How did you get your start as O/O?

I got tired of Cars passing me on the shoulder and being a road hazard so I went and leased a truck till I had enough to make a down payment on my Blue Pete.

 

I got tired of the being dispatched by idiots and bought a '99 Freightliner Classic off of my uncle and leased onto a machinery moving company out of Michigan. Pretty much paid my first truck off the first year I owned it from the money I was bringing in, but like the saying goes...all good things must come to a end. I then leased onto a couple of steel hauling companies that I drove for and loaded the wagon for about 3 years until the auto market dropped out. Now I'm pulling pumpkin trailers around on the Choice program.

 

I started out working for my Father, and after he tired of owning the truck, whining and complaining, i took it off his hands, with a deal to repay over 2 years

Started with $800 and went to run for the co the truck was with.
Got down to $50 befoe my invoices started, that experience has helped immensley too.
After a few months, co-incidentally just as i got my feet under me, he demanded payment in full. Luckily i had it, so he got paid out, and i learnt about dealing with family.
Ran it for 8 months until i could stand it no more ( was pretty rough ) and Traded it on my Western Star.
Was cheaper to run so much so, that the fuel savings were almost covering my Loan Repayments.
Was offered a job elsewhere that SOUNDED good, so i bought a Curtianside Trailer and moved on ( probaby not a wise move, but experience ensued! )
Made average money, REALLY refined my skills, met a lot of people whom respected the fact that somone so young was giving it a go ( in AU its rare to see anyone under 40 driving, much less owning a truck ).
Ran into my old fleet manager from when i was working the 1st truck under for my father and he geve me a number for where he was working at.
Made that phone call and everything turned around for me from the day i left the Ad-Hoc company and went into Hauling for the supermarket co ( which i recently returned to ).
Prodigious hours made for decent income, along with more time off than previously.
Black Saturday propmted my last day for a while, and in the absence the co i was with folded, so i turned to interstate ( OTR ), am still waiting on half my invoices to come in from that.
Annoyed by the lack of turnover, i went and hauled around the ports, which is something i will not ever do again, as its working for enough money to run the truck and no more.

Luck shone upon me again, as the new company that holds the supermarket contract needed expereinced people to return to the job, and we hit present day..

Only just getting my feet back under me, i am back as part of the furnature at the distribution centres, and all is as well as it can be in my world.


Moral of the story, its not only what you know, but WHO you know thats important.

 

I wanted to drive a truck since I was a little tiny kid....When I was 17 (1972) I started riding with an O/O that I talked into showing me the ropes. By the time I was 18 (1973) I was driving for the company he was leased to. When I was 19 (1974) I bought a 1964 Freightliner COE and leased to the same company, Then in January of 1975 I bought a second truck, A 1969 Freightliner COE and hired a driver for the '64. In May of 1975 I bought a new 1975 KW W900A and hired a second driver for the '69. A couple of years later I decided to sell the Freightliners and just stay with 1 truck...It's been like that ever since!

Always W900's, Always black, Always flatbeddin'.

 

Well heres my story. Ever since i was a kid i loved trucks, so much so that my family was confused as to where the love came from, nobody in my family has ever had anthing to do with trucking.. Through High school during the last 2 summers I started working for a freind and his family at their small paving co. I was tought how to drive on a late 70's loadstar with a 471? gas engine (think thats right) 5 speed trans and 2 speed rears, and no power steering.. Working with them was great I leared alot but wanted to drive more so I took a job with a large costruction co. While there I started with a 70s dm mack dump with a duplex doing site work. I seemed to have a knack for drivin and i didnt tear anything up so I Quickly moved up the ladder there.. I earned a rep for being a good driver and was offered a job runnin longer distance with a dump. That was a nice change of pace from local work.. I was around 21 or 22 at the time.. While this was a great place to work i longed for somthin more, so i talked to everyone i met that had work available and every o-op i met for advice.. I figured if they didnt remember my name they would remember my face.. I'm told they call it networking these days, I had no idea thats what i was doin just seemed to make sense.. So at 25 i bought my first truck a longhood tri axle dump with a 550 cat ( my baby).. I put every nickel i had towards gettin goin 35,000 down plus insurance and fuel money... Luckily iwas worked for a good co. from the start got paid every 15 days.. Man the first 3 months were ROUGH.. O forgot to mention that i sold everything i had to get goin including my pickup.. Fortunatly i still lived at my parents house so only bills i had were the trucks.. I had my own athourity since day 1, and while i wasnt leased to the co i started with they were keepin the same 10% as if i were.. I was there about a year when i was offered a deal buyin and resellin sand from a fella who was retiring and happend to like me... I jumpped at the chance and things were great.. Wasnt long before the co i was buyin sand from took notice and offered me some of their work, Now begins the rest of my story.....The rest is a little off topic of how i became an o-op but i would be glad to finish if anyone is interested.. sorry bout the spelling a gramatical errors, but typin and spellin arnt my strong suit...

 

coal bucket,... i am still listening

 

I second dairyman, I'd love to hear your story coal bucket.

 

Yep no prob dairyman.... Lets see...started workin for sand co. and my personal customers at same time... Quickly became to much to handle with 1 truck so i brought in some friends with there own trucks to help out.. Sand co. now offering more work, they liked my service and dedication.... So my one truck became 2 then 3 plus running about 2-3 o-ops at same time... was gettin really crazy.. I did all the paperwork, maintence, payroll.. all of it ... starting to lose my mind! Forgot to mention that i met my now wife around the time i bought my first truck and things were movin towards a more family thing with us... Ahh stress what a motivator.. Things are steamin right along at this point so we add 2 more trucks to a total of 5 owend plus 00ps.. Well i needed good drivers and had good freinds who wanted to be a part of some tin differnt.. Lets just say its not always a good idea to hire freinds, some not all had problems with my title over theirs, but after hours was buddy time again.. Very hard to transition between the 2... At this point all things considerd we were doin well very well.. Fuel had shot up ,but we had a nice surcharge in place and i had a locked in fuel price for the year (got lucky).. Around this time my wife tells me we are havin our first child, my daughter .. She moves into the home office and takes that over ..what a relief! So now i turn 30 and my daughter is born 2 days later.. starting to lose my mind! lol..Work was still goin strong so we added a few more trucks.. now up to 8 ... My mother passed away shortly after due to complications from ms.. i think i lost a little focus afterwards.. oh by the way were up to 13 trucks now.. way outta control... your thinking to big to fast ill agree, just didnt see it at the time.. I decided that 10 was better number so we sold a few... Things were still goin strong .......then.. we did a big dirt job one winter , now were runnin 8 to 12 additional hired trucks a day.. Had to hire more family to run office before this job or my wife would have killed me.. Jb went well, got it completed and then .. have an idea where this is goin?... No more checks from contractor.. Holy S.. fortunitly we had enough to pay all subs, payroll bills and such... Never got paid never will... keep in mind this job went for 2 months or more, #### near killed us.. So here we are tryin to rebuild with 10 trucks terrible cash flow.... and then $5 gal fuel.. cant get a break... Now we used to have good surcharge but oddly enough other co.'s start haulin with out one... ya gots to be kiddin.. still keep runnin tryin to stay afloat, although were losin about $100-$150 a day per truck... Decision made we gotta downsize, hated to let people go, they belived in me what we were tryin to do.......I will say that no matter how bad it got we never cut benifits for the guys .. like their h ins and $1000 xmas bonus.. Not that means anything now but ... So now here i sit at 33 soon to be 34 starting over, we still operate 2 trucks my cousin and i... o and the wife now with 2 kids... we managed to keep some good accounts and gain some new ones... very thankfull to be able to still do what i love... I dont tell this story as a poor me kind of thing, but just so that others dont make the same mistakes i did... Its amazin to me how stress free my life feels now as compaired to when we had all those trucks, when i started with one it felt so stressfull, ha that was nuthin.. guess it all depends on how you look at things.. Just would like to say that my co.'s problems were created by me and my mistakes, not any fault of my guy's.. I can say they all have other jobs now and we let them stay on till they did, that if any of you read this thank you for your hard work! I do still see and talk to most of them on a daily basis , i miss the stuff outta havin yall around!... So im sure i left alot out , but this is more typin than ive done in the past 33 years! This is my tale to tell a thanks for lattin me get it out.. Hopefully it wasnt to hard understand or read... As for anyone thinkin of becomin an oo i say do your home work have a good plan and STICK TO IT... Id rather have this story to tell then lived my whole life wonderin what if... Anyway thats me .........

 

umm.. i want some more too.. kinda reminds me of the novel "Where the Red Fern Grows" just without the hounds..

 

Something i wanted to add ... one thing im very proud of ... never did i have to cut a rate to get work.. just gave the customers what they wanted -service- ... If your reading this and thinkin about becomin, an OO it takes alot of hard work and dedication.... Be there when you say you will, dont overxtend yourself, act and look like a pro, gain as much info you can in your area of truckin (tho you never stop learin) and be willin to take advice from "old timers", learn from others mistkes.. give it 110% Dont sell yourself short... It can be done and you can be quite succesfull .... These of course are all just my opinions, not facts...... allright im goin to bed see yall