So you want to "own " your own company

250 mi. at a 1.oo pm rate= 250.oo / not even worth my time, i would DH the distance to the area with that higher paying freight.

 

I didn't give the example of taking a dollar a mile for 250 miles, he did. I do have my own authority, and if I'm going somewhere that only pays a dollar a mile coming out, I get a rate that justifies deadheading out (at a profitable rate per mile) as far as I need to to get back to a profitable lane, or I don't take the load. I might have to rethink that if I lived in the Northeast like you do, because no one would ever pay me enough to go home .

Surely you wouldn't take a $250 load 250 miles, would you? The only way I'd take a $250 load is if it was across town and I had at least two of them lined up.

 

OK, starting off the week? Let's say you deliver Monday morning in a dead freight area. You get empty by 9:00AM. Then you deadhead across the street to you $1/mile scenario shipper for your 250 mile load. It takes two hours to get loaded, so you're on the road by 11:00. you get to the consignee by 3:00, and get empty at 4:00. Then you go to the truckstop, because the good load you took the cheap load to get to doesn't load until 7:00am Tuesday. You get loaded by 9:00 and deliver the load Wednesday morning at 7:00AM.

I deliver the same load Monday morning, get empty by 9:00AM, and then I deadhead 250 miles to get the load you picked up on Tuesday, only I get there at 1:00PM and get loaded by 3:00 Monday afternoon. Then I drive another 300 miles, and deliver the load at 11:00 Tuesday morning. I'm twenty hours ahead of you already, and I'm only $250 poorer for it.

My break even point is way over $1.00 a mile, because it includes paying my driver-he's a good guy and works hard for me, and is a #### good looking feller to boot, I'm sure not going to make him work for free.

 

You guys are dwelling on the 250 mile radius and that was not the point. If dead heading 250 miles gets me $1.50 per mile instead of $1.00 per mile, hell, I'm there but that is not the case in the real world. You would be lucky to get $.10 to $.20 cents more.

Lets use the example of MA to OH. It's $1.00 per mile for a 600 mile run. From Cleveland OH you can get $2.00 easy. Now what would you do? This is a real example!
You can actually come back to MA for $2.50 to $3.00 per mile. The bailed cardboard trash that TMC and others haul to OH is flatbed loaded strap and go. Probably takes all of 1/2 an hour to load.

 

Your point is well taken-but I live in a good (decent at least) freight area, so I have the luxury of only taking freight into a dead area (like MA) if it pays well enough to deadhead out to a good area. If I had a problem keeping busy doing what I do, I might have to run the numbers again and see where I stand, but the way things are for me right now, I'm not going to haul a load that doesn't cover my costs, my pay, and my profit for every mile and every hour I have to invest in the load, including my deadhead.

 

That's all well and fine for you but we are talking about a specific example. So, given that what would you do in the example that I listed. Let's say you live in Mass and have just been home for the week?????

This is exactly what we are talking about. So, get off the soap box, stop preaching about yourself and give us your words of wisdom on this very specific scenario?

 

No, that's not exactly what we were talking about. I was talking about the "very specific scenario" of a 250 mile run for $250, and I gave my thoughts on an alternative solution to operating at a loss, which is what that load would be. You brought up the Mass to Ohio scenario.

Yeah, sure, if I could get a round trip deal set up from, say, Worcester to Cleveland and back for $2400 a round, I'd do that. If that means $1800 from Cleveland to Worcester and $600 back out, that's what it means, I guess you've got to go with what the market will bear. I understand what you're saying, that's why in my last post I said "Your point is well taken."

 

Ok, I agree with everything you said. Sorry.

 

I understand why some owner operators and carriers haul cheap freight to get out of a bad area. As long as they haul freight for $0.75/mile there is little incentive for shippers and/or brokers to pay a higher rate to move their freight. But as long as we haul freight that only covers fuel or basic expenses rates will not rise. Rates come up when there is a shortage of capacity.

 

There will never be a shortage. I guess that's a point that you don't get. Many states do not produce anything worth shipping out but still require freight to come in hence the over capacity of empty trucks. Either dead head out or take a cheap load. Supply and demand!!!