I have come to believe that full-featured, TVAl, White Glove trucks are best viewed not by their component parts but as a package.
We have a reefer but not every load we haul is a reefer load. We are TVAL qualified but not every load we haul is a TVAL load. We have a lift gate but not every load we haul requires a lift gate. We have furniture pads but not every load we haul is a pad-wrap load. Some loads are reefer/pad wrap. Some are TVAL lift gate. Some are lift gate only. How do you price any component into a load when you carry the component all the time but use it only some of the time?
When you get down to it, White Glove trucks don't do a lot of anything. They do a little of this and a little of that, with the financial result totaled at month-end, quarter end, and year-end. Saying it costs you X amount to buy this component and Y amount to maintain that component misses important aspects of White Glove work.
Example: We recently took a load that delivered in Oklahoma City on a Friday. OKC is not known as a good express center and there is not a good express center close by.
Immediately after delivery, we were dispatched to pick up good-paying freight on Saturday, 620 miles away and deliver it on Monday, 1,650 miles away.
To what do we attribute that load? It was a reefer load so do we attribute it to the reefer? It was a dock-high load a B-unit could not carry so do we attribute it to our Class 8 CR-unit (though a Class 7 CR-unit could have done the load too)?
Other aspects enter in. The run was straight through, so do we attribute the load to the fact that we are a team-driven truck? Security protocols were priced into the load, so do we attribute the load to the driver clearances? Oh yeah. The run went to Canada, so do we attribute the load to our willingness to enter Canada?
The liftgate was not used on this load but it was a White Glove load. Was the lift gate dead weight and a wasted investment? Or was the lift gate an essential component of this run since all White Glove trucks are required to have lift gates to be White Glove trucks in the first place (some exceptions).
What about the fact that without the above-mentioned components, used in that particular combination, we would have very likely have been laid over in OKC for the weekend or may have had to deadhead a long distance to a better express center? These components give our truck more reach than trucks that do not have them. How much is that reach worth and how do you quantify that as a benefit in your cost/benefit analysis?
Do you see what I mean? Because there are so many aspects to serving White Glove customers, and some of them have nothing to do with the truck but with the drivers, it is impossible to accurately assess the costs and benefits of a specific component on a White Glove truck.
If the only service you offered was moving freight from point A to point B the value of specific truck components could be more easily evaluated. When you offer the White Glove package of services, some of which have nothing to do with the truck, the truck and team together is the package to focus on.
Because all aspects are not considered, focusing on individual components is an exercise in futility. Human capital MUST be considered but because it is an intangible, it is difficult to quantify.
This holds true even in operations where the service is simply to move freight from point A to point B with an ordinary truck. Two trucks may cost the same and haul the same freight but if one driver (human capital) has better customer relations and marketing skills than the other, that driver may do better. So too if one driver has a heavy foot and the other does not, or if one driver takes more time off than the other.
A driver with good busines skills may do well in a truck of any kind where a driver who is poorly equipped in the brain power and work ethic department will likely operate at a loss and fail. Profitably operating a truck has far more to do with the driver than with the equipment in question.
If that were not so, all operators of high-end trucks would fail and all operators of low-cost trucks would succeed.
