R&M Transportation owner Rene Holguin, based out of the El Paso, Texas, suburb of San Elizario, is a third-generation truck driver and owner-operator.
He’s had his own authority since 2003 and has seen the best and worst of the U.S. freight economy, from the post-pandemic boom years to the 2008-'09 recession and the current, long-ongoing freight slump -- and everything in between. It’s not just his own business that's benefited from his long-growing acumen as an owner, though. Through the years, he’s helped a few family members get their start as owner-operators themselves, leasing them on to his authority and helping them learn the ropes.
“We've all got to start somewhere,” he said. “I had a helping hand by one of [his wife's] cousins," who "leased me on when I first started, so we all need a helping hand.”
Rene and Messina Holguin
“Do I recommend it? No, because family and money is the root of all evil,” he joked. With Holguin being younger than those he was mentoring in most of those situations, “telling the older uncle or whatever what to do and how to do it, when to do it, it just doesn’t sit well with family” all the time.
At the end of the day, though, each leased owner he helped achieved the goal: their own authority, “which was the big plan, the big picture to begin with,” he said.
Holguin’s wife, Messina, the M in R&M Transportation, said trucking runs in Rene’s blood, which has kept him going through the years. He’s “such a hard worker” who is “always helping his family” and friends, she said. “He’s just a good person all around.”
The Holguins started R&M together, operating the business for 21 years now with Rene behind the wheel and Messina in the back office handling paperwork and the business’s finances.
Messina nominated Rene Holguin for Overdrive’s Trucker of the Year award, and R&M is Overdrive's Trucker of the Month for September, putting Rene Holguin in the running as a semi-finalists for the 2024 top honor.
Overdrive's 2024 Trucker of the Year program, sponsored by Commercial Vehicle Group and Bostrom Seating, recognizes clear business acumen and unique or time-honored recipes for success among owner-operators. Through October, we're naming Truckers of the Month to contend for the Trucker of the Year honor. Finalists will be named in December, and a winner crowned early next year. Nominations continue to be sought through September 30 for exceptional owner-operators, whether leased or independent. Nominate your business or that of a fellow owner (up to three trucks) via this link for a chance to win a custom replica of your tractor and a Bostrom seat from Commercial Vehicle Group, among other perks. Any nominations received after September 30 will be considered for the 2025 Trucker of the Year effort.
[Related: Meticulous with maintenance, eyes on efficiency: Trucker of the Month Alan Kitzhaber]
A dream made real: His own 'name on the door'
“I guess you could say I was bred into it,” Rene Holguin said about his history in trucking. “My grandfather owned trucks, which led to my dad working and having trucks himself. I’ve always been around the truck.” Holguin's been a truck nut “since I was a little kid and putting lights here and there and just making them stand out around the farm.”
He got his first unofficial experience behind the wheel at just 8 or 9 years old “driving them around the neighborhood and stuff.”
When he was old enough, he went to work for a trucking company for a few years. then bought his own truck -- a Freightliner Classic -- in 2002, leasing on with Messina’s cousin to learn the ropes of truck ownership before venturing out with authority the following year.
“It was always my dream to have my name on the side of the door,” Holguin said.
Holguin hauls just about anything that will fit on a flatbed with his stretched-frame 2000 W900L.
In 2004, he bought his next truck, a 2000 Kenworth W900L -- the truck you see above. Yes, he's still pulling with it today. The rig’s powered by a Cummins N14 Celect Plus Holguin does much of the maintenance for himself.
“It’s a big boy toy,” Holguin said of the truck, in addition to driving the business forward. He’s heavily customized the rig with a stretched frame to 315 inches, PDI upgrades to the engine, tall stacks, a custom visor -- “I got everything,” he said. “I’m one of the head-turners out there. You see me coming down the road, you’re going to turn around. I kind of like showing off.”
With the N14, “a lot of stuff is mechanical and I can kind of diagnose it,” he said. “I hear something ticking, I’ve been in this truck for so long … I hear something ticking a different way and it just catches my attention quick, and I kind of know which direction to go with it.”
Holguin's picked up plenty hands-on maintenance know-how, one big key to surviving and thriving through trucking's ups and downs: “Doing a lot of the maintenance myself … trying to keep it out of the big shops, you know, doing a lot of what I can.”
He changes oil every 10,000 miles, give or take a couple thousand, he said. He gets under the truck and greases once a week while he’s home, inspecting components along the way. “Once you’re laying down underneath the truck, you know, you just kind of start looking at different things,” he said, catching loose or broken parts before the scalemaster gets the opportunity.
He keeps high in his mind, too, bigger repairs to get them done before a catastrophe hits him with downtime and greater-than-necessary cost -- he well knows the "the timeframe of, say, air compressor’s gonna go out, or an injector.”
Holguin's rig shown here at the renowned Triple T Truck Stop in Tucson, Arizona.
Generally living and operating "within your means" has been key for him through the years, he said. Too many business owners during COVID and the time immediately following, when rates were at unforeseen highs, “got used to that high and kind of stayed on that high.”
Holguin took a more realistic outlook through it all. “We’re not going to get rich at this gig,” he said. “I’ve tried year after year, but you just got to come to terms with yourself and live within your means. Drive that old pickup truck and don’t be too extravagant. Have the wife with a nice vehicle, and you drive that old pickup every day.”
Holguin specializes in flatbed freight these days pulling a 2016 Reitnouer MaxMiser he also owns and hauling just about anything that will go on it. He hasn't always, though. He's pulled cattle, dry vans, reefers, pneumatic tankers. “We got our feet wet in about every which way, but I guess this is the least hectic” segment he’s found, he said. Most of his freight is booked with brokers, many of whom he’s built strong relationships with through the years.
Bo McIntosh, an operations manager with the J.H. Rose Logistics brokerage, said he’s personally been working with Holguin for more than a decade.
“Rene has been a great asset for me and J.H. Rose,” he said. “He is always willing to help with the big jobs, and the small ones. I have never had any service failures, or any problems with him in all the years I have worked with Rene. He is always on-time with his pickups and deliveries. Rene is just an all-around great driver, and person in general.”
Garrett Robinson, also with J.H. Rose, said Holguin is always his “first call when I have flatbed freight out of the El Paso, Texas, area," similarly lauding his on-the-spot adherence to agreed timing.
Typically, Holguin runs a “big triangle” from the El Paso area up to the Midwest -- Kansas City, St. Louis, Chicago -- then back down to Dallas, sometimes into Arkansas, then working his way back to El Paso.
High fuel costs of recent years (thankfully coming back down of late) Holguin's defrayed with the QuikQ fuel card, offering savings at the pump. “I think without that, I probably would have been pretty close to shutting the doors.” Holguin said the fuel card gets him the "big fuel discounts that the big companies get."
He’s had plenty of help on the homefront, too, with Messina working as a nurse in addition to essentially part-time managing the back office for the trucking business. “Having a good woman at home I guess just kind of picks up the slack everywhere else,” he said.
[Related: 'I just love it out here': Joy, exacting analysis deliver Trucker of the Month Gary Schloo's success]
Vision down the road, looking out for others
Enter your business in Overdrive's Trucker of the Year competition for a chance to win a seat from program sponsor Bostrom Seating, among other perks and prizes.
The biggest danger all fight out on the highway today, he said, is a lack of courtesy and common sense. Too many drivers of all stripes just blindly follow “their GPS and wait until [it] tells them to stop, instead of looking ahead, kind of looking around the corner, looking down the road a couple of miles to see what’s going on yourself.”
At highway speeds, he noted, that kind of human judgment is 100% key to safety.
For success in truck ownership, meanwhile, prospective owners should both manage expectations and learn as much as they can to be able to handle problems themselves, efficiently. “Be ready to work," he said. "Get ready to get your hands dirty, you know, just try to keep your truck out of the shop as much as you can, and do as much as you can to it” on your own.
It helps to keep your priorities straight, too, when economic conditions throw curveballs. His biggest driving factor, regardless of market conditions? “Keeping my family fed. That is the biggest focal point."
When he’s not trucking, Holguin volunteers for a lot of activities at his church. He also enjoys firing up the smoker for barbecue, camping when he takes extended time off or during quick weekend getaways.
[Related: Investment diligence: Owner-op's profitable path to retirement]
Enter your own or another deserving owner's business (up to 3 trucks) in Overdrive's 2024 Trucker of the Year competition via this link. Entries for 2024 are due Monday, Sept. 30. Those received after will be considered for the 2025 award.
Hear interviews with all of this year's Truckers of the Month via the Overdrive Radio playlist below.
