Freight Rates & Areas?

I'm not kidding!!!!,....This stuff was way better than I expected it to be!!!!,...I bought it thinking it would be horrible,..But cheap,..Turns out it is really good,..And cheap!!

 

Every week the loads get scarcer and rates get lower. Just ran from Portland to PA with 2 partials for $3950, that used to pay $5500 - 6000 minimum. I'm now under a 2550 mile load from Carlisle PA to Barstow with 16 feet empty. Took the cheap sh%t thinking I'll fill it out with a partial, like usual. 2 days - no partial, it's Friday night, do I sit here all weekend, or run it for 1.04 a mile GROSS??? Company gets 13%, about $350 a week for insurances and trailer...... comes out to 78 cents a mile to the truck. H*lluva choice......

 

Mark I don't get it at .78 a mile x 2550 mile is 1998 dollars your rich why don't you just sell your kids and stop trying to make so much money..
"paper truckin"

 

Yeah with fuel costing around $.50/m, that's a whole lotta dough for you...

 

I have never seen rates suck so bad. I am probably wrong, but here is what I see...

We are on the edge of a major consolidation in the industry. Yes, 3,000 companies went down last year so there has been some consolidation already, but not enough. License and insurance is coming up for many carriers in the next few weeks. We should see some major players do some REAL downsizing or shut down, or many mid-size (30-100 trucks) companies closing up shop, or going to a pure (ha!) brokerage operation.

Right now, most mid-size "out and back" carriers have their accounts in their strong areas and nowhere else. IMO, that is why we are seeing crap rates everywhere. Ohio carriers have loads in OH that take them to Alabama and Alabama carriers have loads that take them to Ohio, but neither have backhaul. In normal times, one of the two carriers would have excess loads and broker their headhaul at decent rates. Now all of the headhaul is going to that carrier's starving drivers trying to get out of the house, thus making all lanes backhaul lanes. Brokers are capitalizing.

The 30-100 truck out and back carriers are the ones who are taking the .80 cpm broker crap to get their drivers back for the $2.00/mile customer freight (but the $2.00/mile customer freight is being undercut by bottom feeders and brokers because there is no headhaul anymore and the downward spiral continues).

Of course, independent O/Os are caught in the middle.

This is never going to happen, but I think that the government should ban non-asset based brokers, so there could only be trucking companies having broker authority. Also, those companies cannot broker any more than 50% of their freight (by revenue). The rest of it has to go on their trucks. I think that mid-size carriers almost need a brokerage just to service their customers, but this CHR and TQL b.s. is a major factor in what is wrong in the industry.

Let me know where I am wrong. Thanks.

 

I really hate the term "backhaul" It was made up by brokers.. I use to love it when I was on the phone "hey John we have a back haul for you it only pays X but it pays for fuel to get you home" I want to punch Backhaul in the face

 

My husband spent a week trying to get out of FL and came home empty. Took another load down there the following week and spent another week & a half there, again coming back empty (all because of not having reefer insurance and nobody would take a reefer as a van). But the reefer loads were there, as well as lots of flat bed. And a LOT going to TX.

We'll be officially signed on under another local trucking company's authority by this weekend. Hubby's been hauling crushed cars all week in AL and the guy we're hauling for is also going under the 'new' guy's authority because he's not getting enough work with crushed cars. Although we'll reimburse him for the insurance, at least with all the trucks this 'new' guy has on his policy, the cost will drop a lot.

We were expecting to finally use the reefer (as a reefer), getting back-hauls out of Florida after hauling corn down from IL. But the 'new' guy says he's already found flat bed loads for him all next week which are paying more than for reefer loads! I hope by Monday it'll still be a go!

 

Good points....
The non-asset brokers or "briefcase" brokers all but ruined the dump truck biz in CA.
They have next nothing in liability. Compound that with the "Bottom-feeders" who will run for next to nothing, in the case of dumps, Ten wheelers and Supers running for $50/h destroyed the dump biz.

Right now there are mud and debris flows in SO-CAL which usually brought good rates via FEMA, but no longer.
Thanks to the Brokers and the "Bottom-Feeders" I doubt there will be anyone left worth a Flying Eff to run those loads.

 

I hate it too, but I don't think it was made up by brokers. It was made up by out and back carriers with only one terminal. When you HAVE to get somewhere, it affects the law of supply and demand. If you don't have to be anywhere, you will never have a backhaul. That doesn't change the fact that there always has been and always will be more freight coming into Buffalo, NY from the west than there is coming out of Buffalo, NY heading west. The lane is imbalaced and probably always has been. Lanes, like life, aren't perfect. The only way to account for that imbalance is to re-regulate lanes, which is simply not an option (good or bad).

Supply and demand is a cruel mistress right now. Demand for trucks will not increase until the over supply of trucks goes away through one way or another.

That being said, 'briefcase' brokers (thanks for the term R-M, I used to call them basement brokers because I figured that they all must live in their mom's basement), big and small, are also manipulting the natural cycles of supply/demand through ignorance, greed and short- sightedness. There needs to be a much higher bar of entry for brokers than what there currently is.

 

The fix is easily accomplished...Ban all Mexican Carriers from operating on US soil. That will eliminate most of the "bottom-feeders" as well....
Sorry to step on toes, but that is the truth.

If my loads to Mexico require me to drop at a distribution point on the border, why can that not be the case for the Mexican Carriers?
Why is it ok (and encouraged by our congress) for them to run on our highways, but I can't run on theirs???...Like I'd want to....but that's a different story altogether.