Taking the reins: Carlile Transportation Systems full-steam ahead.

• Author: Resz, Heather A.
• Position: ALASKA BUSINESS MONTHLY'S 2008 CORPORATE 100

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Linda Leary was the only woman in the office when she started with Carlile Transportation Systems in 1985.

"I was just kind of answering phones," she said.

Back then, Carlile was a fledgling intrastate carrier with about eight total employees, Leary said.

These days, the carrier is one of the state's largest carriers--with about 500 employees in Alaska--and Leary is the new president of Carlile.

"Linda has been instrumental to the growth of Carlile over the past 23 years and she has the unwavering support of the board of directors and our 635 employees," said Harry McDonald, co-founder and CEO, in a press release.

McDonald and his brother, John, started the company in 1980 with just two trucks and some contracts to haul grain and fertilizer between Anchorage and farmland in Delta Junction.

With the addition of a handful of business partners in 1984, Carlile added nightly services to Fairbanks, and eventually the entire road system from Kenai to Prudhoe Bay.

Leary carne to Alaska around the same time Seward's McDonald brothers were entering the trucking business in Alaska. The week after earning her undergraduate degree from the University of Maine, she was in Alaska and had landed a job at a transportation company.

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A couple of jobs later, Leary landed with Carlile.

"I was looking at the time for a smaller company that would allow me to do a lot of different things," Leary said. "I've been really lucky. They've been great to work with."

Since joining the Carlile team, Leary's filled all sorts of roles. Most recently she was the vice president of sales and marketing for 15 years or so. She moved to Seattle in 2000 to work in Carlile's Tacoma offices.

FROM BRIDGE BEAMS TO ICE CREAM

Although Carlile entered into the interstate market with a stroke of a pen in June 1994 when it purchased K&W Transportation, most of its customers are still in Alaska.

Transporting supplies to the Prudhoe Bay oil fields on Alaska's North Slope has been a staple for the carrier for years, Leary said. Shipping to Prudhoe Bay still represents a significant portion of its total freight volume.

"In Alaska's smaller market, we haul everything from bridge beams to ice cream," Leary said. "Alaska is our home and the base of our growth in business."

Carlile transports all kinds of goods into the state, by land and sea, then consolidates the loads for delivery at its Anchorage hub. Every week the Anchorage facility consolidates...