J & M Tank Lines

J & M Tank Lines (formerly J & M Trucking) is a bulk materials trucking company headquartered in the Meadow Brook 1100 building at 1100 Corporate Parkway in the Meadow Brook Corporate Park off of U.S. Highway 280. Peter Sumerford is president of the company, which operates fifteen terminals across the country, including three in Alabama.

J & M was founded by Jimmie McClinton of Montgomery in 1948 as a one-truck cotton hauling operation. McClinton was joined by partners Buck Jackson, Wingate Jackson, and Bill Jackson in 1952. A year later they acquired the H B Trucking Company of Americus, Georgia. McClinton and Buck Jackson relocated to Georgia, which became J & M's headquarters office. The company grew steadily through the 1960s, still mainly hauling baled cotton and peanuts. Harold Sumerford Sr joined the company as a bookkeeper and warehouse manager in 1961. In 1962 the company obtained its first Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) Authority in order to haul salt from Louisiana.

In 1964 J & M acquired Har-Pen Trucking in Milledgeville, Georgia, entering the clay pipe hauling market. They leveraged that as an entry into the construction market, which became lucrative as Florida real estate development boomed. Bagged and bulk cement became a bigger part of their market. The company moved its headquarters to Milledgeville. McClinton and Sumerford bought out the other partners before the end of the 1960s.

J & M established a tank division in 1980 with 60 tank trucks in its fleet. When McClinton died in 1981 Sumerford bought the remaining shares of the partnership from his estate, becoming sole owner. He sold the company's flatbed and van lines to Builders Transport of Savannah, Georgia. A few years later, J & M re-entered the dry bulk market with the acquisition of Ragsdale Truck Line. In 1987 Sumerford founded a "Coldway Carriers" division which hauled orange juice from Florida, carrying mostly boxed beef on the backhaul trips. In 1988 J & M acquired Fox Transport of Chattanooga, Tennessee and Wilson Freight Lines of Savannah, Georgia, which were merged into its Birmingham-based "J & M Transport" division. Food-grade liquid hauling began at the company's Ocala, Florida terminal in 1995.

Sumerford retired in 2002. His sons, Harold Jr and Peter, consolidated the company's pneumatic tank operations under the J & M Tank name and sold off the flatbed, liquid and refrigerated truck operations. The company's primary focus was hauling mined calcium carbonate. By 2004 the company had returned to bulk dry goods with contracts to haul flour. J & M expanded westward with its first Texas terminal in 2007. Later that year the headquarters offices were relocated from Milledgeville to 7051 Meadowlark Drive Birmingham.

Since then, J & M has resumed construction and industrial hauling, including cement, plastic pellets and fracking sand.

In 2018 the company reported $75 million in gross revenues on 110,000 hauls. They purchased their current building from Valley National Bank in 2019.

References

• Wilson, Charles (November 30, 2018) "Now in its 70th year, J&M Tank Lines planning on more growth and expansion." Bulk Transportation
• Coker, Angel (November 13, 2019) "J&M Tank Lines to relocate its corporate HQ to Meadow Brook." Birmingham Business Journal

External links

• J & M Tank Lines website