SAFETY FIRST
BY TROY MILLER
When it comes to the truckers’ workplace in the United States today, it is often times a place of unsafe practices due to the increasing push for profitability and productivity. This is especially true when it comes to the big companies. For Jerry Wodek, owner of Wodek Systems, Inc. safety is not only his priority – it is his reputation.
Wodek Systems, Inc. has been an aspect of Colorado’s petroleum industry for eighteen years. Starting in 1990 with just one truck and one driver, Jerry’s company has grown into a thirteen unit operation. Jerry’s experience in the petroleum transport industry began in 1980 driving under another company. By 1990, though, he wanted to go out on his own and open his own company – and he did. Employees at the companies he worked for before told him he’d be back within six months, a year at the most, but he kept on trucking under his own name. And eighteen years later, he still is.
Today, though he no longer drives, Jerry Wodek is still heavily involved with the dirt and grime of trucking. He does not just sit around an office all day in a leather chair making phone calls. Often times he can be found in the shop, working on his trucks, making sure they can get back out on the road as soon as possible, or dispatching his trucks all over Colorado, and even into Arizona, Montana and California. But Jerry’s company is not all about the number of loads he can haul or the amount of contracts he can acquire. When Jerry hires a driver, he always asks them, “What is the most important thing to you?” And, understandably, he hopes they have the “right” answer – family. Jerry firmly believes that if his drivers are happy at home then they will be happy at work, and vice-versa.
Coming in at a close second, the next most important thing to Jerry is keeping his drivers safe. Wodek Systems will turn down both loads and contracts if Jerry feels they aren’t safe, or if stipulations will not allow them to operate within the bounds of the law. Jerry runs a strict safety code entailing both formal safety meetings and informal “toolbox” meetings. Furthermore, Jerry does not slipseat any of his trucks – each truck is the individual employee’s truck to drive and maintain. This system works well for Jerry.
Jerry operates in this manner because he feels that if his drivers are driving just one truck, they will be more likely to take better care of it, which also means that it will be a safer truck for not only the driver but everyone around it. Wodek Systems has discovered, as well, that maintenance on trucks that are slipseated is noticeably more prolific than on a truck driven by a single driver. It is this idea of safety and driver comfort that has developed Jerry’s company into an operation entailing 30 safely served clients, as well as attaining Gold, Silver and Platinum Safety Awards from 2003-2006, as well as 20 years without a preventable accident.
But Jerry Wodek is only one aspect of this family-run business. His wife Cheryl and his daughter Nicole both handle managerial duties, while Kyle, his 22-year-old son, handles all of the wrenching on the trucks (and has been since he was 10). Beyond trucking, Jerry has been happily married to his wife since 1979, though, he says, they’ve been together since 1976. At 52 Jerry still sees a lot of trucking and running the company in his future, but he is planning to retire at 60, and hopes at that time to start fishing a lot. Meanwhile, he’s also working on rebuilding a 1964 Chevy Impala Super Sport.
Though retirement is still some years off for Jerry, he still has fun. Most of his trucks have a four to five year turn around in his fleet, but there is one special truck which is older than the rest – and probably faster, too. His 1999 Pete 379 daycab has become a regular attraction at the Colorado TruckFest at Bandimere Speedway for several years now. The truck’s power comes from a 575 hp Caterpillar, cranked through an oversized 18-speed transmission. Painted navy blue with maroon fenders, the truck features airbrushed company logos on both doors and a mural of Yosemite Sam on the back of the cab, firing off his pistols, under the name of the truck, “Six Guns”. Though this truck has some custom parts like a louvered grille and hood, drop visor and half-fenders, it still works just as hard as the rest of his trucks, and now shows 700,000 miles on the odometer. Even so, it has placed as the runner-up three times at the TruckFest show.
We would like to thank Jerry for taking time out of his busy day to let us interview him and take pictures of his flagship Pete. We would also like to say “thank you” to Greg Reichard, one of Jerry’s drivers, for originally contacting us about Jerry and his company. Jerry must be doing something right – it’s not often that you find an employee that wants to recommend their boss to be featured in a magazine. Way to go, Jerry!