The Ultimate Truck Stop

Just curious, with all these request and suggestions for a good TS, where do you see (which parts of your operation) at this point making enough money to justify the large capital outlay. As you stated, fuel is maybe a break even venture, c-store sales you want to keep reasonable (tight profit), and maybe leasing out some square footage to a restaurant chain, truck repair facility, truck wash operation, etc.
It appears to me most of the mom and pop operations are disappearing because profits are pretty thin and competition from chains, not because of bad management on their part.
So how do you see pulling it off?

 

Location, location, location.

 

Sorry for taking so long to respond (very busy).

Also, everyone feel free to chime in on any point i make. Wether you agree or disagree and why or why not:


1) The parking space should be at least 80' long and leave about 3 feet of space on each side with a solid painted "block." i know this will take up more real estate, but we'll get to that in a sec.

a) as stated use paint; Florencent preferred. The cost is minimal.

2) It would be best to be as far away as possible from the major metropolitan areas; In this way, generally, the land is cheaper and i think one of the essential ingredients for a successful truckstop is size----size = more parking spaces= more business.

a) As long as it is still on a major highway or even interstate, it will be ok; Truckers do not mind being "in the middle of nowhere" because often our schedules must end abrubtly(due to federal hours of service laws) so we don't mind "pulling over and sacking out" wherever and whenever.

And reason#2, truckers are generally of a "mobile mindset;" So, if their delivery is scheduled to be in the city (the major metro area) in the morning and the truckstop is 2 hours away. No big deal, truckers are generally flexible schedule-wise and will make adjustments---to wake up earlier in order to make the appointment. Happens all the time.

3) i already mentioned cleanliness; There's no excuse for dirtyness especially in the restrooms. If the airports(who see much more traffic than a truckstop) can do it, you can too. If the T/A gateway truckstop(breezewood, pa) can do it, you can too.

i think part of the problem, in large part, is due to the kind of staff you hire---if they don't give a hoot about cleanliness and are dirty people themselves (lots of trailer trash types and ghetto types are guilty of this), then they probably ain't going to keep your truckstop clean either!

4) Food. Again, If the T/A gateway can serve good food, you CAN AND WILL, serve good food. Also, i think petro north baltimore ohio was good; i haven't been there in a long while though.

Again, the staff can make or break you. If i may be stereotypical (so sue me), HINT: Brothers can cook. Not the ghetto brothers, but regular "real" brothers.

So, to sum it all up. And i think most drivers here will agree with me, the three basic foundations for a good truckstop are: size/parking spaces/ample parking, cleanliness, especially the restrooms/showers and decent food.

If you want to have other stuff like a stupid chrome shop, a chinese "massage", an arcade etc. fine. But all this extracurricular stuff isn't going to fly without the basics.

P.S. Have any of you women drivers tried the chinese "massage?"
If not, then would any of you women try it, now that i mentioned it? i'm just curious.

 

Hopefully you'll read this prior to your project being completed. Aside from clean restrooms and showers, the restaurant needs to be specialized. For instance, for medical reasons, I must follow a high protein diet, yet none of the truck stop restaurants offer this. If you could take into consideration a specialized diet, it would be fantastic!!

 

Also, don't overlook the possibility of, as auxillary/additional parking, using gravel or packed down dirt when you're first starting out as i know paving costs big $$$.

Remember space is EVERYTHING.

 

12 foot X 70 foot parking spaces, with 110 feet of space in front of parking spot. Diagonal spots need 40 feet in front.

1 contrete pillar in the center of 4 parking spots with shore power. Shore power should be free for 12 hours with a 100 gallon purchase or purchased for a dollar an hour. Shore power spots would be gated with those pillars that go up and down out of the ground.

There would have to be a minimum of 200 spots eventually all being shore powered.

10 shower rooms with water seperate from the kitchen. We should be able to move the showerhead, and the showers should have good pressure with the ability to control/limit the pressure.

There should be 4 washers and 6 dryers. (drying always takes longer)

10 fuel islands with a full time attendant to keep drivers moving off the island.

Movie theatre and game room with games rotating in and out every 6 months.

Reasonably priced beverages compared to other truckstops.

Cat scale, transflow, $3 max fee for faxes, USB capable printers that would allow printing docs straight from I phone, 50cent per hour wifi, must have affiliation with major chain so the big fleets would allow it's usage in it's fuel network.

Bathroom attendant/shower cleaner always cleaning and not being pulled to do other stuff.

 

As others have stated-

Clean facilities- esp the head.

Quality food at a reasonable price. One gets burnt out on eating out of the bag or box, not to mention you can't get a side order of Angioplasty when you get that double quarter pounder with cheese.

This was always my main complaints when I did OTR on a daily basis.

 

So basically you'll have to pay to use ANY parking spot. Thats a bunch of crap right there. Why not just have the shore power in every parking spot with no pillar gates?

Doesn't need any affiliation at all. In particular, Werner has a lot of hole in the wall fuel stops. Most trucking companies look at location and fuel prices, and if you'll negotiate a better fuel price. Make it way out in the boonies so its nowhere near any TAs or anything. If its going to be affiliated with a chain, make it AMBest. They're the best.

50 cent per hour wifi sounds good...for a couple hours. I can get wifi for 24 hours for $5 at most truckstops. Your system would cost me $12. Needs a per diem discount.

 

IOWA 80.............