South Carolina-based Blanchard Machinery Company recently announced the delivery of the first Cat CT660 on-highway truck sold in the state to N.W. White & Co., a trucking and hauling firm headquartered in Columbia, S.C.
“We’re very excited to have delivered the first CT660 in South Carolina to our friends at N.W. White. We’re confident the power and operational efficiency of this truck will complement the superior customer service N.W. White is well known for,” said John Spires, truck sales support manager, Blanchard Machinery Company.
Lost in the fanfare of a sparkling new class of vocational truck hitting the roads of the Palmetto State is the fact that N.W. White, which was founded 60 years ago by the father-and-son partnership of Neal Worth White Sr. and Jr., celebrates 30 years under the leadership of current owner Richard Jackson in 2012.
Even more impressive is the fact that in those six decades, N.W. White & Co. has built a reputation as one of South Carolina’s finest trucking and hauling operations.
A major key to that success is the fact that Jackson treats all his customers with the same excellence and efficiency — no matter what size the job is.
“My philosophy has always been there is no one customer more important than any other.” Jackson said. “They are all important to us.”
The company, with more than 200 employees at offices in Columbia, Greer, Greenwood and Anderson, S.C., plus a substation in the Charleston area, hauls for clients involved in grading, paving, utilities and residential construction. The firm also has a Special Services division where it runs 100-cu. yd. trailers hauling trash from county transfer stations to landfills.
“The primary things we move are construction materials such as aggregate, base rock for foundations and roads, asphalt to go on top of that foundation, clean stone for concrete companies and asphalt companies,” said Jerome Jones, the president of N.W. White and the man who runs the day-to-day operations of the company. “In addition, we have done quite a bit of demolition work, too, as well as move a lot of stockpile material for concrete and asphalt companies in the state.”
Jackson and Jones also enjoy a very team-oriented relationship with the various general managers at N.W. White’s locations, including Chad Andrews in Columbia, Art Youngblood in Greenwood, Fran Gregory in Greer, Stan James in Anderson and David Jacques in the Special Services division.
“I feel that the leadership team of Jerome and [vice president] Jeremy Godwin, along with the general managers and their supporting staffs of dispatchers, shops and clerical people are earning business right and left because of the fact that they are doing what they say they are going to do,” Jackson commented. “We are determined to be dependable and efficient in the way we run our business — not only in price but also in service.”
N.W. White began in 1952 when the Whites started the hauling firm after gaining experience working at what was then known as Columbia Quarries. The quarry’s owner suggested that the Whites form a trucking business to fill a need for a better and more reliable delivery service for his customers.
For the next 30 years, N.W. White continued to improve on that original concept, adding trucks and personnel that were experts in moving construction materials efficiently and affordably.
By 1982, N.W. White Jr. was ready to sell the firm and found a buyer in Jackson, who had founded C.R. Jackson Inc., a grading and utilities contracting firm, in Columbia 10 years earlier.
“Mr. White approached me about buying his company because he had experienced some difficult times and wanted to sell,” Jackson recalled. “At that time we were not in the asphalt hauling business, so there were synergies that came with the union, even though C.R. Jackson Inc. and N.W. White & Co. have remained two separate companies. By and large, N.W. White has earned all of its customers on its own. C. R. Jackson is treated as just another customer to N.W. White.”
Jackson said that he is proud of the success of N.W. White, a success that helped to sustain the company during tough economic times, especially those of the last four years. The only real problems that the firm has weathered, he said, have been the periodic fuel-cost spikes that have been endemic in the trucking industry since 2008.
“It is very difficult to react to that and maintain your balance, but we have managed and have really suffered no other real setbacks,” Jackson added.
Another anniversary worth noting in 2012 is the 40-year relationship that Richard Jackson and his companies have enjoyed with Blanchard Machinery Company, South Carolina’s authorized Caterpillar equipment dealer. Although the new CT660 vehicle is the first on-highway truck made by Cat and the first piece owned by N.W. White, C.R. Jackson has a large inventory of Cat construction pieces in its fleet.
“We are very good friends and customers of Blanchard Machinery. After we investigated the truck and it passed our muster, we just felt it would be fit to buy the first one and they allowed us to do that,” he said.
Jackson also said that when N.W. White took delivery of the new CT660 truck on March 26, it was another in a continuing series of moves to keep top-of-the-line equipment in the hands of employees. By doing so, he feels, N.W. White fosters pride among his people.
“We believe that the best and the newest and the best- maintained equipment are a compliment to our drivers. Our customers recognize it and it is a great recruiting tool too. And we are going to keep good equipment that makes people proud to work here.”
Blanchard Machinery Company’s Brian Smith, territory manager, commented, “Blanchard truly values our long-standing partnership with the C.R. Jackson family of companies. This company is, without a doubt, committed to its customers and employees and we look forward to continuing to provide business solutions to them in the years ahead.”
Eric Olson
A writer and contributing editor for CEG since 2008, Eric Olson has worked in the business for more than 40 years.
Olson grew up in the small town of Lenoir, NC in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, where he began covering sports for the local newspaper at age 18. He continued to do that for several other dailies in the area while in college at Appalachian State University. Following his graduation, he moved on to gain experience at two other publications before becoming a real estate and special features writer and editor at the Winston-Salem Journal for 10 years. Since 1999 he has worked as a corporate media liaison and freelance writer, in addition to his time at CEG.
He and his wife, Tara, have been married for 33 years and are the parents of two grown and successful daughters. His hobbies include collecting history books, watching his beloved Green Bay Packers and caring for his three dogs and one cat.
Read more from Eric Olson here.
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