Most people never think about what it takes to keep a truck legal. Fabian Guerrero thinks about almost nothing else — and over four years in Tampa Bay he has turned that unglamorous corner of the trucking industry into a company, a training academy, and two books.
Guerrero is the Chief Compliance Officer of Trucking Services & Logistic, a Tampa firm that handles DOT and FMCSA compliance for carriers and drivers nationwide. The work covers drug and alcohol testing programs, FMCSA Clearinghouse compliance, driver qualification files, return-to-duty support, and safety training, with bilingual service in English and Spanish. The clients are mostly the people the industry tends to overlook: small carriers and owner-operators.
“I saw a real need in the trucking industry and felt I could do something about it,” Guerrero says. “I was meeting hardworking drivers and small business owners who knew trucking, but many of them were overwhelmed by DOT regulations and didn’t know where to turn for help.”
“That stayed with me,” he adds. “I thought, if I have the knowledge and experience to help them understand this process, why not build something around it?”
The part he did not plan for
Compliance was the business. Education turned out to be the thing that grew around it.
“As we worked with more drivers and trucking business owners, I realized that many of the problems they faced came from not having access to information that was practical, easy to understand, and available in their language,” Guerrero says.
That gap produced Academy on Wheels, a training arm offering courses and educational resources for the trucking community, and eventually two books: English for Truckers and a Spanish-language guide to starting a trucking company in the United States. For a compliance officer, becoming an author was not on the plan.
“I started this journey thinking I would help companies stay compliant,” he says. “I never imagined it would also give me the opportunity to teach, write, and share what I had learned with people across the country.”
The company has become a particular resource within the Hispanic trucking community, and Guerrero says the referrals are the metric that means the most to him. “One of the most rewarding things is when a new client calls us because another driver or business owner recommended us. It reminds me that what we’ve built is based on trust and relationships.”
Growing without becoming a call center
Ask him what is hard right now and the answer is not regulatory. It is the thing that tends to break service businesses when they scale.
“One of our biggest challenges right now is growing without losing the personal connection that has always been part of who we are,” Guerrero says. “As we serve more companies and drivers across the country, I don’t want our clients to ever feel like they are just another number.”
DOT and FMCSA rules keep moving, which means the operation has to absorb change while still explaining that change to clients in plain language. His answer has been to invest in systems and technology while drawing a hard line around what technology is for. “Technology should help us become more efficient, but it should never replace the human side of what we do.”
The mistake, and the lesson
Guerrero is direct about what nearly cost him. “One of my biggest mistakes was saying yes to everything,” he says. “When you’re building a business, you want to take every opportunity and help everyone. I learned that not every opportunity is the right one. Learning to say no, stay focused, and protect our vision has helped us build a stronger business.”
The larger lesson is about who is standing next to you. The company is a family operation — his wife, Viviana, is both his life partner and his business partner, and the two built Trucking Services & Logistic while raising their children.
“Success means very little if you don’t have the right people beside you,” Guerrero says. “Success isn’t just about how much a business grows. It’s about the people you grow with, the people you help along the way, and the example you leave for your children.”
Advice for anyone standing at the start
“Don’t wait until everything is perfect, because it never will be,” he says. “Start with what you know, be willing to learn what you don’t, and listen to the people you’re trying to serve. Building a business takes time, and there will be difficult moments, but if you believe in what you’re doing, stay consistent and keep moving forward.”
Asked where he is headed, Guerrero describes an expanding company and more educational tools for the next generation of trucking entrepreneurs — and then, unprompted, pulls the answer back toward the same place. He wants more time with his family, more travel, more learning.
“The goal is not simply to build a successful company,” he says. “It’s to build something meaningful that creates opportunities for others and something my family can be proud of.”
He offers one more thought, in answer to a question nobody asked him: what he wants his legacy to be. “I want to be remembered not only for building a successful business, but for using what I learned to help others move forward. If something we created, taught, or shared helped another person build a stronger business or opened a door for their family, then all the hard work was worth it.”
Fabian Guerrero is the Chief Compliance Officer of Trucking Services & Logistic in Tampa. You can follow the company on Instagram and Facebook. Statements in this feature are his own, submitted through the News Bosses Contribute form.
