It's a Team's Life

Cheap Freight!

In my opinion OOIDA really went wrong when they created their signs “Just say NO to cheap freight”. As a paying shipper if I saw a truck pull into my place of business with this sticker I would politely ask them to leave. As a shipper my job is to get my freight moved as economically as I possibly can to keep my costs down.  I also in turn want to sell my product as high as I can to make a profit.

 

As an Owner Operator I want to move the freight with the best price per mile I can get. I also watch my other costs and pay as little as I can for fuel, tires, parts, and all other items related to the truck.  

 

We are often asked “What do want per mile to run a load?” I have to say “It depends”. Where is the load going? Will there be tolls? How far will I have to dead head out to find another load? How heavy is the load? How long will we be under the load? Will we be crossing mountains? What does the weather look like? Will the load be taking us by our house?   Is it time to go home and will the load get us there? We have a myriad of questions or a check list we go through on each load offer before we accept or decline.

 

Our bottom line we will run a load for changes daily and can change depending on if the load will go east or west.   We watch our costs closely as our costs can change quickly.   One of largest expenditures is fuel and if a load is going into an area with a high fuel cost this also adds to our bottom line and whether we say yes or no to a load.  

 

All of these decisions come with experience and learning where the customer base is located with the company we are leased to.   Each company has a different customer base and each division in a company can have a different customer area.    We would not ask a reefer truck or a cargo van where a good place to layover is, as their freight, even though with the same company can be quite different from ours.

 

Every driver or owner operator has a different cost to run their truck.   Some have high payments, high health insurance, or any other high costs while others run on a shoe string and survive just fine.   Each one of us has a cost to run our trucks and be profitable.   The secret is to know what it costs to run our truck and for us to define what we consider cheap freight neither for us nor for someone else.

 

So what is cheap freight?   Who the heck knows… as it is not I.

 

 

Bob & Linda Caffee
Leased to: FedEx Custom Critical
TeamCaffee
Saint Louis MO
Expediters 5 years been out here on the road ten years
[email protected]

 

Expediting isn't just trucking, it's a lifestyle;
Expediting isn't just a lifestyle, it's an adventure;
Expediting isn't just an adventure, it's a job;
Expediting isn't just a job, it's a business.