Current rates are now below fleet operating costs! It's official!

I had a driver who was offered Dallas Tx to Fairbanks AK and a return trip to LA (~7100 miles) Monday.

This was a cold call from a broker no one has ever used in the fleet so we can't figure out how they got the driver's number.

The broker acted like she was a gift from god (which god we wondered) and said it was a great amount of money and so on. We needed to cover all expenses though, border crossing and lumper fees (why lumper fees were mentioned I have no clue).

Ready for this - $12,425

which works out to $1.75

The driver countered with $20k ... then she lost her mind, calling him a ripoff artist and a few choice names, then told the driver she has only $12,425 that can be offered and after no word from my driver, she hung up the phone.

He texted me with the offer and I said ... you know what I said.

About a couple of hours later, my driver calls me and tells me how he got the load. He works out of Dallas and has a great reputation with a few companies there. He said he thought about the run and remembered moving product from a manufacturer in Dallas to stage up near the border for another Alaskian carrier to take the load up there. He did this run a few times and he said this may be one of those runs. Not hard but time-consuming.

He said he called the company he thought this is a load for and asked if they have anything going to Alaska. As he put it, the angel on the other end of the phone said "We sure do! It has been sitting here waiting for a truck for two days". She said there is a return load waiting to be moved to Socal and then she offered it to her through a broker, told him what the broker was charging, and gave him the contact there. Her point in doing this was to get the load moved, she didn't care what the broker thought or offered but it was sitting there too long for her. She has to maintain a standard in moving freight out of the place and sitting for more than a day tanks those numbers and it may mean her job.

He said he would take care of it for her if it isn't booked already.

So he call the broker's number, got the contact there and the driver told him what the company said in the shipping office. The broker contact wasn't happy but as my driver said screw him, it is about servicing the customer who is the shipper. So the first thing the driver asked is if it is available, which it was, then he said he will take it and then pick up the load to LA. he can be on-site in 1 hour. The guy hesitated and then offered the load at $15,500. The driver said hell no, the load will go on the truck for $21,000/$3.23 which he said it leaves the broker with $4k to do nothing but make themselves look good for the company. He also has a number of other things that didn't make the broker happy but's not for open discussion. He was sure to say a couple of times the company wants him to take the load, no one else.

He has the load on the deck now headed for Fairbanks, the shipper was so happy I got a call from the girl in the shipping office. She said it is off the dock, their metrics are good, not screwed by the broker trying to maximize profits. And we are talking to them about having a contract for their product shipments in the future.

 

I got a funny story too. Had a delivery few years back in WI on Friday morning. On Thursday started to look for a load back home. There was a load posted for $1500 to Detroit, 500 miles with 7am pickup appointment, I did not call since it was too early for me to pickup.
After I got empty at 8am , I see this load is back on the board for $1200. Called the broker, straight through run and $1200 is all he can do. On my question why it was posted for $1500 yesterday, he just rudely answered that "it was yesterday price, today is $1200".
Whatever, wished him a good day and started browsing loadboard for something else.
A bit later another broker from that company calls and offers $1300. I just laughed and told him $1800. After few more calls I told them that I wouldn't take anything less than $1800, just because the first dude was a jerk.
Eventually they sent a confirmation for $1800 and started to beg me to move asap and not waste a minute.
Turns out it was a load of books written by some famous baseball player (broker did not give me the full details before hand, just said it's a load of books) it needed to be delivered to the Tigers stadium in downtown Detroit straight through and the guy had to autograph and give those books away. When I got to Detroit police moved the barricades and escorted me straight to the main entrance, bunch of people jumped in the trailer and started unloading right away. It was pretty fun experience being a VIP in there lol

The main point of this story is when I got to the shipper, the shipping manager, a lady in her 50's, was sitting there crying waiting for me to arrive. The event in Detroit was high profile, Tigers people were calling her non stop freaking out about this load, while those brokers were spending time trying to save $300 . I sure hope someone got fired after that.

 

I bet that extra $3-600 was the most satisfying money youve ever made.

 

No, I've still got everything. I'll keep it as backup, because when I come back, it's going to be in a W900 and a new trailer.

Tons of logging. I'm doing 13 wells starting on the 30th to the 7th.

 

That is freaking awesome. I am glad your guy did what was right and helped the customer out. I have been on that side as well when I was the production manager of a smaller shop. We shipped stuff to a lot of trade shows and did not have time to deal with BS. Get the dang cargo out of the building ASAP so we had room for everything else and they can get it all set up.

I sure hope you guys get that business for the future. Hate people that are so dang worried about themselves when a customer needs stuff moved.

 

Sounds like a good deal man. Should be a lot of fun doing the work. Do you guys rig up on your own to go down hole? Or do you have someone nipple up for you?

 

Youtube star. Ha Ha