I didn't make it, but I want other startups to learn from my mistakes.

After making it past the dreaded first year, I am now giving up my authority. Just as rates were going up and I was starting to get a handle on the business.

I thought I knew something about trucks and trucking when I started my company. I did my research, talked to people, had OTR and local driving experience, etc. In this past year, I have come to the realization I didn't know anything. What I've learned over the past year is amazing. The knowledge I have gained would have kept me from making my fatal error if I knew it beforehand.

Learning to deal with brokers, shippers, receivers and other drivers is not too bad. Basic people skills take you a long ways. Negotiating rates is fun. Having the ability to turn down a crap load is more fun. Keeping up with the paperwork is challenging, but kinda fun. Paying the bills and dealing with the government? Not fun. Never will be.

Here's where I screwed up. If you are thinking about becoming an o/o, this is free advice.

-I was underfunded going into this. I knew it, so no excuses. I had been working for a company, socking away startup funds. The company went out of business 6 months before I was ready to head out on my own. I rushed into my authority with no reserve funds. Had I not made mistake number 2, I could have sucked it up and recovered. However, I made my fatal mistake...

- I invested in a "lemon" truck. Plain and simple. I bought a truck I couldn't afford. The payments were killing me, but not as much as the maintenance. The added stress of the monthly payment caused me too many problems and led to robbing Peter to pay Paul. I was just talking to a friend who owns another trucking company. He complained about spending $5k on repairs over the course of last year on one of his trucks. I laughed and told him I spend a minimum of $5k a MONTH for repairs to mine! This is true. I had a lousy dealership mechanic pull one over on me last summer, which resulted in my truck sitting for three months while they did nothing with it. It took some strong arming from my financier to get them to finish the job. That resulted in at least $43k in lost revenue alone. But the payments and insurance were still due...
I couldn't dig out from under that when I finally got back on the road. I just spent 3 months out trying to play catch-up, to no avail. I was still constantly facing downtime due to repairs. That truck was as unreliable as the day is long.

I realize now, I could have taken the hefty down payment I had and bought a better truck with cash. No stress over monthly payments. No getting behind on two months of payments, no repos. I could have owned the truck outright, probably had a more reliable truck, and still be in business. Taking the knowledge I've gained, I'd have bought a much cheaper truck from Iron Planet auctions, or something similar. Owning the truck is the key to success, in my opinion. Having monthly payments, on top of all the rest of the learning curve and troubles you will face, is not a way to start on the right foot in trucking.

I offer this story of my failure not for pity, I don't deserve it. I offer it as an object lesson to those of you doing research on starting your own company. Don't over purchase. Stay with what you can afford to own outright and upgrade down the road after you've become a successful o/o. I hope this serves as a cautionary tale for someone else. Now, it's time to go store all my trucking gear, tarps, chains, binders, etc., sell the house and plot my return to trucking.