Freight demand slowing down

It's not necessarily that the industry is in a down cycle, but the economy as a whole sucks and the morons in charge can't see it. Thanksgiving to April is usually slow, but it sounds slower than normal right now. Don't expect too much

 

There is a "demand" for drivers. Reason being the mega trucking companies cannot keep employees. They treat them poorly and do not pay them well.

Until this changes and it probably won't there will be a demand for drivers.

 

Freight drops off in January. Right now certain segments are booming. I've been killing it with less than driver friendly freight as a company driver.

There will always be demand for quality drivers. there are too many people out here that aren't qualified. Scary thing is, a lot of them then become owner operators.

 

Are you starting as company drivers or are you opening a business?

 

There is no downturn of freight for Covenent. They have a pretty good pool of freight to draw from. They don't pay well and thier training is sub par but you'll be moving on quickly if you guys are a team. For example with one good year in, you could come to a Company like Barr Nunn Transportation and split 60-62 cents per mile.

 

The ATA has been pushing the idea of a "driver shortage" for at least as long as I've been driving. Helps them fight putting any kind of training standards in place for new drivers (which would help overall highway safety, but would seriously cut into their bottom line as they would actually have to train new drivers instead of letting the blind lead the blind as they currently do). The idea of a "driver shortage" also helped CRE get a waiver allowing permit holders to drive without a licensed driver in the jump seat, and push for lowering the OTR age to 18...again, NONE of which benefits highway safety. Then, they use the fact that they are bringing hundreds of unqualified drivers into the industry and turning them loose as an excuse to push for electronic gadgets like speed limiters, electronic logs, automatic transmissions, stability control, lane departure warnings, driver-facing cameras, automatic crash avoidance technology, etc...to make it easier to find warm butts to occupy their seats for low wages without having to spend too much time and money training them to do more than hang onto a steering wheel and keep it between the ditches.

Fact of the matter is, there isn't a shortage of drivers. There has always been a shortage of drivers willing to put up with the mega's BS. Companies that treat their drivers well and pay them fairly are never short of drivers.

As for freight, winter is generally slow. It is what it is, and the sad state of the economy isn't helping.

 

I saw, I THINK I SAW A PUDDY TAT !!! I saw CRE truck that I'm thinking probably didn't set its brakes, that BLAZED at the Pilot on I40 like exit 8 or close to it. It was over the embankment, and I'm guessing when it went over the curb ruptured the fuel tank(s). Nothing left, engine block and frame rails, trailer BLAZED as well.
How do I know it was a CRE truck then? The logo was on about 10 or 15 feet of what was left of the trailer.