“I think he was decent. He was calm. He had a pleasant attitude, and I think together, I was a little more assertive-aggressive, and I think the two of us worked pretty well together,” he said. By April 1987 the company had grown to 18 power units split about evenly between company-owned and owner-operators, but Ray intended for Sunrise Express to grow much more. It reached about 50 trucks by the mid-1990s thanks to his and Mettenbrink’s skill at finding drivers, building a customer base and then servicing those customers. “He had a vision almost from day one when he came to Sunrise of what Sunrise could be, and he’s never let go of that, and we’re still working towards getting to Ray’s vision for this company,” Roland said. That vision, Ray said, was “Growth. Growth and continuous growth, and good drivers. And to be able to expand on our business, expand on our customer base, and to see how far we could go with it.” Ray said he had joined the company with


plans only “to do a good job.” But his am- bition was leading him to a leadership role.


While working at Sunrise, he also started a three-person trucking company, plus a logis- tics company, C.N. Logistics, and, because he wasn’t busy enough, he owned a restaurant for seven years managed by his wife, Shari, and his mother, Phyllis. When Mettenbrink retired in 1995, Ray’s transportation compa- nies were merged into Sunrise, and he became the company’s president and owner. Butch Brown and Dean Aden with Brown Transfer are silent partners. In 2004, Sunrise Express acquired Austin’s


Transportation, a Twin Falls, Idaho-based company that primarily did brokerage work but also operated about 50 trucks, about 15 of them company owned. With the acquisi- tion, the company managed about 160 power units. The Twin Falls location is now about 25 percent of the operation.


Sunrise Express faced one of its biggest challenges during the oil boom of the 2000s, when many of its owner-operators left the company for North Dakota. In order to maintain its growth strategy, it had to focus on increasing its company-owned assets by about 10 trucks a year starting in 2004 and


continuing over the next five years. That meant having the equipment, the financial ability to back it, and drivers. According to Steve Beahm, vice president and gener- al counsel, Sunrise Express would obtain a commitment from new drivers first and then would buy a truck. It focused on hiring drivers who lived within 100 miles of Grand Island so they could be home as much as possible. Today the company has about 200 power


units, all but about 22 company owned, and about 325 employees. It transports commod- ities both nationally and in Canada and has won numerous safety and other awards from the American Trucking Associations, Ne- braska Trucking Association, and Truckload Carriers Association. Ray is not satisfied. In fact, he hopes to double the company’s size again to 400-500 power units, depending on what happens in the industry. He isn’t afraid of new technolo- gy and isn’t shy about taking a chance on the latest equipment. The company maintains a 3:1 ratio of trailers to power units, meaning it can compete with larger motor carriers.


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