Companies w/ Manuals that hire new drivers

Pride Transport gives drivers a choice of stick shift or automatic and hires new cdl school grads from 48 states.
Trucks loaded for driver comfort. You won't have to relocate.
pridetransport.com
https://www.pridetransport.com

 

Pride Transport is in Utah and a great place to relocate to if you want.
My friend from Tennessee moved to Utah and loves it there.

 

Land Air, unless the policy has changed, hires new cdl school grads from Virginia and a choice of stick shift or automatic.
Landair Transport, Inc.

 

I'm not sure having manual experience is more than a tie breaker between 2 good jobs. Backing is the skill that separates a pro from a rookie. Most people are taught to avoid backing unless it's an emergency and you have a police escort and 300 yards of empty space in front of the spot to put the trailer. I used to be a mild manual zealot. It's mostly a minor preference now.

 

Utah is great except Californians are busily ruining it.

 

I would agree about the backing thing it seems to be a lost skill. I do a lot of local heavy equipment moving and some days put in several miles of rewind. I think my record is 6 miles of high side rewind with a top speed of 19mph all for one load of disabled equipment. Oh well when I have to get fuel and there’s a bunch of flip flops and sweatpants cowboys hogging the fuel island I ain’t afraid to get creative if that’s what it takes to fill both sides.

 

Heartland Express used to be almost exclusively manuals. Not sure if they take on new drivers or not, but I think they had some sort of training program. It might have been for experienced drivers returning after a hiatus.

I thought manual was more interesting, but I haven't felt the urge to seek it out when on the job market. I found that lanes, type of freight, variety, etc. does more for me than a manual does. Chaining up for Snoqualmie Pass in the dead of winter is a much more fulfilling experience to me than driving a manual across Indiana, but that probably qualifies me for a psych ward.

 

I completely understand wanting to learn on a manual. It’s not like either backing or shifting is that difficult but both can take a while to get really good at. Why not do both when still a rookie?

Jamming gears is going to be a rare skill someday as even those that passed their road test driving manual never drove one since. It’s one thing to pass the test and an entirely another thing to jam gears everyday for a few years.

 

I don't see any real benefit to manual transmission that an automatic or AMT with a manual mode doesn't also have. Maybe off-road or logging in the back country or heavy haul it's necessary, I never did any of that.