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BLAZING A TRAIL-ER

by Jim Morgan

As a little boy growing up in Spartanburg, South Carolina, Steve Brockman was an expert truck driver.

“My favorite toys were Matchbox cars and Tonka trucks,” he says with a smile. “I'd spend hours and hours with those things. I loved to take them out in the back yard, especially if it hadn't just been mowed. Driving a toy semi through a stand of grass made me feel like an explorer, like I was really blazing a trail.”

Though he's now a grown-up territory manager for RL Hudson, Steve is still a trailblazer, and he still devotes a fair amount of time to the big rigs. One of his largest customers is Cottrell, Inc., the world's leading designer and manufacturer of auto transport trailers, headramps, tractors, and accessories.

“Cottrell now manufactures auto carriers for the United States, Mexico, and Australia,” Steve says, “and they have plans to expand into Europe and South Africa. In addition to hydraulic seals, RL Hudson provides Cottrell with all of their custom-molded rubber components, hydraulic tanks, and other specialty rubber and plastic products. Serving Cottrell was the primary impetus for opening our Southeast Sales & Distribution Center in Greer in 1998.”

Over the past two years, growth in the Southern region has greatly exceeded Steve's expectations. That's due, of course, to loyal customers like Cottrell. The Greer group has expanded to include Stacy Cureton (who serves as account manager), Jackie Powell (distribution manager), and Kevin Oxendine (working in the warehouse).

Business has been so good, in fact, that Steve and his team recently outgrew their initial 3,000-square-foot home and had to seek larger accommodations. As it turned out, they didn't have to look very far.
“We found a 17,000-square-foot complex just up the street from our original building,” Steve says. “It was exactly what we needed, when we needed it. Our new location gives us more space now and still allows room for future expansion.”

As Steve sees it, having room to grow will continue to be a big necessity. “We anticipate our annual growth in the Southeast region to range between 18% and 20% over the next several years. With our new offices, we now have both the facilities and the systems – including our ISO 9001 registration – to accommodate that growth. At some point in the future, we also plan to further expand oursales force here in Greer so that we can keep pace with the rapidly growing manufacturing base in the Southeast, particularly in the Carolinas and Georgia.”

Steve is the first to admit he enjoys the challenges that go along with heading up the Southeast territory. “I guess you could say I'm driven to succeed,” he says, “so the challenges are what attracted me to this company in the first place. Some companies see challenges as bad, and they expend energy to avoid them. But RL Hudson was founded on the idea that challenges are really just opportunities in disguise. Rick Hudson thrives on challenge, and he's shown the rest of us how important it is, both professionally and personally, to constantly challenge ourselves.“

Professional challenges aside, Steve's personal life has also changed since he was first profiled in our October/November/December 1998 issue. He and his wife, Laura, just celebrated their seventh wedding anniversary, and they now have two beautiful daughters, Anna (age 3) and Becca (1). Making full use of his “spare” time, Steve earned his MBA in May of last year from the University of South Carolina's prestigious Darla Moore School of Business.

Despite the graduate degree, however, Steve refuses to lose sight of the simpler pleasures in life. “There are definitely days when I'm still tempted by the Tonkas,” he says with a laugh. “The toys being made now are better than when I was a kid, that's for sure. One of the great things about being a dad is that I can buy all the toys I want and say they're for the girls. And the best part is, Becca really likes playing with trucks!”