At TransCore, we refer to our DAT Network, confident that our customers are familiar with our brand and its origins in the Dial-A-Truck load board service established in 1978 by the Jubitz brothers at their truck stop in Portland, Oregon.
Maybe we assume too much. After I published this article, I received an email from a customer named Eddie, who claimed to be losing sleep, puzzling over about the meaning behind our DAT acronym.
Here’s what he wrote:
I was reading your Broker News Monthly Pub. And found an interesting article “DAT Special Report”. For the life of me I can’t find what DAT in this context stands for. I know that in IT this stands for a Data File as i extension .dat, or maybe for a ‘Digital Audio Tape’ or even ‘Dynamic Address Translation’.
In the military I recall this to stand for Drug and Alcohol Testing or Deployment Action Team.
In Brokerage as relating to security it stands for ‘Defense Against Terrorism’.
In gardening – ‘Days After Transplanting’.
In investing – ‘Direct Access Trading’.
But in logistics/transportation, what does this stand for? I won’t be able to sleep until you educate me as to this abbreviation.
I answered Eddie’s email on the spot, and I hope he caught up on his rest!
