Cambridge-Based Trucking Company Challenger To Acquire Wiersma Trucking
Ed Wiersma and Dan Einwechter have been friends in the business for decades. Einwechter, the Chief Executive Officer and chair owner of Challenger Motor Freight, had stated that he and Wiersma have always stayed in contact in their many years of operating their respective businesses.
With his existing company for trucking in Cambridge and around Canada, Einwechter has been looking to keep expanding Challenger’s prospects and resources. For most recent years, he had instructed Ed Wiersma, the owner of the aptly named Ed Wiersma Trucking firm that had been constructed and started in the early 1980s, to tell him if he were ever thinking of retirement. In 2018, such thoughts have come to Wiersma and his wife Grace, initiating the deal that would lead to Challenger Motor Freight’s acquisition of Ed Wiersma Trucking.
Einwechter had commented that the deal went and came together smoothly due to his and Wiersma’s friendship in the business, wherein they had build a strong relationship of trusth between each other.With trucking in Cambridge at is base, Challenger will be absorbing Wiersma’s Trucking staff of 12 into its own nationwide team of 1,600 people. The 13 trucks they previously owned will add to the 1,300 Challenger trucks, and their unspecified number of trailers will add to Challenger’s existing 3,000.
Einwechter had also stated that Wiersma still cared for his employees even while thinking of retirement, choosing the “good home” they will work for to be Challenger Motor Freight. Likewise, Wiersma believes that Challenger’s acquisition is a sound decision for the business and its staff.
Wiersma has added that it is difficult to find willing drivers who would undertake the truck driving lifestyle in more recent years. Einwechter had announced that his company will then provide its new and current truck drivers with an increased double-digit percentage to their salary, commenting the raise was “overdue”.
Wiersma Trucking had specialized in flatbed shipping, which is good news to the existing flatbed group in Challenger, to which Einwechter said was a way to introduce their company to new customers they have not worked with before.
Challenger Motor Freighter is in high demand for its services around Canada, and so they will continue to search for deals and acquisitions like with Ed Wiersma Trucking for the progress of the business.
