Why did mbm foodservice get crappy trucks from Ryder?

Its not by choice I would think. The columbias would be the generation after Centurys that we had. Those were good trucks up to a certain point, then trade em in rather than endure ever increasing failures as it wears really fast beyond 200,000 miles.

If you handed me a steel tractor with a premium interior of the old school ways it would be more durable for that kind of service. Sometimes the nature of the work itself is pretty tough and you have nothing left over to love on the truck.

I ran for Darden MBM out of Aberdeen for a while. Ive got a picture of it somewhere in full unloading situation at a red lobster in the NE somewhere. One reason for that one is because it was a real catty corner getting that thing all into that spot.

 

The Columbia was Freightliners popular truck among distribution fleets, those trucks are mass produced, cheap and throw away. MBM leased what ever came next. Our MBM in Columbus actually had a lot of Volvo's, the Columbia years had some bad trucks, back in 2007 you didn't see a McLane Columbia that didn't have a rusty bumper on it.

Companies like MBM just lease whatever comes next MBM always had shoddy equipment at times, lots of used trailers with heavy tare weights MBM took what ever they could get there hands on because they weren't planning to have stuff forever get what ever the most popular make and model is and like @x1Heavy said after 200,000 miles or so the mechanical failures will be ever increasing at a fast pace and instead of trying to hold on to an old clunker for 10 years they just switched them out.

Freightliner has a large dealer network and a large availability of parts and service options, if one in every 10 cars is a Mercedes Benz where as 5 in every 10 cars is a Ford Escort, which unit is it going to be easier to get parts and labor for? That's why Freightliner is so popular.

Hungry Howies, McLane, and countless others had Columbia's.

 

MBM/Mclane still has ####ty trucks. Supposed to get 11 or so brand new ones where Im at, but Ryder hasnt in-serviced them yet. Based on what Ive seen the last couple months, Ryder sucks.

 

I’ve never heard anything good about Ryder.

We have both in house maintenance and Penske contracts at are warehouses that don’t have mechanical shops and the Penske maintained trucks are always junk.

Our trucks maintained in house at our company owned shop night and day difference.

 

MBM from what I’ve seen and read Ryder was constantly road servicing the MBM trucks I know MBMs trailer fleet was a bit rough to say the least.

 

As an MBM driver, i actually asked some big muckity muck about this one day.

What he told me was:

MBM leased EVERYTHING. They owned nothing. Not the buildings, the forklifts, the trucks, the office furniture NOTHING.

It started as a little 1 man operation and was still mostly owned by the family so they leased every thing to protect themselves.

now WHY they kept leased trucks and trailers so long, I have no idea. I mean the whole point of leasing it is to get rid of it when ti's old and out of warranty, but we had 800,000 mile day cabs (yeah, ryder sucks) and sleeper/team trucks with just as much. You can just imagine how rough those were.