Kevin Burch: Taking the Story of Trucking to the White House

I love trucks. As I travel the country as chairman of American Trucking Associations, I wear a simple button with a simple message: “I Love Trucks.” I even wear it in my official ATA chairman’s portrait. It’s a button I encourage everyone I meet to wear. It starts conversations about this great industry and gives me a chance to tell our story.

Joyce N. Boghosian

March 23, 2017, was a momentous day for me — and for ATA — when President Donald Trump put on that I Love Trucks button when ATA leaders and our America’s Road Team captains visited the White House.

We were invited to the White House to talk about health care with the president, but it was much more than that. It was an opportunity for the trucking industry to showcase who we are, what we do and why we do it.

As ATA members and industry leaders, one of our most important jobs is to educate all we meet about our safe and vital industry. It is a story that resonates with people, especially after they meet someone who works in trucking.

Joyce N. Boghosian

I watched the president — the most powerful man in the world, leader of our government — become engaged and interested in our drivers. I witnessed how impressed he was when he spoke to drivers, one with more than 3 million miles of accident-free driving and another driver with more than 1 million. The 12 drivers with us that day on the South Lawn had a combined 319 years of experience and more than 29.4 million miles of accident-free driving .

The president, a man who flies on Air Force One and travels by motorcade, got up in the cab of ATA’s Share the Road Truck (using proper, three points of contact form by the way) and was energized while engaging with our drivers and executives.

Joyce N. Boghosian

PHOTO GALLERY: Images from trucking's visit to the White House

Trump asked our drivers about their work, their safety records and about the equipment they drive. I told him that drivers drive our company and emphasized what a hardworking, passionate and dedicated workforce we have.

That hard work paid off with an audience with Trump. It paid off with the powerful visual of ATA’s Interstate One Image truck and our Share the Road truck hauling a Trucking Moves America Forward trailer. It paid off in an opportunity to tell our story in as important a venue as we ever have.

It was an amazing thing to be a part of, to have the president and vice president sit in the Cabinet Room with drivers and executives and talk with them about the hard work we do.

Joyce N. Boghosian

To give the president the button that I have given hundreds, if not thousands, of people before. Trump told the press and public about the important work we do while wearing that button. It was a wonderful and proud moment.

During our meeting, Trump said, “No one knows America like truckers know America. … Through day and night, in all kinds of weather, truckers course the arteries of our nation’s highways. You carry anything and everything — the food that stocks our shelves, the fuel that runs our cars and the steel that builds our cities. America depends on you. And you work very hard for America.”

These comments were recognition that he understood what we were trying to say and shows the value and importance of telling our story. Once someone takes the time to learn about trucking, and the people involved, it builds a relationship.

Joyce N. Boghosian

And our new relationship with the administration and the president is going to pay dividends to our industry when the president moves to other issues such as tax reform and infrastructure — important priorities for our industry.

At the end of the year, when I look back on my year as ATA chairman, this day will certainly be a highlight, not only because I was able to visit the White House, but I was able to represent an industry I am so proud to be part of. For many years, ATA was on the outside looking in. Now we have taken our seat at the table in a big way.

The day, the meeting, the trucks on the White House South Lawn, none of that is possible without the involvement of ATA members and staff working to provide the industry a platform to tell its story.

Trucking has a good story to tell. It’s a story that resonates with everyone who hears it — from congressmen and senators to Cabinet secretaries to the president and vice president of the United States.

Joyce N. Boghosian

It is a reason to belong to ATA, to be a leader in this industry. There is no more effective organization at telling our story than ATA, and I’m proud to be its chairman. I’m proud to love trucks and proud that the president accepted that button and declared he loved them, too.

March 23 was a great day for trucking, a great day for ATA and a great story that we will be able to tell for years to come. The story of trucking shouldn’t be told every now and then — it is a story that should be told every day.

Burch is president of Dayton, Ohio-based Jet Express Inc.