Page 50 - ATR 4 2021 digital

THE LAST WORD

My Final Mile

By Gwen Moritz constant. But the way the staff and I a highway funding formula that suf-

Guest Writer did our jobs changed so much during fered from better fuel efficiency. Like
that time that it never felt static. you, I saw the annual report card on
A few years ago, I sat in an audi- I’m pretty sure the same is true for substandard infrastructure and I hoped
ence of business publishers as our readers of Arkansas Trucking Report. You for some kind of political breakthrough.
keynote presenter offered a tip on might have the same title at the same (At this writing, a deal has been
extemporaneous speechifying. If you company and the same ultimate goal, announced, but I’ll believe it when I see
ever find yourself called upon to speak but the way you are doing it is different it.)
to a trade group, he said, you can’t go than it was last year or five years ago. Meanwhile, the destination for
wrong with this opening: “No industry And if you have been at it for decades, delivered goods made a sea change. I’m
has experienced more change in recent you may think back on the beginning of not sure when you started talking about
years than yours!” your career in the transportation indus- “final mile,” but it entered my con-
Those of us in the audience try the way I think back on the IBM sciousness about 10 years ago. The rise
instantly suspected that we were not the Selectric typewriter on which I wrote of e-commerce has literally changed the
first trade group audience to hear his my first news stories for the Pine Bluff color of our residential waste stream as
speech about speaking to trade group Commercial. more cardboard boxes started arriving
audiences. “Totally meta,” as the kids My time at the Commercial taught at more American homes with increas-
would say. But he was right: Virtually me this much about the transporta- ing frequency. My husband and I made
every industry has navigated so much tion industry: If I was late to work, I more orders from Amazon in 2020 than
change that anyone with even a few had to wait for a train to pass. I’m sure we did from 2001 to 2011 combined,
years of experience feels that surely no I never gave much thought to how my and we’re e-commerce amateurs com-
one outside their industry could possibly worldly goods arrived at the store until I pared with my 91-year-old father-in-law.
appreciate how much they have had to went into the business news niche. And I avoid making predictions — about
rethink and relearn. I’m certainly no expert on your busi- anything — because I’m almost always
I was invited to write this “Last ness, but I started to understand the wrong. I don’t know whether the pan-
Word” because I stepped down at difference between truckload and less- demic will result in long-term changes
the end of July as editor of Arkansas than-truckload and to appreciate the in U.S. manufacturing or global supply
Business. I’m doing other projects for tragedy of an empty trailer. Logistics as chains or workplace occupancy. But
Arkansas Business Publishing Group — a business started to make sense. After whether paper needs to be delivered by
my new title is “contributing editor” — retiring from the Air Force, my sister’s the ream for an inkjet printer in some-
but it’s now Lance Turner’s job to keep husband became a long-haul driver, one’s spare bedroom or on giant rolls
an eye on the people and businesses and conversations with him were eye- for the web printers that newspapers
that make up our state’s business com- opening as well. use, I know how it’s going to arrive.
munity. I had the same job title for 22 I watched your industry figure out
years, and my responsibility for deliver- how to roll with wild fluctuations in Gwen Moritz was editor of Arkansas
Business from August 1999 to July 2021.
ing a quality product hand-crafted from fuel prices, with well-intentioned but
scratch on time every week remained poorly crafted regulations and with

Opinions expressed on this page may not reflect official policies or opinions of the Arkansas Trucking Association or the American Trucking Associations.

50 Issue 4 2021 | ARKANSAS TRUCKING REPORT