Highway Star winner Brian Bertsch (middle) with award sponsors and Today’s trucking staff.

MONTREAL — One of the first things you need to know about the 2013 Highway Star Award Winner Brian Bertsch is that his wife, Debbie, never knows when he’ll be home because “he always stays late to help the other guys finish up.”

“He just says, ‘well, that way we can all go home together at the same time,'” she told Today’s Trucking editors at the awards ceremony luncheon.

It was just one of myriad reasons Highway Star judges picked Brian Bertsch as this year’s winner of $10,000 in cash and prizes. The awards ceremony was held at ExpoCam in Montreal this past Saturday.

Bertsch has been a driver for Hi-Way 9 Express Ltd. out of Drumheller, AB. for 35 years, but his love of all things freight started when he was boy following his uncle and father, both of whom worked for CN in the 60’s and 70s. He would ride with the CN drivers, and then jump on the carts around the dock, helping load and reload trucks.

The number of customer testimonials that accompanied Bertsch’s Highway Star application was nothing short of outstanding. Although calling them “customer testimonials” may be inaccurate as his customers consider Bertsch a friend. Even the most difficult customers Bertsch can win over with humour, respect and top-notch service, his employers noted.

Regular customers can set their clocks by him, said Reg Trentham, director of Northern Operations with H-Way 9.

The safety-conscious, two-million-accident-free-miles Bertsch will also let dispatch know if he thinks one of the other drivers headed out should wait until the roads are cleared. He always attends training meetings and company events, and is the first to offer help to Hi-Way 9’s new drivers.

Bertsch is also probably the only person in the world that can leave work looking just as clean as when he showed up, and despite the company’s uniform cleaning service, he prefers to take his uniform home to clean and iron himself.

That pride in his job naturally extends to his truck, and while he has “worn out” many trucks over the years, every one he handed down was still in the condition he started with.

“I don’t think it has hit him yet,” said Debbie on her husband winning the prize. “The only thing he said was that he wished he could share it with his buddies that he started with that have now passed on.”

The Highway Star of the Year Award is sponsored by Newcom Business Media (which owns Today’s Trucking, Transport Routier, and truck shows ExpoCam and Truck World) and couldn’t be possible without the generous support of signature sponsor Freightliner Trucks, along with Cummins, Espar, Meritor, Chevron, and the Owner-Operator’s Business Association of Canada.

The winner gets a $10,000 cheque, a trip to Montreal for two, plus a special-edition Chevron jacket, an Espar heater system,  a road-ready laptop from OBAC, and other gifts.

The award was presented to Bertsch by Editor of Today’s Trucking magazine Peter Carter.