Panther drivers

[guest]

Anyone there making any money?..In the last 4 weeks I have to run like an idiot just to make money to survive in this business..I live in detroit area and here everything looks dead..I'm in Detroit from saturday morning 6am..the only offer I got was after 3 days PU tuesday morning 264 mi going to IN..that's what I got in the last 3 weeks Indiana and from there I have to put myself in a better spot..but to wait 3 days for a load offer is strange..the number of loads drop in Detroit but Panther still hiring drivers..any idea what is going on there?..I know 4 O/O looking for a job..Why Panther is doing this to Detroit drivers..this is just not right..Hiring when you have sometimes 40 cargo vans in Detroit area and 20 loads?

 

[miguy1957]

Panther is going to do what is good for them. They dont care if you get a load or not, but they got you there if they need you. It cost them nothing to have 40 vans in one spot. Its the Drivers choice and expence to move to another spot. Panther just does what makes them the most money, and by having a van on every corner they can cover any load whether you make any money on a crappy load or not they do...........Just Business

________
Vaporizer

 

[tallcal101]

I feel you pain my man.This industry seems to be "full"of owners who like to brag about all the dollars they have rolling in.Raining bucks it is.Well,they are for the most part trying to convince themselves so they don't have to admit they are walking the thin line.I suggest you don't wait to long,as the pain only gets greater.Listen to what your gut is telling you and not what you read on this site.Paying the bils is not making money.It's paying the bills.
There are many other opportunities in trucking that will put real dollars in your packet,but you have to willing to change,and admit the pot of gold is not in expediting anymore.

 

[Fr8 Shaker]

Well Remus, If you only waited 3 days in Detroit and got a load taking you out of Mi. consider yourself lucky. I don't even want to tell you how long I've been sitting here, even after doing a mini with a first out, only to be offered another P.O.S. run. But it's hard to leave home and D/H 200 to 300 miles only to sit in a parking lot somewhere else. As Miguy 1957 says, it doesn't cost panther anything to have trucks just sitting around. As they say on their hold messages they care about their drivers because we're panther partners. LOL.

 

[poison]

we were in el paso texas and got a load delivering to kansas city they gave us 5 days to do it in ........... we get that one off in kansas city and now were are on our way to st. louis (no dead head pay) i just called panther and asked them where the freight was and he told me "detroit" was the hot spot to be in i dont think we are gonna dead head to detroit we are a team but dont get the team runs i dont know from talking to other panther drivers its just dead when we were in el paso there was a team there that sat for a solid 7 days then got a load to tenn. but really the dispatcher i just talked to said detroit was the place to be.















If a man speaks on the beach where no woman can hear is he still wrong?

 

[cheri1122]

Remus, you've been a member here for three years, but can't have been reading much, or you'd know that the questions you ask have been debated a lot. Does the phrase 'Panther bashing' ring a bell?
IMO, the definitive answer was given by the VIP at Panther, in an interview that was published here, not too long ago. He recounted an occasion when he was able to pull together fifty (yes, 50) cargo vans almost instantaneously, to fulfill a customer's need, thus making Panther look very good to that customer. (Cynic that I am, I'm betting he got a bonus for it, too)
The other side of the story is that to accomplish it, there had to be 50 vans available. That there were, and almost always are, is why Panther continues to add cargo vans, despite the numbers already waiting for loads. As has been pointed out many times, it costs them nothing. (In fact, they're making a profit even when you're not, on weekly deductions for the QC, insurance, Comdata, etc.) If you are willing to wait, they're willing to let you.
There are plenty of o/o and drivers leased to Panther who are profitable and happy there, but from what I've seen, read, and experienced myself, individual cargo van o/o's are a tiny fraction of that group.
Panther runs their business to make a profit. To be successful, you must do the same. To quote the very wise & successful DaveKC: "Businessman first, driver second."

 

[poison]

I have heard rumors that panther plays favorites,I have heard rumors as a contractor driving for an owner depends on who the owner of the truck is or how many trucks that owner has least on to the company depends on how many paid miles you get.Well my personal opinion is that while maybe those rumors might be partly true I believe it's
how proactive or interactive the fleet owner is with their trucks
such as the case with us,I understand we came into expediting in the
slow time of year or so I have been told.with that in mind I still think if our truck owner was more active in our dispatches and would
mentor us instead of just throwing us in this truck and more or less
in not so many word say "drive the truck to seville go through orientation
do the best you can"we might be making better money.I have been driving for 16 years but expediting is a whole different animal.And when you don't have any kind of guidance or mentoring as we call it here.you can go broke and loose your butt real fast.so ATTENTION ALL YOU FLEET OWNERS:those that think their drivers could be making you and them more money keep in mind it goes both ways when they say "you only get out of something what you put into it".are you looking for back hauls when you carrier can't find anything are you posting your trucks online when your drivers don't have what it takes to be able to do that ie:computer,skills,etc.I don't own any trucks yet and maybe I don't know what I'm talking about but you have to put an effort into something in order to see those GREAT Incomes some of these truck owners say they are making.but just like everyone else in here thats
just my opinion.












If a man speaks on the beach where no woman can hear is he still wrong?

 

[FAMILYEXPDT]

While I understand the gist of all you are saying, I have to add that you as the driver are not JUST the driver. YOU are a subcontractor running your own business. Have you posted your truck? Have you found a backhaul? Have you bugged dispatch? (contrary to popular belief squeaky wheel DOES get greased) Have you kept a log of your p/u's and del's to know where freight has been? Do ou call your owner with a possible backhaul to get help with rates? There is a lot to be said about owners being involved and as you know I do not believe anyone can be an "armchair expediter", but YOU are a business person also...not a steering wheel holder.



-charlotte

 

[cheri1122]

Let me see if I have this right: you're unhappy that the fleet owner you're driving for isn't mentoring you, or being proactive in finding you loads, when Panther doesn't.
Let me just ask this: how 'proactive' were you? Did you try to find an owner who met your requirements, as far as mentoring, and finding backhauls?
In other words, ia it really the owner's lack of proactivity to blame, or your own?

 

[poison]

yes we call the backhaul dept. we try to get help from the owners we ask
questions,but we don't get answers. we post our truck online we call general dispatch check on board position and how many trucks are in the area,we ask how many loads have come out of a paticular area in last 21 days we keep every load we have ever done since we have been here in a notebook and on laptop.we do everything that we know to do.I wasn't trying to bash fleet owners by no means I'll I was trying to say is ,everyone not just fleetowners not just subcontractors,need to do there part sorry I mislead ya'll into what i was saying.all I was trying to say is to the one's that aren't moving or aren't making any money.to look at themselves don't put all the blame on panther.Believe me I agree with y'all thats what I was trying to say don't just put the blame just on panther not running them.








If a man speaks on the beach where no woman can hear is he still wrong?

 

[hondaking38]

as a single owner operator (sprinter) it is slow wayyyyy slow from a year ago, no its not just me, of course there is 5 of us single operators that keep in touch every day,many times more then once a day, we find out where each of us is at, and what loads we are getting and how many miles...with all of us it is slow, one has been with panther 8 years, and he says its slow!!! we never had a period where we were running our butts off this year,and we probably never will again,..however you can still make a living, if your home expenses arnt to high...and get out of detroit,i dh home after each detroit run, 120 miles just to get out of that cess pool...

 

[davekc]

I'll have to thank Cheri for the plug. Some of the mentioned issues are truck size related as slow times have a greater impact on the vans.
Freight over all has slowed down. We had a fantastic September followed by October being below average so far. Some of it is a slower economy, and some of it is self inflicted. Still have several weeks to see how things go. Some of it just depends on where you wind up, and how one reacts to what is there.













Davekc
owner
23 years
PantherII
EO moderator