Titan Transfer’s Hodges Takes the Helm at ATA Years After Reconsidering Retirement Plans

By Eric Miller, Staff Reporter

This story appears in the Oct. 12 print edition of Transport Topics.

SHELBYVILLE, Tenn. — The day in 1998 that Tommy Hodges sold Goggin Truck Line should have been one of the best days of his life.

The hefty proceeds from the sale would ensure his family’s future financial stability and allow him to reach his longtime goal of retiring at a relatively young age.

Yet Hodges calls it his “darkest” day.

Installed as the 65th chairman of American Trucking Associations last week, Hodges recalled recently that after the sale he immediately started to wonder about the employees who had helped him build the less-than-truckload carrier from 11 trucks in 1984 to a regional carrier with nearly 500 trucks and 44 terminals in 11 states.

Once the company had been turned over to a new corporate owner, what would become of the officers, dock workers, mechanics, truck drivers and secretaries who had stood by him for years?

“That’s about the most stressful thing that I’ve ever gone through,” said Hodges, who now is chairman of truckload carrier Titan Transfer. “Telling the people that had worked there for so long and put so much hard effort into helping us grow that company that there was going to be a new owner was just very difficult for me.

“A lot of them had a lot of sweat equity into the company.

“So consequently when we sold it, they didn’t end up with anything,” he said.

More than a decade later, that decision still tugs at Hodges’ heartstrings and is a reason he said he’d never sell another company again.

Since the sale, Hodges, now 62, has turned down retirement. He has gone on to build several other successful companies here in the small town of Shelbyville, the place he and his wife of 40-plus years, Dean, have called home for the past 25 years.

Hodges is controlling owner and chairman of several transportation companies, most notably Titan Transfer Inc. and Goggin Warehousing LLC. His industry experience includes everything from truck driver and dockworker, to salesman and top management.

As he takes the helm as ATA chairman, Hodges said he is convinced the current White House and Congress are less friendly to the trucking industry than during prior administrations. He said he needs not only to keep an eye out for costly and unnecessary regulations and legislation but to be proactive in his advocacy for the industry and encourage the ATA membership to do the same.

“I’m just a little bit concerned that there’s a disconnect between the current administration and the way our economy and business works,” Hodges said.

Hodges added that during his year as chairman, he’ll try to inform trucking and other groups about what ATA’s doing to help business.

“I’ve always been of the school that ATA needs to be more proactive than reactive,” Hodges said. “There are times when you have to play defense, but I don’t think that needs to be our major objective.”

Hodges already has held several leadership positions in the trucking industry. He’s served in key posts at the Tennessee Trucking Association and also was chairman of ATA’s sustainability, small truckers and membership committees.

Outgoing ATA chairman Charles “Shorty” Whittington said he’s been impressed with Hodges’ leadership abilities. In fact, Whittington said the best meeting he’s ever attended was a sustainability gathering led by Hodges.

“That was the most productive day-and-a-half in all the years I’ve been at ATA,” Whittington said. “Tommy had a hold of the wheel.”

As chairman, Hodges said he expects to spend a lot of time on federal highway reauthorization legislation. Something has to be done to improve the nation’s infrastructure, he said.

Other key issues include further improving truck safety, increasing industry productivity by pushing for a boost in size-and-weight limits, fighting union card check provisions, defending the use of independent contractors and persuading the government to spend more on research to raise the fuel economy of heavy trucks.

ATA President Bill Graves said Hodges will be well received by the membership and, with his warehousing experience, will bring a unique perspective to the post.

“This is the first time that I’m aware that we’ve had a chairman with such a significant warehousing operation as a part of his portfolio,” Graves said. “We’re not just motor carriers any more; we’re very diverse logistics providers.”

Hodges will “bring a calm, steady hand during a pretty tumultuous time,” Graves added. “He’ll help us find the recovery that everybody’s anxious to see.”

Fred Burns, chairman of Burns Motor Freight, Marlinton, W.Va., said he first spotted Hodges’ leadership potential when he was ATA chairman earlier in the decade.

“With the problems and issues that our industry is facing, we couldn’t find a better man to lead the trucking industry and be able to get our points across,” Burns said. “He has a real passion for the trucking industry and his fellow man. His fellow man comes first in any decision Tommy makes.”

That sentiment was shared by Mike McFarlin, who has served with Hodges on the executive board of the Tennessee Trucking Association.

“Given the extreme difficult conditions our industry is currently enduring, I can’t imagine having a more qualified leader to chair ATA at this time,” said McFarlin, chief executive officer of M&W Logistics Group Inc.

The 6-foot 3-inch tall Hodges runs a relatively modest size trucking and warehousing operation, lives in a small Tennessee town, loves to “move dirt” with the family’s old farm tractor, goes to church every Sunday and seems to love nothing more than spoiling his grandkids.

But those who have observed his business acumen and leadership skills over the years say his still waters run deep.

These days, with decades of trucking and warehousing industry experience and several years of “moving through the ATA chairs” behind him, Hodges said he’s ready to go full-time as trucking’s most visible frontman.

Hodges literally grew up in the trucking business. His father was a longhaul truck driver; Tommy loaded trucks in high school and college. He has been a salesman and even was a truck driver and Teamsters union member.

Growing up in Nashville, he said he always had a fascination with big trucks and has fond childhood memories of his mom driving his dad to his truck. He said he always has loved the smell of diesel fuel.

Hodges currently has a controlling interest in and is chairman of several companies, including Titan Transfer Inc.; Goggin Warehousing LLC; HEC Leasing Inc.; International Warehouse Logistics Association Insurance Co.; Titan Transfer Logistics Inc.; and S/M Transportation and Warehousing Inc.

He sums up his leadership style like this: “Give every person his say, no person his way.”

Hodges spent many years building Goggin Truck Line, a former less-than-truckload carrier that grew to nearly 1,000 employees by the time he sold it to Old Dominion Freight Line in 1998. In 2000, he started all over again with Titan, a dry-van longhaul carrier that owns nearly 300 trucks.

He tried to retire but got back into the game after only a few months by starting Titan.

“I missed trucking too much,” he said.

Although Hodges still is passionate about the business he controls, his son, Tom, said his father has largely delegated the day-to-day operations to longtime trusted employees.

“But Dad’s still very goal-oriented, very goal-driven,” said his 26-year-old son. “There’s always a next tier, a next level to check off the list.”

Hodges’ son also said he believes his father will enjoy being trucking’s top spokesman.

“Dad likes to be around intelligence,” Tom said. “He’s a constant learner. I know he loves to travel and talk to different people about his passion, the thing that makes him tick, the trucking business.”

“He’s a Type A personality,” said Phillip Edwards, president of Titan Transfer Inc., Hodges’ flagship company. “When I first went to work for Tommy, he was very different, very hands on, very into the details.

“Over the years he’s changed a lot,” Edwards added. “I won’t say mellowed out, because he’s still very passionate about the business. He’s entrusted us to take care of the company, but he’s always there to give guidance.”

Hodges said the trucking industry for years, mostly unfairly, has gotten a bad rap. He said he’ll never forget that day in college when one of his professors asked his students what they wanted to do with their degrees.

“It got around to me, and I said, ‘I’m a supervisor for a trucking company, and I want to get a degree,’ ” Hodges recalled. “The professor said, ‘If you’re in the trucking business, I know why you want to get a degree — to get out of that industry.’ It was kind of a slap in the face, and I remembered over the years that that was the perception of our industry.”

Ever since then, he’s tried to do his part to make the industry more attractive to young men and women.

“Today, we have become an industry of choice,” Hodges said. “We treat our people better, and we’ve improved our benefits and working conditions. But there’s still a lot of work to do.”