On this week’s episode of Taking the Hire Road, Jeremy Reymer, founder of Project 61, joined Jeremy Reymer (yes, you read that right!), founder of DriverReach, to discuss his passion for addressing the epidemic gripping the trucking industry: the fact that the average life expectancy of a CDL driver is 61 years.
Reymer had no experience in trucking and no family history in the freight industry, but at 30 years old, he was offered an opportunity at a small staffing business in Indiana. “It didn’t take long to realize what a great industry this is,” he said. “I dove in right away and learned a ton. I even started a trucking company myself, a small, for-hire fleet, just in time to experience the Great Recession, which was an awful education.”
After learning the ins and outs of freight, Reymer ended up buying the staffing company he worked for and growing it for a number of years. In the course of running that company, he and his staff developed novel technology to help the business grow.
“At some point, I realized I could help way more companies with the technology I’d built, certainly much more than I could with just my staffing company,” Reymer said. “So I founded DriverReach and sold that original staffing company in 2017.”
Now, in addition to DriverReach, Reymer is on to his next venture: Project 61. The Project 61 movement seeks to address an alarming statistic: The average life expectancy of a CDL driver is 61 years old.
“Project 61 is in its infancy at this stage, but my goal is to raise awareness and educate all industry stakeholders, most certainly drivers, and also to provide resources and solutions and move the needle to alter that trajectory,” Reymer said. “A life expectancy of 61 is just unacceptable in my opinion. We’re letting our drivers down and not supporting them properly.”
Companies spend tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars to care for their equipment, while the most valuable assets, the drivers, are left to fend for themselves with poor access to healthy food, little to no opportunity for movement and exercise, and poor or inconsistent sleep.
“We all know how important truck drivers and this industry are to our economy at large,” Reymer said. “We have to do better for them.”
According to Reymer, affecting change starts with education and awareness. “We have to establish just how critical this is, but then we’ve also got to make it easy for drivers to make better decisions with their health,” he said. “We have to help them get easier access to nutrition and exercise and sleep, to take steps to improve their mental health, so they can live longer, healthier lives.”
As this has been a serious concern for decades, Reymer asked himself why it hasn’t been taken more seriously. “Candidly, I think it’s just been easier to look away,” he said. “Perhaps many of us have heard this before but have just gotten numb to it.
“The reality is that we must recognize the fact that one of the largest and most important industries in North America also has one of the lowest life expectancies. But it’s the right thing to do.”
There have been many in-depth ROI case studies on the merits of improving driver health by incorporating health and wellness programs, especially ones developed specifically for drivers. “[Those programs] lead to savings in insurance costs, more productivity, higher retention rates, loyalty and morale, but really it’s beyond the numbers,” Reymer said.
With drivers often working demanding hours, he says, one of the challenges companies face is making these choices easier for drivers to make. “Drivers are working hard enough as it is, and some companies struggle with getting enough adoption among their drivers,” he said. “Sometimes they end up nixing the programs altogether. To get more traction, I think education is a big part of it, for both management and drivers.”
While presenting the facts and providing opportunities for healthy choices are among the priorities for Project 61, the biggest factor in success is helping the drivers connect the dots by themselves. “If I understand that my life trajectory has me exiting early or at a much greater risk of that outcome, and I have someone that I don’t want to lose, then something needs to change,” Reymer explained. “We all need to uncover our why. We all need to make better decisions about some of our habits and diet.”
For some drivers, Reymer says, what you really have to communicate is that loved ones will lose them. “For some people, it’s their spouse, and for some it’s their children, and for some, all you need to communicate to them is that they need to be around to see their grandkids grow up,” he said.
“For me, it’s my three children, who are 10, 11 and 12,” Reymer said. “I want to be healthy and alive and enjoy them growing up. If they have kids, I want to be there to pick up my grandchildren. And for that to happen, I need to make better decisions today.”
Book recommendation: “How Not to Die”
Click here to learn more about DriverReach.
Click here to learn more about Project 61.
Sponsors: DriverReach, The National Transportation Institute, Career Now Brands, Carrier Intelligence, Infinit-I Workforce Solutions, WorkHound, Asurint, Arya By Leoforce, Seiza, Drive My Way, F|Staff, Trucksafe Consulting, Seated Social, Repowr