Crissy Wieck was born and raised in Nashville and graduated from The Harpeth Hall School.  After working at Dell for 12 years, Crissy joined her family business after the death of her father’s business partner.  Crissy has spent 10 years at Western Express and is currently the Chief Sales Officer and a minority owner.  In this capacity, Crissy is responsible for Sales and Operations (~$850M) and is a member of the Executive Team.  Crissy is married to Matt Wiltshire and has three daughters, a son and two stepsons.

Crissy left Nashville to play soccer at Maryville College. After graduating in May of 2000, she headed to Dell.  The company opened an office in Nashville the month before she graduated and made a commitment to the city to grow local talent organically.  By 2009, Crissy was the General Manager and Global Site Lead for Dell Nashville and the Regional Sales Director for the East Coast.  Three buildings, 2500 employees and a $5B footprint in Nashville allowed for her to be the CEO of the largest non-headquarter site for Dell.  Her direct P&L represented $2B of the $5B in Nashville.  This proved to be a perfect training ground for the unexpected career change in 2012 when she joined her family business.      

Western Express is a top ten Truckload Carrier in the country with over 3,000 trucks running the US and Mexico.  The company has been in business since 1991 and was started by Crissy’s grandfather (minority owner) and another family, with only 5 trucks.  Her father joined the company in 1996, when they had 36 trucks, and across the ten years that followed, grew the company to 3000 trucks.  She and her brother joined Western Express upon the death of their father’s business partner to help run the business and they are both minority owners in the business, while their father is the majority owner.  Today the company has 4,500 drivers and ~750 non driving associates across 6 locations in the US.

Crissy has been on several Boards including; The Adventure Science Center, Nashville Public Television, The Maryville College Alumni Board, The Bank of Nashville, The Banner Advisory Board and The Harpeth Hall School.

In this episode of Family Business Today, Crissy will share:

• How two neighbors talking over a fence in 1991 grew into a multi-generational company with 3000 trucks in 2006

• How the vision for the company grew as the company grew, and how it has changed as the economy has changed around it

• What it means to have “fun” as a business’s core value

• How the company has adapted and rebuilt through a tornado in 2020 and COVID in 2021

• How her experiences at Dell helped her learn about how to run an entire business

• And more…

To learn more about Western Express, Inc., visit http://www.westernexp.com/.   

At the Tennessee Center for Family Business our passion is to help business owners create a positive environment in which their family THRIVES, their business performs and working together create a lasting family legacy. To learn more about the Tennessee Center for Family Business visit www.tncfb.com.

If you are considering a transition in your family business contact us today for a FREE  Transition Assessment (follow link) and receive a one-on-one review of your business transition preparedness with a family business consultant. (a $299 value)

Until next time, There’s No Business Like Family Business…..We Know!