Freight Connections...?

Because you have nothing to loose. Sometimes you could get lucky, but if you don't call you'll never know.

 

I would say that 90+% of our best paying freight comes from bid boards. But these boards are different than what you are seeing here. The customer is first concerned with service and then they use the bidding process to get the best rate they can from a set of pre-qualified carriers. And the customer is paying a set fee or percentage per load.

If these boards allowed any carrier or didn't set a minimum size on the carrier they would not be able to be as affective. While the business model has already been proven to work very well I would be surprised that it will work as well without the quality control of carriers and shippers that place service above price. We are already seeing the results of the lack of controls over the carrier and shipper base. "I have to bid and cheap carriers will be underbidding me." It is almost like it is a self fulling prophecy. They have not shown that the freight is going to be cheap but why would this be any different than the rest of the market if some control is not placed in it.

There is a market for someone to monitor the quality of independents and small carriers and give them access to the better paying bid boards. The challenge is that for this to happen and work the carrier is going to have to accept working within a tighter environment.

 

So true. I never just write off any source although I do have 3 main go to loadboards. If I get a load from a contact that doesn't have a reload or ends me up out there somewhere... ..the first thing I do is look at every load available for after I get empty, that puts me back at my lane of choice or back home. I can usually spot 5 or 10 prospects based on posted details,do a rough guestimate of what I believe the broker will likely pay on them, do a detailed break down on exactly what my minimum would need to be based off previous load(s) rate(s), miles. This tells me if I am in the likelihood of being within $200 of my minimum, a number most brokers will raise a rate to (anything further apart than that, forget it most times), then I call and see. Always shoot for $100 or more above my minimum if they offer the load at my minimum. This works system works great and allows me to quickly plan and book 2 or 3 days of work in advance when the better brokers I work with don't have much.. not as easy as spot bids but still pretty much the same thing I get my kicks from planning loads off open loadboards as much as I do the other freight that just gets offered up out of the blue and is easy money.. A real challenge would be to do this with several trucks though..