CALENDAR NOVEMBER
November 26-27 Holiday - TTA Office Closed
DECEMBER December 1-2 NATMI Safety & DOT Compliance
December 24-25 Holiday - TTA Office Closed
TBA WTN (Memphis) Big Rigs for Little Kids Golf Tournament
Dates are subject to change. Please refer to the monthly Newsletter for updates
MAX FULLER
• Age: 62. • Job: CEOofU.S. Xpress Enterprises.
• Education: A native of Athens, Tenn., Fuller graduated from the University of Tennessee in 1975 with a B.A. degree in finance and business administration.
• Career:He hasworked in the transportation industry more than 30 years. After working at Southwest Motor Freight, he and attorney Patrick E.Quinn startedU.S. Xpress in 1986.
• Boardmemberships:He has served on the boards of SunTrust Bank of Chattanooga, The En- terprise Center and the Chancellor’s Round Table at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
• Personal: Fuller and hiswife, Janice, live in Chattanooga and have three children and four grandchildren.
PHOTO BY DOUGSTRICKLAND /TIMES FREE PRESS
New Members! ALLIED
Welcome
Ahern & Associates, Ltd. Assured Neace Lukens Avant Specialty Claims Carr Allison EpicVue
Fleet Advantage
Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers Rockland Flooring Safety Vision, LLC
Yokohama Tire Corp. CARRIER
Derby Distribution, Inc. Eco-Energy, LLC
Grammer Industries
Jim Dandy Freight Services Music City Logistics Express
He said all the inaugural listers have
at least one thing in common: “They built something significant.” “They were trailblazers. They were
reformers. They were investors. They were social entrepreneurs,” he said. Looking back, Fuller sees so many
things falling his way again and again. He was born into trucking. And in
Chattanooga, a “central port to a big part of the population of this country,” he said. Clyde Fuller gifted his sons trucks to
get their companies started. And because Chattanooga was a smaller city, there was less initial capital required to get a compa- ny off the ground compared to some of U.S. Xpress’ competitors. In 1986, the year U.S. Xpress began op-
erations, fuel prices took their biggest drop in history at that point, remembers Fuller. And fuel is roughly 20 percent of the cost of operating a long-haul trucking company. “It turned out to be almost the perfect
time to start a trucking company,” said Full- er. “By 1989, we were growing so fast that we almost couldn’t finance the company.” Fuller says he always seized the oppor-
tunities before him — but he doesn’t take credit for the opportunities that appeared. “I really believe I’ve been put in the
right places at the right time,” he said. “No one could have been that smart to put me there. I’m not that smart.” It’s just like falling in with the eventual
godfathers — the gatekeepers, Fuller calls them — of American motor carrier trans- port: “I couldn’t make these things happen.”
26 TENNESSEE TRUCKING NEWS
THERE ARE STILL UNTAPPED,
UNDISCOVERED,
TECHNOLOGIES TO HARNESS. THERE
AMERICANS FASTER, CHEAPER.
ARE STILL WAYS TO GET GOODS TO
But Fuller the innovator isn’t finished.
He doesn’t say much about retirement, other than “I probably won’t.” There are still untapped, undiscovered, technologies to harness. There are still ways to get goods to Americans faster, cheaper. “I’m looking for a better way to do
things,” Fuller said. “I’m looking for that competitive advantage.” Then, he shared one of his favorite
pieces of advice: If you don’t like the result you’re getting, change the equation. After talking trucks for an hour, Fuller
dropped an unexpected “Star Trek” refer- ence.
Remember when Capt. James T. Kirk re-
programmed the no-win-scenario Kobayas- hi Maru training exercise before taking the test himself. “That way,” said Fuller, “he knew all the
answers.” TTN Q3 2015
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