We go wat beyond just picking up and delivering cargoes for our customer. Nelson Fey founded Calex in 1974

How is Calex different from other fleets?

Doug Barbacci, President: “Probably the most important thing is that we go way beyond just picking up and delivering cargo for our customers.

“Ever since 1974, when Nelson Fey started the company, we’ve focused on what else we can do to help the people who ship with us
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“One thing we discovered is that most of them don’t have a lot of space for storage, and many of them would be glad to have help with warehousing, packaging and fulfillment.”

How are you meeting those customer needs?

“We have over one million square feet of warehouse space, some of it fully climate-controlled, where we store, package and ship goods for our customers.

“About 50 percent of the entire population of the U.S. is within one day’s truck travel of our facility in Pittston, Pennsylvania. That makes our location ideal for distribution.”

What kinds of goods are you handling?

“A lot of our work is in confectionery goods including candy, chewing gum and similar items. Pennsylvania leads the country in manufacture of these products.

“In addition, we store and transport canned goods, soft drinks and other foodstuffs, as well as the packaging materials for them. We haul plastic wrap, plastic containers and cups for all sorts of food packaging.
“We can pick, pack, shrink- or stretch-wrap and then ship to anywhere in the United States – on time.”

What kinds of trailers are you running?

“All of our trailers are 53-footers and about 75 of them are reefer units. The reefers are important for hauling confectionery items on the runs to California.

“With the widely fluctuating conditions they encounter along the way, it’s important that we be able to keep candy at 60 degrees, regardless of the outside temperature.

“Still, some of our most interesting loads are in dry vans with ropes hanging from their ceilings.”

What do those trailers carry?

“We have about 20 of these units, each of which has hundreds of ‘ropes’ inside. Each has several loops in it at varying levels.

“High-end, expensive clothing – on hangers – is hung from the loops in each rope. This is a simple, but very effective way to keep dresses and coats from getting wrinkled in transit.

“The beauty of it is, the garments can go directly from the trailer to the store racks. That saves an enormous amount of time and work for our customers.”

Is this expensive clothing?

“Very. So much so that ‘time-critical’ takes on a new meaning. These shipments are so valuable that if one of them is just a little late arriving, we can expect a call from the store, worried that their goods might have been stolen.”

How many vehicles are you running?

“We have 110 tractors of our own, plus about 30 owner-operators. Our trailer fleet consists of about 330, 75 of which are reefers and the rest dry vans.”

How much of your own maintenance do you do?
Greg Zimmerman, Maintenance Director: “We have nine service bays, and can do just about everything from PMs to engine and transmission rebuilds to body work and painting.

“This also gives us the opportunity to take on work for others. We do maintenance and paint work for UPS locally, and can handle a lot of service needed by the owner-operators who work with us.

“We’re even a licensed Pennsylvania vehicle inspection station, and offer that service too. We can inspect both cars and trucks, so we provide those services for UPS as well.”

Do you take care of your own tire maintenance?

“That’s one area where we’ve outsourced most of the work. Calex has been working with McCarthy Tire in Wilkes-Barre for about 25 years, and they take care of most of that.

“We do yard checks every day, including looking at the tires on every truck that comes in, checking air pressures and tire conditions. McCarthy is here from three to five times a week, and they take care of any tires that need to be replaced.

“Their service technician demounts and mounts tires and installs them on our vehicles. We have the equipment to do it ourselves, but rarely do, unless we’re in a pinch.”

What tires are you running? “We use the R227 and R299 on our steer axles and the M726 on drives.” How about retreads? “Our retreads are Bandag, made from our own casings by McCarthy. They retread them, then hold them in inventory until we need the tires. “McCarthy also handles wheel refurbishing for us. We run aluminum wheels on our tractors, but on our dual positions, we often run steel wheels on the inside and aluminum on the outside.” What’s the idea behind that? Doug Barbacci: “Running aluminum outside and steel inside on duals helps us maintain a very clean, well-maintained look, while saving on costs. When you carry any kind of foodstuffs, the appearance of your vehicles is very important to your customers.”

What kind of tire mileage are you getting?

Greg Zimmerman: “We probably average about 110,000 to 120,000 miles on steers and 265,000 to 300,000 on drives before sending them for retreading. We consider that very good performance, especially given the conditions we encounter here in the Northeast.”

How often are inflation pressures checked?

“With the way our trucks shuttle in and out of here, we see every tractor about once every two weeks. We don’t ask drivers to check and maintain air pressures since we see the trucks so often.

“We’re doing PMs on tractors about every 10,000 to 12,000 miles and trailers every four to six months.

“It varies, of course, but we usually keep vehicles about five years before trading them in. A tractor will usually be traded with about 600,000 to 700,000 miles on it.”

You also have a “local” operation, don’t you?

Doug Barbacci: “Yes, we run a number of trucks locally, picking up goods and bringing them to the warehouses, as well as distributing backhaul items.

“This ‘local’ part of our work covers the area from roughly Ohio east to Maine. The roads aren’t the greatest and the winters are hard, but our vehicles are never very far from home.

“We use a lot of retreads on these runs, and we even buy our own fuel in bulk to save money. As a general rule, our local trucks never have to buy fuel on the road.”

Are you planning on expanding?

“We’re always trying to expand our business. But, we want to be very careful not to expand too quickly. That’s one of the reasons we have those 30 owner-operators.

“They enable us to adjust to fluctuations in volume without having to make big capital investments."

“We’re constantly looking at opportunities. That’s one of the things that got us here. We saw clearly that there were additional services we could offer.

“Our logistical capabilities make us much more valuable to our customers than fleets who only offer transportation. We will continue to exploit that advantage.”

McCarthy offers Calex more than tires If one key to Calex’s success is offering services beyond hauling, much the same can be said of McCarthy Tire’s success in keeping Calex’s business for nearly a quarter of a century. According to John McCarthy, “We try to relieve customers of jobs they’d rather not do. “We inventory tires, both new and retreaded for Calex, so they’re available when needed, but Calex doesn’t have to store them. “And, we mount, demount and install those tires right on their premises. We’re just 20 minutes away, making it easy for both of us. “We do Calex’s retreading, refurbish their steel wheels, align their vehicles, repair their radiators and handle their air conditioning work.” “Those are specialized services. With tire work, especially, there’s a big liability factor. Alignments require expensive equipment and trained personnel. “By offering alignment not only to Calex, but to other fleets in our area, we can keep that shop open from 7 AM to 11:30 PM. Most fleets couldn’t make the equipment pay for itself. “We’re offering what they need, but really don’t want to do for themselves. It’s similar to what Calex does for its customers,” McCarthy concluded