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Pickup Notifications for LTL is a new feature that allows customers to gain greater control and insight into their entire pickup process.  UPS Freight® is the first national LTL carrier to offer full visibility into LTL pickups when scheduled online.  Now, customers will be able to receive email alerts when the pickup is scheduled, when the driver is on his way and when the pickup is complete. 

UPS has been recognized as a leader in logistics.  We can manage the most intricate details of any small package or heavy freight move – whether it’s getting Grandma’s cookies to your front door, critical service parts to a hospital half-way around the world or a polar bear cub cross-country to its new habitat.

Literally hundreds of thousands of UPS’s “logistics leaders” work behind the scenes every day to make it all come together.  We’ll introduce you to a few of them whose jobs may not come top of mind when you think of Big Brown.  You’ll get an inside look at how their unique jobs fit into UPS’s logistics story.

Meet Randy Baker.  He’s been with UPS for 21 years, the last 17 in the meteorology department.  Randy is based in Louisville, Kentucky, at Worldport, UPS’s all-points international air hub.

I’m currently on a “peak” season assignment working at the UPS Forest Park facility. This is a departure from my role in public relations at UPS but is giving me a great month-long opportunity to see the operations in action, and help coordinate the logistics of teaming our drivers with new part-time seasonal helpers. UPS hires 50,000 seasonal workers to help deliver 430 million packages between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I’m excited to be doing my part!

I’m currently on a “peak” season assignment working at the UPS Forest Park facility. This is a departure from my role in public relations at UPS but is giving me a great month-long opportunity to see the operations in action, and help coordinate the logistics of teaming our drivers with new part-time seasonal helpers. UPS hires 50,000 seasonal workers to help deliver 430 million packages between Thanksgiving and Christmas. I’m excited to be doing my part!

To learn more about the experience view my video.

For the sixth consecutive year, UPS has been named to Interbrand’s list of 100 Best Global Brands. UPS ranked among the Top 50 around the world at No. 31 and is also the only transportation company to appear on the list.

According to Interbrand, a leading brand consultancy that has produced the Best Global Brands list since 2001, the companies were rated on the value of their brands as determined by three key factors: financial performance, the role the brand played in influencing purchase decisions and the strength of the brand to continue to secure earnings for the company. UPS’s brand value is estimated at US$11.8 billion.

In order to be considered for inclusion on the list, several criteria must be met. In general, the brand must be global, visible and relatively transparent in financial results. More specifically, almost a third of earnings must come from outside the home country; the brand’s financial performance must be publicly available, and there must be a presence on at least three major continents.

Just earlier this month, UPS announced the launch of a new brand campaign in the United States, China, the United Kingdom and Mexico, highlighting the company’s expertise in logistics and expansion of its capabilities. The company has evolved beyond just delivering packages. Its products and services portfolio now includes trucking and air freight, retail shipping and business services, customs brokerage, finance and international trade services.

Impressive. Innovative. INTENSIVE! These are all words that have been used to describe UPS Integrad®, the driver training program that combines technology, hands-on experience and real-time feedback to get new driver candidates ready for the road.

The program started three years ago at the first training site in Landover, Md., the result of extensive research on differences in learning style among multiple generations. Based on the retention rate and performance of new drivers who went through the first Integrad facility, UPS opened a second facility this summer just outside Chicago.

I’ve often wondered about what happens after Integrad? To date, more than 1,500 new driver candidates have begun the Integrad training. Where are they now? The very short and simple answer is that most of them have gone back to their home state to become safe and confident drivers. 

I recently had the opportunity to speak with a few graduates right before they started on their fast-paced day. A couple of them were fresh out of the program and the others had been out a year or longer, including one who was recently promoted and now manages a pretty diverse group of drivers – some with 30 years of experience, some with five years and some with as little as two weeks.

Although we couldn’t chat long, it was interesting to hear each driver express how the program provided “real world” experiences impacting their personal driving habits. 

Related Post: Ever Wonder What it Takes to Wear Those Brown Shorts?

Here are snippets of their reflections on the Integrad experience:

Maybe more than you think. Today’s UPS driver must focus on more than just the physical tasks of delivering your package. As the company’s most visible representatives, they’re also expected to have a broad knowledge base of our products and services and know how to interact well with our customers.

That’s why we have UPS Integrad, an innovative driver training program that helps new drivers make sense of it all. The state-of-the-art program was developed as a result of almost two years of research that UPS did with some of the best minds at MIT and Virginia Tech. It incorporates technology in the form of virtual reality and simulations with classroom-based training, allowing trainees to “learn by doing.” 

A typical day in the program might include walking across a treated surface that simulates ice or grease; using a touch-screen to identify potential hazards encountered while driving a typical route, or maybe even driving the truck (we call it a package car) in the parking-lot-turned-fake town of “Clarksville,” complete with little houses, street signs, a loading dock and sheds that simulate delivery stops.

The program, which launched as a pilot in 2007 in Landover, Md., has proven successful in training and retaining good drivers – so much so that UPS has expanded the program to open a second training facility in the Chicago area. This facility replicates the first one and serves as a central location where driver candidates can come to receive consistent training. 

Want to become a driver now? Let me warn you, it may take a while. Most UPS drivers begin their career as part-timers, starting out by loading, unloading and sorting packages, then they work their way up through the ranks. I guess we all have to start somewhere.

You can view the current open positions at upsjobs.com. We also share news about job opening on Twitter and at Facebook.

Related post: Where are they now? Life After Integrad.