Stepping Out With My Own Numbers

I'f you got extra time run over to the produce market in plant city and talk to some of the produce brokers.

 

I was there on vacation with family back in March. We went to Everglades too. To my dismay, the creatures were moving loose and literately within a spit distance from a trail where there were no fences ...I mean people with little kids strolling by...I wonder if they see humans as food or they are fed so well there.

 

The biggest danger to humans from gators is other humans thinking its fun to feed them. That makes their tiny brains associate humans to food. They are naturally afraid of us, and will keep their distance but if some idiot has been feeding one chicken it thinks we are the chicken and will take your arm off.

 

I have an LTL loaf tomorrow. I’ll have the final details in the morning. It will be 200.00 a pallet and 21-24 pallets. 4-5 pickups and 4-5 drops.

 

Got loaded up finally. I had 3 picks in FL and the final pick was in GA. Delivery in PA and 2 in upstate NY. Got 3900.00 on it, all of it comes off Friday. If I can keep the momentum going, this could be a $20k month.
What kills me, is that there were loads on the board being covered at only 1.70-1.75 a mile heading to PA, MD, NY, and MA. I don’t understand why someone would take those when the market is paying much more than that.

 

Most people have no idea what the market is paying.

 

True. I’m not hauling for outrageous rates or anything, but if there’s money to be made, seize the opportunity. I always shoot for fair and reasonable rates, not sticking it to anybody. I pull for the same brokers a lot, and so far, that has worked out well.
I put a bid in on a JB360 load out of Tampa to Syracuse at 2900.00, they countered at 1900. I just cancelled the offer and called up this other broker on the LTL load I’m on now. They’re pretty good size with offices across the country, specializing in produce. I told him where I’d like to end up, we talked rates (depending on number of pallets), and he hooked me up. His office is in southern Florida and they don’t post on the boards. There are a couple other big produce brokers I’d like to pull for sometime. Same deal, they don’t post this stuff on the board, they’ll only post the one pick, one drop stuff.

 

That's why i have suggested taking some time and taking to the ones in plant city. A ton of strawberries get moved through the produce brokers there.

 

I’m delivering Wednesday morning in MA and I’ve stumbled across a direct shipper over there of sorts. They have their own local day cabs that bring stuff in and they move their own freight outbound on outside trucks. Most of it is multi stop stuff going just about everywhere. The shipping lady wants me to call her tomorrow to go over the load list for Wednesday and get something lined up. I’ve been hitting that area a lot lately and could use a reliable, good paying source out of there.

 

Filled up today, longer than usual between fills. 2525 miles, 9.1 mpg, 7.5% were empty miles, 57k PA to AR, 76k AR to MI, 72k IN to Effingham.