Best Dispacher Ever- Griffith Engergy Maryland

Hands down, the best dispatcher I've ever come across in the 26 years I've been involved with Commercial Truck Driving in Maryland is the Head Dispatcher for Griffith Energy. Griffith heating oil in Cheverly Maryland

Ashton Welsh.

When I started at Steuart Petroleum in the winter of 1982, Bob Sears was the dispatcher, Bob gave me the employment break of a lifetime by hiring me to drive the truck no one wanted to drive.

I didn't even have my truck licence yet, with God's Grace, Bob hired me first, then told me to go out and get a learners permit and tell the boss that I 'used to have' a commercial truck license but I let it *expire*.

This was total fiction, but my job security was that no one else wanted to drive the little truck, the gasoline powered 1,000 gallon 'baby truck'.

I was so green, and performed so badly that Ashton wanted to get rid of me that first season, Ashton was not the dispatcher that year, he was the 'driver supervisor' (the equivalent of truck foreman)

The next season that I reported back to work (heating oil is not a year round job, we get paid so much in the winter that we DEFINITELY wanted to come back next winter)

Over the next few years with tutoring from Ashton, I became a top producer, the route I had was close in: Bethesda and some Silver Spring, some upper Northwest DC, all along MacArthur Blvd.

The stops were so close together many drivers didn't want that route - you never got a chance to rest, and the hose pulls were mostly UP HILL (steep hills at that)

In 1993 Steuart Petroleum sold out to Griffith Energy, and Ashton Welsh became a top dog with Griffith.

The best thing I liked about working for Ashton (I never looked at it as if I was working for Griffith, I was working for my dispatcher!) was that if I busted my ass when it was cold, my dispatcher would take care of me when it got warmer.

You see, in the heating oil industry, as soon as it gets warm, the first ones laid off are the slackers, the schedule of who got laid off was directly tied to who had the best production (stops per hour, gallons per hour and so on)

That way I had almost total control over how much overtime I got, and how long a season I had.

I made so damn much money in the short winter months that I really didn't give a damn WHO I worked for in the summer... this way I got to drive a variety of different trucks/ different products:

Concrete Mixers

Roll off Trucks

Dump Trucks

Box Trucks

Trash Trucks

I was fearless... I could change jobs because the ash trays were full.

the other drivers lived in fear: "What are you gonna do when it gets cold and the work slows down?"

I didn't give a sh**!!!