Calculating Your Operating Cost

Great! Now I can't get this song out of my head from the Muppet Movie!

 

Don’t know what your English comprehension is like, but the part in the opening post where he states “each truck” to me indicates he’s talking more than one. But what do I know I’m just a ####### fleet owner

 

I don't wanna jinx myself so I'm not saying anything.

OP - $0.80 or less. If it's more than that stop incorporating your vices expenses into the equation, or become an electrician. Good luck.

 

Hey Dave, how much do you calculate your per mile cost of cat food and corn dogs to be???

 

Cat food & cat treats are about $0.007 mile. I'm off the dogs, but take a little hit on mini tacos.

 

If anyone is doing it on a reasonable scale with multiple trucks paying people properly on a W2 in new trucks running for much less than $1.60 I’d shake your hand and be the first to congratulate you on a job well done.

One truck as an owner op, sure you maybe able to do it for around .80c a mile. Plus whatever you pay yourself.

Different horses for different courses

 

I did my cost per mile at 6 mos. and it was not great. Then it was a terrible winter. I grossed $100k second half of last year and $77k first half of this one. Bad, but now I have a full year and just redid my cost per mile.

$1.00 per mile on the nose plus my salary. I only take what I need so I'm not including that just yet.

Doing the math I'm taking home nearly 50% of gross, which was my plan, but at the same time with all of my down time this past year and taking time off (freedom/time off is a huge part of the equation for me) I came up with 10-11 weeks off this past year.

Before you think WOW, remember that O/O's are hardly ever completely off. I took maybe 4 weeks vacation and the rest were days off to be home for something, work on the truck, work in the office, etc.

Knowing my real numbers better makes me realize why some keep a good paying company job but at the same time I only ran 97k miles last year and didn't drive 10+ weeks out of the year.

I can't decide if I'm pleased or pissed. I guess I'm just a typical owner operator.

 

I would say your doing good but I don’t know how many bills you have. Sounds like you work like me I did 90k miles last year and finished with a gross income of 89k and was home non stop with one weekend worked the hole year.

 

So after paying yourself an equal wage to a good solid company driver, your company made $25,000. Not bad for all the time off which like you said is a big part of the equation. You could have maybe capitalized more on the great market but I say job well done your first year.