Extensive Travels Prepared Long For Helm of Trucking Federation

This story appears in the Oct. 13 print edition of Transport Topics.

RALEIGH, N.C. — Duane Long has run everything from an array of companies with more than 2,000 employees to a logistics firm with 40 trucks, a breadth of experience that he brings to his new role as chairman of American Trucking Associations.

But the time he regularly spends on the road also keeps him connected to the challenges fleets and drivers face, Long said.

“I see the traffic, I see the potholes, I see the construction and the truck stops,” said Long, chairman of Raleigh-based logistics company Longistics, which specializes in serving the pharmaceutical industry. “I go in looking like a truck driver, and I see how they are treated.”

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Long said the way drivers and fleets are treated on Capitol Hill will be a key focus of his tenure as chairman, which began Oct. 7 at the conclusion of ATA’s Management Conference & Exhibition, where he took over from Philip Byrd Sr., president of Bulldog Hiway Express.

And because of his proximity to Washington, D.C., Long will likely be a frequent visitor, said ATA President Bill Graves.

“Duane likes to drive,” Graves said, noting that the road trip from Long’s home in Raleigh to Washington is a relatively short one. “I expect Duane will be very involved in a number of congressional hearings, a number of meetings with regulatory agencies and the members of Congress. So his plate will be very, very full.”

But lobbying the nation’s lawmakers should be no problem, because he’s had practice; in November, Long testified before a House committee on the current hours-of-service rule. And that rule is one of many issues he will tackle.

Long, 61, is the 70th chairman of ATA and the fifth from North Carolina.

While he is reluctant to provide details on his plan of action in Washington, Long said that he will immerse himself not only in efforts to undo the hours-of-service rule but also to try to soften the blow of federal sleep-apnea guidance and keep pushing for a long-term federal highway funding fix to build and maintain a decaying system of U.S. highways and bridges.

“I told Gov. Graves and the ATA team that wherever you see I can play a role, I will do that,” he said. “Just let me know what, when and where, and I’ll be there.”

Long already “knows how to walk the halls and talk the talk,” said Crystal Collins, president of the North Carolina Trucking Association. “I don’t see a learning curve with Mr. Long.”

Graves said that Long will well-represent the industry in Washington and elsewhere, but he joins the fray at a critical juncture for the industry.

“Duane will come in just in advance of mid-term elections, just before the new Congress convenes,” Graves said.

Graves said that, even if the Senate turns majority Republican, the balance likely will be so slim that ATA and other groups will be challenged to persuade Congress to enact a long-term funding source.

ATA wants Congress to raise the federal fuel tax to fund a long-term bill, but so far, “the political winds have not obliged,” Long said.

“We believe there will emerge some political leaders who will help solve this in the future,” Long said. “But up to this point, we haven’t been able to come up with a solution that is acceptable to elected officials when they go out and search for additional revenue.”

There are other challenges, Long said, not the least of which is the industry’s critical shortage of truck drivers.

“This driver-shortage issue is one of my passions, and people will hear me speak about this a lot,” Long said. “I will be working very hard on this with other members of the ATA team.”

Long is “always thinking, strategizing,” Collins said. “He’s a visionary, both politically and in business. He’s very tied-in and well-respected in this industry as a leader.”

“He’s very humble,” Graves added. “He’s a man who often gives others credit for things that are getting done when he probably deserves to be mentioned as well.”

And those who know him say Long is driven to finish any project he starts.

Frank Grainger, a North Carolina tobacco-chemical manufacturer whom Long calls his best friend, said the new chairman is the kind of man you want in your foxhole when you go to war.

“He’s tenacious,” said Grainger, who has known Long more than 20 years. “He doesn’t give up. He’s willing to fight hard to get what he wants, and he’s willing to use his brain as well as muscle to make sure it all happens.”

Grainger added that Long has had to rely on himself throughout his career.

“Neither one of us have four-year degrees,” Grainger said. “He did not have a family that had a lot of money, nor did he inherit a penny. Duane’s had to go out in life and really work hard to be as good or better than anybody else he had to compete against.”

That’s certainly how it started with Long’s career in trucking, which dates to 1972, when he met an Akers Motor Lines vice president at a Christmas party. Long said he was good friends in high school with the executive’s two daughters, so it came as little surprise to him that the father would want to check him out in case he had any intentions. He didn’t.

“He asked me what I was going to do with my life,” Long recalled.

Long, who was attending a community college in Gastonia, North Carolina, at the time, said he wasn’t sure but had been thinking about studying law.

“He said, ‘Why would you want to do that?’ ” Long said. “I said that I’d been watching Perry Mason on television and [thought] that it would maybe be an excellent career.”

The Akers executive then asked Long if he’d considered getting into trucking management training. Long pondered the question for a week or two and eventually thought it might be a good idea.

He went to work for Akers and began a lifelong career in trucking.

When he started work there, Long thought he was going to work in an office. That didn’t happen for a year or so. The bosses said he first had to learn how to drive a truck and a forklift, and work in the warehouse.

“You’re going to find out what the business is really all about,” Long said they told him. “It’s not in the office.”

Long said he actually enjoyed the buzz of activity on the dock, the trucks coming and going.

“I just fell in love with it,” he said. “It was exciting, and it still is today.”

Long left in 1980 to manage a private fleet for Black & Decker. In 1984, he founded Long Transportation Services Inc. — Longistics’ corporate predecessor — with one truck.

Over the years, he has learned that the transportation industry can be tough. Long has operated businesses ranging from trucking and warehousing to personnel staffing and customs brokerage, employing a total of 2,500 workers and operating in seven states.

“We’ve been a big company, a medium-size company and a small company,” said Long. “Our company has been pruned, like you prune a tree. I call it going back to the future.”

Today, with 100 employees and 40 trucks, Longistics is by design a downsized version of those earlier endeavors. The privately held company exclusively uses team drivers for long hauls, and it is a niche carrier, serving mostly the pharmaceutical industry. But the value of that cargo demands high levels of security.

At first glance, the modern, white concrete and glass building Longistics calls home might seem a little more like Fort Knox than the headquarters of a modest-size motor carrier. Nestled in a wooded area known as Foreign Trade Zone No. 93, the headquarters clearly impresses a visitor as a precise, security-minded operation: Guests are escorted, doors are locked down tight, and a black metal fence surrounds the company’s 90,000-square-foot warehouse.

Because Longistics operates in a foreign trade zone, about 10% of the company operations are dedicated to transporting and warehousing goods originating in France, England and Germany that remain duty-free until they are sold in the United States.

Long also has experience doing business in China. For about one year, another one of the family’s companies — Rare Bird Trading Co. — marketed North Carolina products at an exhibition center in Suzhou, China. During this time, he even learned to speak a little Chinese.

But Long said he found it difficult to pursue a serious business in China. Rare Bird ultimately exited the country but still operates today under the leadership of Long’s wife, Pat. Their son, Brooks, is a vice president.

“They are long-term builders,” Long said of the Chinese.

“They’re not concerned about trying to make their quarterly or monthly numbers.” He said that, by contrast, Americans are ready to do business quickly.

And when Long’s chairmanship ends and he returns full-time to his business, he hopes to grow the modest company into a larger one.

“Now I have a younger, vital team who want the company to grow,” Long said.