BUSINESS
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PUBLISHER SAMANTHA SWINDLER ••••• SSWINDLER@COUNTRYMEDIA.NET HEADLIGHT HERALD • JUNE 27, 2012
STILL TRUCKIN’ AFTER 90 YEARS BY JOSIAH DARR sports@orcoastnews.com
TP Freight Line has been a long running business in Tillamook. So long in fact, that on June 21 TP Freight celebrated its 90-year anniversary with a company party recognizing the employees’ and company’s accomplishments. “Having the right people with the right team spirit has been huge for us,” said TP Freight Lines President Buck Colleknon. “We all have a lot of mutual respect for each other around here, and that has made it easier for the company to be successful.” TP Freight Line was founded in 1922 as Tillamook Portland Auto Freight by Carl Josi and the Haberlack family. At the time, government regulations restricted where the company could travel – an “authority” had to be purchased to ship freight in an area, Colleknon said. So in the beginning, Tillamook Portland Auto Freight focused on shipping products up and down Hwy. 6 between Portland and Tillamook. Many of the items shipped were related to the logging industry, or oil for local homes and mills. “At one point, we were running around the clock shipping oil to keep the mills running,” Colleknon explained. In 1946, Carl Colleknon along with Elmer Olsen, Paul Hogan, Adam Graver and Darrel Johnson bought the company. They owned it together until Colleknon eventually bought out the partners to become the sole owner. Today, the company is owned by his
three children, Jack Colleknon, Sue Hurliman and Buck Colleknon. In 1982, the name Tillamook Portland Auto Freight was changed to TP Freight Lines and the company began to expand by buying “authority” in other areas. Currently TP Freight Lines has nine terminals, including locations in Lincoln City, Coos Bay, Eugene, Medford and Klamath Falls to name a few. In 1994, shipping authority was deregulated by the state. That opened up the market to more competition, but it also meant more potential business for TP. Today, TP Freight Lines’ terminal sites employ approximately 125 people, nine of which are in Tillamook. The company has 10 smaller trucks and 54 tractor trucks capable of hauling triple trailers to ship a variety of products or “general commodities.” TP can ship directly to a personal residence, a mall or a large business. But, unlike many other shipping companies, TP provides only short-haul trucking; all of the company’s drivers can sleep in their own beds at night. Colleknon is quick to point out that the success of the company rests squarely on the shoulders of those drivers and the rest of the employees. “The company started out with 15-20 employees in Tillamook and Portland 90 years ago, and today we’re 125 employees strong and we’re servicing over 1,000 customers monthly with somewhere between 400 and 425 shippers serviced daily,” he said. “With-
Brian Cameron and his Tillamook Eco Adventures passenger van.
New business offers ‘Eco Adventures’ Cameron grew up in Tillamook and currently lives in the Netarts area. He plans for Tillamook Eco Adventures to feature the areas he has come to know well, living nearly 30 years in the county. Tillamook Eco Adventures takes visitors to see the sights, sounds and indeed smells of Tillamook County. The company provides half-day and allday tour experiences that comprise a number of sites and themes. These tours offer an array of options that span from backcountry forest tours, beach and bay interpretive hikes, waterfall tours, brewery and winery tours, and also collaboration between other local eco tourism ventures such as Kayak Tillamook. Tillamook Eco Adventures plans to offer dairy tours soon as well. For more information on Tillamook Eco Adventures, find them on Facebook at facebook.com/tillamookecoadventures or visit tillamookecoadventures.com.
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Maybe you’ve seen it rolling around Tillamook County lately, the white tour van with the name Tillamook Eco Adventures emblazoned upon its sides. If you haven’t yet, you likely will this summer as the tourist season is just ramping up. Brian Cameron, owner of Tillamook Eco Adventures, LLC, brings experience from his personal time abroad and being part of a number of business ventures in the area. Cameron hopes to bring some of what he’s done overseas back to his home in Tillamook County. “When I came back from almost half a year as a vagabond in South America, I realized one thing real quick, we’re underutilizing a very precious resource: tourism,” he said. While the establishments currently in place bring an impressive number of visitors to the county, he said, “the eco tourism scene is another aspect entirely.”
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out great employees we wouldn’t be able to do that. “Typically in this industry the turnover rate for employees is over 50 percent, but we have less than 1 percent, which makes everything run so much smoother. “I think what has made us most successful above all is the fact that we appreciate our customers and do all we can to make their businesses successful. And, we have the right people to to do what we need to do TP Freight Line’s Tillamook location was the site of a 90th anniversary celebration and to make that work.” barbecue last week.