money and they should have job protection. You know they should have job protection.
Speaker 1:No disrespect to the feeders out there as well. I mean driving all those hours, all those nasty accidents out there. You got to trust the other driver as well that's driving for you while you go to sleep, so yeah all of it.
Speaker 2:I mean, yeah, there's pros and cons to every job, but you know, those people that look down on part-timers in the building haven't been inside of the building because, uh, you know, our brothers and sisters on the inside work their ass off. They really do. And uh, sure, it may be a three and a half hour shift and you know, I got to go out and drive in a blizzard and Wyoming, and in the winter I, I, you know, sure that sucks on my side too and it's tiring and it's you know. But the point is is that there's, um, you know there's there's the everybody who's a member has their place within what we do at at UPS and they're all really imperative to what we do.
Speaker 2:And the success of the Teamsters, long-term, is to make sure, hey, when Ray retires he's replaced, right, somebody takes that job. And and and I think people lose sight of that when they're negotiating contracts, sometimes, where they're looking, they're thinking me, me, me, me, me, and how much am I going to make? But you want to make sure somebody comes behind you and keeps contributing to the pension and, um, you know, pays into the health coverage and and all of that. That's just as important and should be a priority when you're voting on a contract is protecting everybody's job, so the real one that we need to be looking at is automation and you know, bringing it to the future.
Speaker 1:You know, think about that as a union steward as well. You know representing people. When there's nobody there and there's an automation being done, maybe they can contract it in to have someone work on that system. They keep it going. I'm not sure how it works, but I'm sure it's going to break at some point. But there won't be an individual there, a taxpayer, worker, a hard-working labor person. So what does that look like for you? I mean, like you said, we need to come together and work on what really matters. Automation is the real enemy here, isn't it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, automation, ai. I don't know who these companies think they're going to sell their products and their services to when none of us have a job. But I don't think they're focusing on that now. I think they're looking again. Everything's driven by money. I don't think they're focusing on that now. I think they're looking again. Everything's driven by money and um, you know, I I think at some point these corporations have to realize that.
Speaker 2:You know good jobs like ours. Um, you know the, the places where there's hubs, um, where there's UPS hubs. I'd love to see a study of how those communities fare, you know, with workers who work at a UPS hub and the monies that they collectively bargain and how that affects local communities. You know local restaurants, local grocery stores, things like that. Local restaurants, local grocery stores, things like that. You know, because you know our system of capitalism doesn't work unless there's money, money moving through the system, which means you and I and the people that we work for, work with, have to make money. Right, we got to be able to go to the grocery store and buy groceries. Or, you know, take the. Take the spouse out, or take the family out for a nice dinner, or um, go on. Or, you know, take the, take the spouse out, or take the family out for a nice dinner or, um, go on vacation. You know, and, and and pay for uh, services, you know, tourist services, or pay for that hotel, and if nobody has money for those things, those things don't exist, they go away, you know. And so this uh, right, and so I don't know.
Speaker 2:You know, when you start, oh, we're not going to have any truck drivers on the road and we're not going to, uh, I think we talked about that the last time. Like you know, the, the American Trucking Association, which of course is, is not. You know, I know everybody goes to. You know they have all the news articles and things like that, but they don't support labor. They support truck owners and trucking businesses, right, and so a lot of their gripes are what are we going to do with this trucking, this truck driver shortage? But nobody really has an honest conversation about why there's a truck driver shortage. But nobody really has an honest conversation about why there's a trucker shortage.
Speaker 2:You know the trucker shortage is created by the depression of wages within the industry. You, you want people to go do a job that you're not willing to pay them what it's worth, right. And when you have that imbalance where, hey, I can go do this job where I have to, you know I have to, I have to go out, and maybe I have to stay out on the road one or two weeks and I'm making not enough money to do the things that I want, why would I go take that job, especially when, when especially progressive states out there have been raising minimum wage, why would I go out in a truck and make $400 a week when I can go to the McDonald's down the street, be home every night and I can make 22, 24 bucks an hour? It doesn't make any sense. And so the trucking industry's response to that again, is not to recognize hey, we need to pay more because this is worth more, because they, we need to pay more because this is worth more, because they don't want to pay you more. They want to pay for something that creates bigger, higher dividends for the executives and the shareholders within those companies, and so that's where they put their money. They don't. They could invest money into training. They could invest money into higher wages and better benefits and invest in people, right. But that's not money they get to put in their pocket if they do that. So it's.
Speaker 2:It's really about to me. You know, I really think at some point America has has to be. You know, this whole america first and all this stuff. And people want to have these conversations and, hey, we want jobs to come back and we want this and we want this. None of that really matters unless those jobs are union jobs and they have benefits and they have pension and they have good wages.
Speaker 2:You know, you bring a manufacturing job back to your community and it pays 12 or 13 bucks an hour. What's it really doing Except making money for the people that own that? Again, and in the most successful times and what people don't want to talk about is the most successful times when we built the middle class, it was all tied to unionism. It was about worker rights and both parties back then cared about working class people. They supported unions, they supported your right to collectively bargain and unfortunately, you know, there's more and more and more attacks on our on our way of life, because it's driven by, you know, corporate greed. Basically, and until we, I think, until we address that, you're going to see corporations spend more and more money onto automation and AI and all of these things that they can do without paying you or I to do it, you know.
Speaker 1:So we've got to be aware of it Amount of money that is being put into just two automated vehicles that are on the road with the Aurora. I know they're supposed to be talk of more, but there's just two right now that are actively running, but they actually had to put someone back in the truck. So, yeah, they're spending a lot of money billions of dollars and they could be putting that elsewhere, like you said, for taxpaying individuals Sure, hardworking individuals, hardworking individuals. And, like you said, you know, if you want to dilute the workforce, you create a weaker society, because you have younger ones that are looking to educate themselves on something to do in life, for a future, but yet they don't feel like it's attainable because they feel like it's going to be replaced by some form of AI or automation. So what's the point of even trying? And so then you're going to create more people that are disconnected for wanting to actually achieve more.
Speaker 2:And so I like, I like, well, well, and then and then, and the saturation of good paying union jobs out there. You know, even if you go into the trucking industry now now UPS has been hiring more people directly off the street. But you know there's a lot of us that when we started you had to work for that crappy company that you've got paid $300 a week and you weren't home all week. You were home for a 34 hour reset and, yeah, that was that was kind of your. You know, pay in your way to get your experience. But, god, you were in such a bad spot four years in because you made no money. I mean, that's, that's a hard thing, that's a hard thing for anybody to do and not have opportunities out there.
Speaker 2:You know I remember stories of old timers. You know, before deregulation, when, when you had interstate carriers and interstate carriers and and you know there were uh cartage companies coming into every union yard every night picking up in-state deliveries, cause, you know the corporations couldn't deliver them there was a whole industry that was um, that sustained people where they could work as a casual. Uh, maybe, maybe they weren't posted on a union board but they could. They could work for CF and Preston and and ABF and Caroline and everybody at the same time. Uh, one day, at a time when they needed them and they could, they could earn pension credits and they could make a good wage and really not have a full-time job somewhere. And they got to learn and they got to know people within the industry, which made them good drivers later on.
Speaker 2:You just don't have those opportunities anymore. It's very difficult to go out and good, get a good training with steady work and get paid well for it. There's just not a lot of companies out there that do it, and that's unfortunate. And you also have the gap where you can't go out on the road and leave the state until you're 21 in a commercial vehicle. So these kids come out of high school 18, 17, 18 years old. They got to find a company that's within their state.
Speaker 2:You know, if they want to drive and get that experience, you know so you're allowing them to go other places and invest time getting a start somewhere else. For those kids that aren't going to go to school, um, they're investing two or three or four years somewhere else before they're even eligible to do our job. You know so that's, I think that's, and there's been some. There's been some talk of that nationally, about do we lower the age? Do we let 18 year olds go out with you know, on teams, with other people and uh, I don't know if I'm in favor of that either, but you know it is an issue. You know it is an issue for sure yeah, and there's some go-getters out there.
Speaker 1:I've been some truck shows and a lot of responsible acting 18 year olds that they're driving show trucks. I mean there's, there is a percentage of young ones out there that knows the importance of being safe on the road and yeah, so that's great. I mean, um, we're going to want to pass on a legacy and also want to debunk a lot of the fear monger that's being put out there. Sometimes just the narrative, just putting out the story that trucking's in jeopardy and it's not going to be here, can cause some issues as well, and I talked to many different people out there and they say that's crazy. Just you know, just that trucking will disappear. And then there's some people that buy into it and they believe it that it's going to happen. So it is a topic to talk about, especially when it comes down to what the future looks like for young ones and also what the future looks like for the middle class and the hardworking individuals that are out there. So I appreciate you speaking on that Absolutely.
Speaker 1:And the union culture, the legacy and leadership. You've seen a lot with the culture of union work and it involves over time. What keeps you passionate about it, even though there's a lot of politics, stress and company pressure. Uh, what keeps you going?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, you know, I think, uh, you know, I don't know, I don't even know how to explain it I think I have a um, I have an internal tick about you know. There's something about companies that already make so much more off of labor than than the worker does, um, and trying to take advantage of that person or not treat them fairly, uh, really rubs me the wrong way. You know, and I just, uh, you know, I've tried to take breaks over the years within, you know, felt like I was burned out or, hey, I'll take a little break, I won't be a steward for a while, I won't run. And you just, you know things happen and you want to, you want to be involved and you want to be able to have an impact, um, because you believe in, you know, believe in justice and you believe people should, um, have a fair shake, and so I don't know that I can put my finger on it. As far as you know why I continue to stay involved, I just, you know, I feel like it's it's the right thing to do.
Speaker 2:You know, the Teamsters in general, anybody, anybody, in any position within the unions, will tell you that. You know, sometimes, as Teamsters, we're our own worst enemy we're the organization itself is, you know, is political, and it's unfortunate, you know it happens at a national level. It's unfortunate it happens at a national level. Sometimes it happens at a local level where criticizing, even if it's constructive because I think anybody who, if you really expect to improve what you're doing and you want to improve on the things maybe you're not doing well, you have to have an openness to acknowledge that those things are wrong, right, and so simply writing someone off is you know how long you've been here because you got a gripe, or you know we've all heard it there are, you know, people that are dismissed all the time because of things they're upset about.
Speaker 2:And I think we can, at every level within the union, whether you're a rank and file member or steward, or you know somebody at a local level, you know, try not to take offense when someone's upset about something, regardless of how long that member's been there. They're paying dues, they're supporting their brothers and sisters by paying those dues. They have the right to have their feelings heard within their local and maybe it's something you can't do anything about, but listening, being empathetic, understanding that just because someone has a critique or thinks something can do. They can do something better, you know, doesn't mean they're coming after your job. It doesn't mean they're attacking you personally. It means they care, you know, and those are the type of people you know, we want people who care about our union to be involved in our union and, as frustrating as it might be for people to hear it that are in leadership positions might be for people to hear it that are in leadership positions, you know, I think leadership is a lot about listening and I think it, I think leadership starts there, and the really good leaders out there are, you know, have an ear, are empathetic, listen to their members and then try to be progressive in the way that they, they evolve themselves and within the organization to, you know, to address member issues, and I mean all the members, not just, you know, not just the top guys, not just the bottom guys, not just the you know individual groups, but everybody as a whole. And I think you've seen some of that. I mean, even in the last contract. You know there was some wording changes within the contract that were more inclusive to a lot of our members, and you know that's progress.
Speaker 2:But, you know, I think, in order for us to effectively move forward as teams, at some point we have to stop worrying about oh hey, that Ray's a really talented, thoughtful guy. He might take my job, so I can't. You know, I got to play politics with him because you know I can't look bad because he questioned something Instead of having a conversation and saying, hey, ray, you had this opinion. We want to do something about that. What do we do? We want to do something about that. What do we do? And coming together as a group, instead of dividing our own uh, our own union, whether that's locally or, uh, local versus other local or, you know, locals versus the international or, you know, whatever the situation might be, um, I think we can do a lot better job of being inclusive, not just dismissing people because they're not the people in charge, and I think if we do that, we can improve our local or our Teamster union overall, coast to coast.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, I agree. Great tip. What's one question? You get a lot. I mean, I know the steward, life is hard. I know you hear a lot of things. What's one question that maybe you can address? Maybe help someone that listens to this episode, maybe you can address and help others this episode.
Speaker 2:Um, maybe you can address and help others. A question I get a lot, um, you know I would say probably it's. It's um, a lot of calls as a steward are repetitive. Um many times they're questions on um Many times they're questions on you know how to, essentially how to, what procedure is for the company. So you know that question for me might be different than a steward in Minneapolis or somewhere else, based on the type of work. You know a lot of questions I get are on guarantees. You know how do I get my 40-hour guarantee? Do I have a mileage guarantee on sleeper? You know they're all based on guarantees. So you know I would just say that it's a.
Speaker 2:I know the contracts, whether it's the national or if it's your local supplemental or whatever. They're not the easiest thing to read, but I would encourage um every member, whether you're a steward or not. You know I was guys joke. They think I'm joking, but seriously like, put, get your, get your contract book and put it in your bathroom. You know, when you're in the bathroom, read an article, read two articles and have a basic understanding of what your contract is and I think that you'll you'll find that you have a. You know, you have a better understanding of what's going on at work.
Speaker 2:When the company tries to do things, a lot of people get upset because they don't know what the rules are. Saves you a lot of angst within the workplace to just try to educate yourself as much as possible. You're not going to know everything, but you have a basic understanding. It gives you gives you a better understanding, I think, of what the union itself is trying to do for its members. It gives you a bigger picture of you know what's been done at the table, both at an international and local level. It gives you an appreciation for where you're at and some of the rights that you have that maybe you don't realize you have until you read your contract. But yeah, I would say overall, it's maybe not one question, but it's some type of contractual conversation. Hey, what's the rule here, what's the rule there? An explanation on, on uh, you know, on something contractual, is what most of my time spent on.
Speaker 1:And you and you share that with your family. I mean, that's a great sacrifice that you do and we really appreciate it. I know you talk to you for some time and I know you've put the time in not just at UPS, but other companies as well, and I wanted to give a thank you to your family as well. You know you guys, you know it's a team effort. It's not just you doing that, and I'm also coming on this podcast to share more for the listeners out there as well, so that they can gain some understanding or just have something to listen to when they're out there on the road and they can play it over again. So, yeah, thank you so much for that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think you know, I think there's an appreciation. I certainly have an appreciation for what the union has done for me. The union has done for me and I, and I really think you know, we, we, you know I said it on your last podcast and it's something I do believe in is, you know, we don't call ourselves a teamster organization, we call it the brotherhood of teamsters. You know, a brotherhood indicates family and you know that's. You know, when I think about what I would do for my biological siblings, right, it's, it's. You know.
Speaker 2:You think about the contracts, you think about things in that nature of hey, raise my brother, he's my union brother and he's in trouble or he needs help. You don't tell your brother, no, your brother, no, you do what you can to help people. And so it's just a way of viewing yourself within this organization and understanding the benefits that you've been allowed by people that came before us and the people here now that try to stand up for those. You know those beliefs and those principles and just trying to be a part of it, to ensure that it's there for the people that come behind us. You know, and not not thinking about things as how does this benefit me? You know how does it benefit us, how does it benefit us as a group and, um, you know it's, it's.
Speaker 2:I know it's a difficult thing for a lot of people to grasp, because the rest of the world is all about me, me, me, it's all individual and a lot of times we don't think about ourselves communally. But in order to really understand the union, you have to think about yourself as a group of people, you know, as a, as a person with responsibilities to other people. Because for the union to be successful, um, I have to care about what happens with Ray, I have to care about what happens with, with everybody at my barn, um, regardless of what their situation is and whether, whether or not I'm even friends with them, right, maybe we don't get along, but their, their job's important, their, their ability to um, you know, to take care of their families is important, um, important because we're in it together. So I always encourage people to think about the union in that way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's nice. I think that's a better way to look at it. I'm not sure how bad can it get when you do help your brother out. I guess some people they get the fear going in their head and they think they're going to lose their job or something or I'm not sure what happens, but there's a lot of fear that goes on. You know, if I file a grievance oh no, I'm going to have a target on my back, oh no.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, well, there's, yeah, there's always that and you're always going to have that, whether you have, well, there's, there's any proof of that or not. You know. But, uh, um, you know, my, my grandpa used to always tell me you know, you know what's right, the hard things doing it. So you know you can make any excuse you want not to do. Uh, what you know is right, but they're just excuses and at the end of the day, you know, you just try to do what's right and and and approach it from an honest perspective and do the best you can.
Speaker 2:And you know, if you're coming in and you're doing your job, in most cases I'm not going to say that there's not a company out there that's not going to retaliate, because we hear about stuff like that, but that's not rampant. You know it's not rampant. Most people come in, do their job. A lot of people don't have issues. So, by and large, you're not going to get attacked by the company and look, if they retaliate, that's a violation of labor law and you address that with your local. There's ways to grieve that. There's ways to bring that to the forefront.
Speaker 1:Yeah, maybe that's something that people need to see more often is that we need to put that to the test and then that will go away. You know, maybe you know it's OK to stand up and we're not going to be. It's a law by the law of labor, so people fight for those laws as well. So knowing your rights are important, people fight for those laws as well. So knowing your rights are important, and I think when people know that it helps them act differently and more calmly and knowing that they have particular things that they can ask for that aren't greedy, it's just the things that we fought for that you have rights to yeah.
Speaker 1:Right, yeah, absolutely you know absolutely, you know absolutely. I look at those autonomous trucks and that if there's nobody in there, that person ain't gonna be fighting for you at the stop sign or at the stop. That's, to me, is the ultimate form of greed for a company to have a vehicle that can run down the road. I can't imagine if a tractor would be hauling fuel with nobody in there. So I mean, there's there's a lot of things that truck drivers do that we just don't want to not leave it unmanned, it so well, you know, and that's the thing is we should.
Speaker 2:You know we can use the public to. You know, when I talk to people about that, I go. You want to. You want to be driving down the road on your way to a vacation with a truck 80,000 pounds rolling down the interstate with nobody in it, or some guy a thousand miles away sitting in a cubicle controlling three or five or seven trucks. I mean, you know the, the for a lot of this automation, automation stuff for the trucks they have. They're going to have to earn the trust of the public and it's and it's things that we should be talking about in public is how these things aren't safe. You know they're not going to be safe.
Speaker 2:And, um, you know a lot of the things on our trucks, your front mitigation system and your, you know, um, the, the lane, departure and and all of these things. We drive trucks with them on them now and they're awful. It's awful, that's right, it's terrible. You know how's the truck going to go, drive through. I mean, don't even talk about Wyoming, but I mean there's, there's, even in Arizona there's ice and everything. They're just going to shut down on the interstate.
Speaker 2:I mean what? In Arizona, there's ice and everything. They're just going to shut down on the interstate. I mean, what's going to happen? We don't have any of these. You always see these things and they're on nice, flat ground, beautiful days, freshly painted interstate, and it's like that's not the reality of trucking most of the time and it's like that's that's not the reality of trucking most of the time, you know. So you know, I think that's that's something we use, we definitely should use, uh, you know, with, with, when we're talking to the public is you know? What would you think if, if you look up and there's nobody in that truck driving? You know?
Speaker 1:Your dad's driving out there and you know that's something where it happened to him. So it's cool. Uh, so yeah, I mean, with everything going on automation, corporate changes, labor policy shifts um, how do you keep the next generation interested in doing this work? What would you say?
Speaker 2:the next generation interested in doing this work. What would you say? Well, you know, again, we're in a unique position because we collectively bargain, right? So UPS or other union entities right, we're making a good living. We have health coverage health and health coverage we have pension payments right, we have all of these things. We're, we're holding a standard that's desirable. We're sure, some of our jobs are really tough and some of us don't go home every night and work on all week.
Speaker 2:You know the sleeper teams out there but you're compensated in a way where it offsets your time, right, um? And so I think you have to. You have to keep jobs. Um, financially, there has to be a benefit where someone sees, um, hey, if I go do this, I can buy a house, I can buy a car, I can support my family. You know, I can get great insurance. You know all of these things. I think we have to maintain those things.
Speaker 2:But again, I go back to the communal part, where, you know, an old timer once told me that when he's looking at a contract, he says you negotiate a contract based on the unborn, and what that means is the people who aren't here yet, right? Well, he said you have to negotiate a contract based on the unborn, and what that means is the people who aren't here yet. Right, you have to guarantee that this job is going to be as good or better for the people who aren't here yet, because that's how you maintain your benefits in your retirement, that's how you ensure that there's always going to be good jobs here, because you negotiate on the behalf of the whole, rather than you making a couple extra bucks. You know and you see this in contracts all the time where they go hey, ray, I'll give you, I'll give you five dollars an hour, right, but everybody. Right, but everybody hired after this ratification date, they got to pay half their insurance, right, but we're going to pay you and they, they basically sell out the young is what it is where they, they incentivize you to vote, they buy your vote in money, while they take a benefit away from someone and they say, well, it's not going to affect you, because it only affects people who were hired after this particular date. And a lot of people go well, the hell, does it matter to me? Right?
Speaker 2:Problem is the next contract. They want to take your insurance from everybody, right, where they want to make you pay and you let those people you know, you let them. You know it might be $15. You're paying for insurance this time. Next time it's going to be 20% or it's going to be 30% and if you don't think that's right, ask any union person out there. You know that's paying for insurance. That's how it started. You know most of them generally, um, you know, if they're old legacy contracts, they, they generally had free insurance at one point and then the company got their foot in and they, they whittle away and whittle away and whittle away and they take advantage of people thinking about things individually and they buy stuff in the contract. They buy a vote.
Speaker 2:So our members have to be aware of that and we have to fight against that and we have to ensure that the benefits that we enjoy now, that we make sure we protect those for the people coming after us. Even those young kids that might be working. For you know we've got feeder guys that catch that are in their twenties out there running sleeper. You know, 20, early thirties just starting families, you know things like that. But the the young single guys, they're not thinking about pension. You know we have to have those conversations with them Like, hey, we know this isn't important to you now, but it's really important and you're going to care about this, um, and that's part of us, uh, that's, you know that's part of every union member ability to be able to you know, uh, talk to the younger generation and support them and understand that we're all in it together and them benefiting from a really good contract is going to benefit all of us when we're retired too, because it's going to maintain our pensions, you know it's going to ensure our stability in our retirement.
Speaker 1:So I mean congratulations to you for getting the votes that you needed to continue to do what you can to help your members I think you're the right guy for it and as well as those that got elected as well. So what's one thing that we possibly didn't cover on the first episode that, uh, maybe you want to cover today and, um, or just something you want to let the people know, kind of open ended there.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, just uh, you know what. What I would say is uh, you know, don't get discouraged, you know, don't, don't. Uh, you know I, I think I think you can get frustrated, I think you can get, uh, I think you can get discouraged. And there's especially on the company side you know that a lot of times, um, they nitpick and nitpick and nitpick and blame other people, and a lot of that's to break us down as a unit. You know, sometimes things take a lot longer than they should and you can get frustrated and even hopeless in the prospects.
Speaker 2:But you know, what we've got now is a product of people sticking with it and demanding, you know, demanding those things and and and those benefits. And we just have to, uh, you know we have to stick together, that support one another and, as frustrating as it might be, um, you know, whether that's with one of your stewards or other rank and file members or or business agent or your local you know somebody on your local board just stick with it. You know, just stay positive. And and don't don't let the grind, you know, grind you out. Just just stay with it, be positive be positive.
Speaker 1:I think that's a good, positive message. Thank you so much, jack. I mean you always appreciate the way you break things down, um, and a very you know calm and relaxed way of talking with individuals about the heavy stuff. Um, it never fails that, um. You know, it's the real talk that we need, um, when we, when we reach out to someone like yourself. I think that's going to be great for the future. I think that's going to be good for everyone.
Speaker 1:So, if you guys are listening to this, share this with another fellow Teamster. Help them to stay encouraged, stay positive, and I appreciate that, man. So anyone who's struggling with management right now and feeling like they're not being heard, just a little bit of advice is to stay grounded, keep pushing and seek the right help from the individuals that will be able to represent you. So thanks so much, chuck. Yeah, absolutely yeah. So glad to have you on the show.
Speaker 1:That's it for today's episode of that's Delivered. A big thanks again to Chuck Bryan for coming back on and giving us the real talk that we need, not just about what we do on a local level, but also what we can do nationally to fight against a lot of the negativity that's out there that we're doing okay. It's not just about the job, but it's the responsibility that wins. It's the pressure that we have with the purpose to get things accomplished for the future, even right now too. So take a look. If you like this episode and like what you see, like what you hear whether you're a union steward or a dock worker, a driver or just someone out there trying to make a difference share this with your crew. Let's keep on building up each other and staying positive out there for the things to come, any topics that we can discuss next time Maybe we'll get Chuck Bryan back on again for a third time.
Speaker 1:Anytime you need me, ray. I appreciate you, I appreciate it. We can talk about those topics, let us know. Until then, stay strong, stay sharp and always keep it delivered.
