S&T Trucking, Inc.

At a kitchen table in Billings, Montana, DiAnne Grimm manned a telephone and penciled loads of cattle into a dispatch book, while her husband, Gary was at the wheel of a 1973 cabover Kenworth. As she was promising customers top-notch service, Gary was delivering it. They had no way of knowing that they were laying the cornerstone of what would define S&T Trucking. In 1978 they added their first owner-operator, as well as their first new
company truck — a 1978 cabover Freightliner. By 1980 the company had grown to include a couple more owner-operators, one of them being Gary and DiAnne’s son-in-law, Larry Littrell. In 1983 S&T moved from Billings to Pompey’s Pillar, Montana. The office was still in the Grimm’s house but had expanded to actually include a couple of desks and two telephones. Gary and DiAnne’s daughter, Tammi Littrell, began doing the bookkeeping while DiAnne devoted herself to the dispatching duties and a telephone that rang 24/7. With the sheep market on an upswing, Gary and Larry took a leap of faith and purchased two new sheep trailers, beginning what would be a successful run of many years of sheep hauling. Though the company was growing, it was still a genuine mom-and-pop operation. Bull haulers from across the U.S. were making their way to the little porch in the Grimm’s trailer house to lease their trucks on. Most were given a meal and a tank of fuel, and with a handshake, they joined the fleet. By 1984 S&T had expanded to include approximately twenty lease trucks, two company trucks, and nine cattle trailers. Tammi and Larry bought the company on January 9, 1985, promoting themselves from employees to employers overnight. The move did not come without its pitfalls as every single one of the owner-operators quit! Faced with their first of many setbacks, the couple forged ahead. They sold trailers that weren’t being pulled and traded others in for trucks, turning stagnant equipment into revenue producing. DiAnne continued to dispatch and together they recruited a new group of owner-operators. In 1986 the Littrells built a small, log building, giving S&T its first real office...although it was without running water! Larry continued to drive while Tammi managed the day-to-day operations. A year later they bought a shop some 35 miles away in Billings and Larry got off the road in 1988, to maintain their expanding fleet. His foresight that new, well-maintained equipment would set them apart from the rest of the industry would prove to be a benchmark that customers came to recognize as standard with the S&T trucks. By the early 1990s S&T’s gross revenue was exceeding $5,000,000 annually and the company had grown to a fleet of twenty company-owned trucks and approximately twenty lease trucks. This new equipment became their calling card and they branched out to cover all aspects of the livestock markets, hauling hogs as well as cattle and sheep. At the time, their versatility was unprecedented and S&T’s reputation for maintaining impressive equipment and providing excellent service increased the demand from customers. The overflow resulted in a booming brokerage business that was second to none in the livestock industry. With hundreds of truckers at her disposal, DiAnne dispatched thousands of loads of livestock across the country, making S&T one of the largest livestock carriers in the western U.S. This rapid growth resulted in the need for more staff so a new office was built and in 1991 became S&T’s new home. The cost of expansion and exposure is recognition — the kind that small trucking companies prefer not to have. The DOT was a constant threat and its increased scrutiny only added to the growing pains of the rapidly expanding business. Montana’s reputation as an unfriendly business environment eventually made it obvious that if S&T was to survive into the next decade it would have to move out of the state. With the paint barely dry in the new office, the Littrell’s began what would be a three year plan to relocate their company. They opened an office in Sheridan, Wyoming, and Tammi made the weekly drive, putting in two or three days each week at the new location. A search for commercial property had also begun. In August of 1994 the move to Wyoming was complete but the excitement was overshadowed by a series of accidents. Brand-new trucks and trailers loaded with cattle and hogs found themselves upside-down in the ditches, turning a move that was intended to be about survival, into a disaster that nearly resulted in the company's demise. Plagued by eight truck wrecks in less than one year, S&T was on the verge of collapse. That, combined with the volatility of the livestock market, the decline of quality drivers, and the increase of DOT scrutiny, forced S&T to adapt to the changing times. The Heavy Haul Division was born in 1996 when Larry introduced step-deck trailers to the fleet, following up with what would be the first of many nine-axle set-ups. In 1997, Jeff Davidson began working for the company as a dispatcher. Together, he and Larry, with their “ain’t scared” mentality, took S&T in a whole new direction. The company livestock drivers were gradually phased out and replaced with heavy haul drivers. By the end of 1998 only owner-operators were pulling company-owned livestock trailers, marking the beginning of a new era for S&T Trucking. In 1999 Ryan Holzbauer joined DiAnne as a dispatcher in the Livestock Division. The office was in Deming, New Mexico, where DiAnne and Gary were living at the time. Ryan was tutored by the best and one of the most well-known livestock dispatchers that the industry had ever seen. On June 14, 2001, DiAnne passed away and Ryan inherited the legacy that she had built and that had defined S&T Trucking: If she had a truck, she found a load — and if she had a load, she found a truck. What was the beginning of a new era for S&T was also the end of another. A two-year contract to supply trucking equipment on a telecommunications job was confirmation that S&T was no longer the mom-and-pop operation of the 1980s, but a multi-million dollar business. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of equipment were added to the fleet and for the first time ever, S&T joined the Teamsters and employed union drivers. By 2002, the company had expanded to include nine belly dumps and pup trailers. The office was bursting with staff and the additional equipment kept three full-time mechanics and a welder busy. Throughout the 2000s, S&T’s heavy haul business became more specialized, as did the trailers; gaining the ability to haul over one hundred tons of payload on thirteen axles. As the freight got bigger, so did the revenues, which eventually exceeded $10,000,000 per year. With a focus on the continued success and integrity of S&T Trucking, on January 1, 2008, Larry and Tammi placed the company into the capable hands of Jeff and Ryan. The time had come for someone else’s vision to choose the path of this little trucking company. In 2009 Larry was diagnosed with myelodysplastic syndrome, also known as pre-leukemia. Doctors gave him a five year window, in which he would then have to undergo a bone marrow transplant. The Littrell's had been used to living life with a "full steam ahead" attitude and they essentially thumbed their noses at cancer, bought a catamaran and moved to the Caribbean where they spent the next three years sailing the the Spanish, U.S., and British Virgin Islands. In the fall of 2012 Larry got is Captain's license, a goal that he had set for himself shortly after buying PISCES. He also got the news that his bone marrow had quit working and that the transplant would likely be sooner, rather than later. In March 2013 they left the islands and in May, Larry underwent the transplant in Denver, CO. It was a rough couple of years for Larry and Tammi. With their fleet reduced to a mere two heavy haul trucks, they managed to keep their foot in the door of the industry with Larry recuperated. By the fall of 2015 Larry's health had returned and he was ready to kick up the heavy haul operation again. Today he is currently cancer free and S&T Trucking is back in full swing. The office is once again fully staffed with Larry, Savannah Manke (Larry and Tammi's daughter) as the Oversize-Overweight Specialist and Josh Manke in the dispatch office; Krisit Bjorem is the company's secretary and Tammi is still in charge of the money and the ass chewings. S&T Trucking has seen its share of ups and downs over the past forty plus years. Failures were met with fortitude, resolve, and hard work and success was measured by loyalty, longevity, and respect. The ownership, management, and locations of S&T may have changed over the years, but many things have remained constant. DiAnne and Gary laid the foundation for S&T and Tammi and Larry built it up, using the same cornerstones that had been put in place before them. Now a third generation is prepared to take S&T into the next decade, with Savannah and Josh building their own heavy haul fleet of trucks and trailers and overseeing many of the day to day operations. The company's commitment to their customers of delivering quality service and providing superior equipment with dependable drivers is still what S&T stands for — loyalty is rewarded, respect is earned — and finally, their never ending desire to succeed, is what has kept S&T Trucking in the business for over forty years.