How hard is it to get a set dedicated OTR route?

Look around, keep looking, maybe find a small company that values having a Driver. Larger Companies may have more dedicated lanes, more Drop and Hook runs. That’s always a good thing. But even their Freight Contracts change. Everything changes constantly. Just have to keep looking, decide, and be ready to start looking again if needed. That one perfect Job that lasts forever is very rare. Have to be flexible. Your not asking for much, it’s very possible. I agree, never knowing where you’re going next, is the worst feeling. Steady Dedicated gets old quick. An almost sort of kinda like Dedicated is better IMO. Mixes things up a bit. Running the same areas. Mainly the same Customers. So you know what to expect. Still a bit Challenging, instead of the same thing always.

 

Best shot is look for a non-trucking company that delivers its own products. Building supplies, animal feed, lots and lots and lots of companies have trucks they control to deliver their own stuff to their own customers.

 

Excellent idea , I had not the first clue that such a situation/job like that existed , until a few years ago. The trucker that I worked for hooked up with a local company to haul their overflow loads , and the company drivers were home just about every night weekends off and pretty much went to the same stores

 

Speaking of WallyWorld- they have their own trucking fleet... Mostly dedicated runs & high-ish pay relative to the region.

I know, because I'm looking into them once I get my CDL lol.

 

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I hate that. You go to sleep because there's no dispatch. Then you wake up well-rested, feeling good and ready to work.

Then you see your dispatch is for midnight, a 250 mile Tyson load.

It would be fine if they told me ahead of time, I'd just stay up all night and I would be good. That never happened, though.

When I drove for FFE, I was able to drive staggard because I got dispatched for a week at a time. So I got good at looking at those schedules and I knew when I needed to stay awake.

That's what I learned pretty quick about OTR reefer, they will blindside you every time. You can tell them you want days or nights, they will say, OK... and then flip you like a pancake.

That's one reason why I switched over to flatbed. I stayed with the same company, but yeah, I said no to those games. Driving tired takes all the joy out of the job.

 

I helped Crete with their Walmart account last holidays and it was a lot of fun. I didn't mind delivering to those stores at all. Made some good money.

 

I can concur that OTR reefer is just one big flip-fest. The latest split-sleeper changes made it even worse, having both breaks pause 14. Used to have some control over it by just starting my 14 really early in the morning could limit what they gave me, it wouldn’t prevent them from having me take 10s back to back though.