MEET THE PEOPLE WHO CALL THE LT® SERIES TRUCK HOME
By Cristina Commendatore, chief editor and content manager, International Motors, LLC
It’s a good thing Jesse and Robin Cobb get along. They’ve been married for 35 years and share a life on the road together, living in what most of us would consider tight quarters.
They, however, have all the space they need in their 2027 International® LT® Series truck.
“When you live in these trucks, space is so important,” Jesse said. “And we really live in our truck. We love the LT for all the storage it has. This truck does very well with storage space.”
They drive as a team for Arkansas-based Transco Lines, Inc. (TLI). They haul a lot of different freight — mostly dry van and sometimes hazardous materials with a 53-foot trailer, but never flatbed — on a route from Atlanta to Salt Lake City, Utah. Their goal is to run more than 7,000 miles a week.
“If we could drive seven days a week, we’d do it,” Robin quipped. “We don’t want downtime.”
Right now, they live in their LT, which is equipped with the S13® Integrated Powertrain. They’ve also driven trucks from other major truck manufacturers.
Although Jesse initially wanted a more familiar engine, he and his fleet manager attended a meeting about the S13 Integrated Powertrain. That piqued his interest.
“Our fleet owner at TLI had some new Internationals in the yard,” Jesse said. “I just wanted to look. I was impressed by the space and how well we could use it. I called my manager and said, ‘I want an International.’ Function and reliability mean the most for me. The shop said parts for Internationals were way easier to get and easier to get things fixed.”
The couple was also sold when they found out that most of the parts they needed could be found at Love’s Travel Stops. Another perk: their LT’s mattresses.
“Your mattress right off the line is one of the best mattresses,” Robin said. “You can tell this mattress will last for the duration of us having the truck. Mattresses are huge to us because it all comes down to quality of life.”
“I am super happy with the truck,” Jesse added. “I love the International truck. The only thing we are not happy with on this truck is the climate control. When it’s hot and humid it’s very hard to sleep. I think that the parameters need to be set differently.”
Another area of improvement, they cited, is the small size of the door pocket. For a truck driver hauling hazardous materials, by law, the paperwork for those materials must be held in the driver-side door pocket. The Cobbs recommend International expand the size of the door pocket to make it more functional for drivers.
Jesse and Robin Cobb, husband and wife team drivers for Transco Lines, Inc., are shown with their fleet manager and 2027 International LT Series truck.
While the Cobbs spend most of their time on the road today, they started out as high school sweethearts.
Right after high school, they went straight to work and began their life together. They have three children and eight grandchildren.
Jesse got into trucking in 1992 and got his commercial driver’s license (CDL) in 1993. Over the years as an over-the-road driver, Jesse was an owner-operator at one point, so he learned how to keep his truck maintained and save fuel.
Their two sons drive professionally today, and Jesse used to drive as a team with his stepfather.
These days, Jesse and Robin enjoy life on the road together. When we spoke with them, they were in their truck, making bacon and eggs for breakfast.
“As the kids grew up, I asked Robin to come out on the road to ride with me,” Jesse said. “At first, she was nervous about getting her CDL.”
“We raised our kids in Minnesota,” Robin chimed in. “I am five foot three, but I was always surrounded by big burly farmers.”
When Robin passed her CDL tests, they sold their house and hit the road together. They ended up joining an Arkansas-based fleet that allowed team drivers. Then, they found their sweet spot with TLI.
“That was it for us,” Robin said. “We’ve been with TLI since June 2013. They’ve been great to us.”
“We started out on a route doing 8,012 miles every week for nine years,” she added. “We wanted to do twice the amount. We just want to go, go, go. Now, we go home maybe once or twice a year. We didn’t have a house for nine years. We were tracking the most miles of anyone in the fleet.”
After 35 years of marriage and millions of miles behind the wheel, Jesse and Robin Cobb have found what works, and they aren’t planning on stopping any time soon. For the Cobbs, the miles ahead include each other, a fleet that supports them, and a truck that helps make life on the road feel like home.
