Company closed its doors

A local company I worked for three times, I started with them when he had like 10 drivers. He built the company to over 200 drivers. Then one day out of the blue he sold out to some big non-trucking corporation out of CA. I guess the offer was too good.

The new owners ran the trucking company for like 6 months and then just shut everything down and liquified the assets.

I was like ???

Maybe it was some tax write off for them? Strange move though, putting some 200 people out of work. That's corporate greed.

Some of you might remember Volunteer Trucking. That's what happened to them.

 

Trucking Companies don't dictate what the freight rates are. Shippers and receivers do. The companies only bid on the load if they think they can make money on it. Smaller companies tend to be top heavy (too many chiefs, not enough braves) so there's too much unsupported salary going out the window and it leads to the death of the company. I see this time and time again.

 

This is a mis-perception that many make about rates. It is the carrier who dictate the rates. Shippers and brokers may offer a rate, but until a carrier takes the load the rate is not set. If more carriers would refuse to haul cheap freight then rates would go up. Some carriers don't seem to understand that they are in control of freight rates, not shippers and not brokers. Where else can you go for a service where the customer tells you what you will charge for your services? Go to a mechanic and have him work on your vehicle and then tell him what you are going to pay him for his labor. Find a plumber and have him come and repair a leak. Do you really think that he will allow you to tell him what he will charge you for his labor? This business is filled with people who are all too willing to accept the crumbs for their labor. It is YOUR truck, YOUR fuel and YOUR livelihood. You either decide to control your future or get out of business. The problem we run into is that when a carrier takes a cheap rate, then the rate has been set. However, if enough carriers pass on the rate then rates will come up until another carrier takes the load. Rates are very fluid. It is time for carriers to stand up to those who only want to pay a cheap rate and NOT haul their freight.

Do you think that the shipper's customers will tell them what they will pay for their products? Do you think that the shipper will sell their wares for less than their cost and a profit? I don't think so. Yet, some truckers do it every day.

 

Kind of like going to the store and offering them two bucks for a gal of milk when it's say's $2.99 a gal. LOL!! The price has been set, you'll not get it cheaper.

 

I must not have made myself clear in my post.
I am not condoning what is going on, I am merely pointing out the obvious: Size DOES matter and gives a distinct advantage to the larger carrier.
The nature of business in a free market society dictates the larger will swallow the smaller until they reach the point where their own bloated selves create so much ineffiency that once again the small guy can compete.
We're in the 'tween stage of that right now.
Hurts too.
I don't like it. But it just is. Wishing it were different doesn't solve the problem.
More government regulation 'protecting' the little guy isn't the answer either.
I don't have an answer.
And just for the record, I was a minority owner of a small trucking company that finally bit the bullet and ceased to operate.
I know all too well how much this hurts.
I'm sorry for the people that lost their jobs, and especially for the owners that lost their 'child'.

 

Please don't use this forum for recruiting. Thank You.

 

any update?

 

Karl Marx could not have said it better

Walmart WAS the little guy at one time just like most large corps today. There is no socialist utopia where everyone can have a shop, field or store that all charge the same so no one gets priced out of the market. It has been tried many times and has failed. When you make everyone equal there is no more incentive to do better or better yourself and then quality starts to suck and then quantity soon after.

Every Socialist program from SSI, Medicare, public schools, unions are all inefficient massive burdens on the taxpayers because none of them deliver close to what they cost.

To say trucking was better run and more efficient during regulation is laughably absurd.