How do you determine your rates?

The DAT board has a spot market map that kinda shows you what rates are for various type of trailers. It does help some, but it's really not gonna help unless You have been in business for over a year. You start out with a NEW DOT # and most brokers are gonna laugh at you for 6 months. They see that Joe Blow starts his own trucking company and then he starts yelling I want $3 a mile... yea right pal not gonna happen... Customer Freight is the same way. MOST of them won't even budge on rate unless you have references or you are known to other people.

 

You should be charging $4.46 gallon then.

Old school rule of thumb is charge per mile what a gallon of fuel cost, new guy.

 

Well I told you part of it, here is the other part, your profit, which is your wage. YOU figure out how much you need to live on and figure what you are going to pay in full taxes, which I recommend one full third of the wages and add that up to your operating costs. YOU won't pay a third but it is there for calculation reasons - and some here have crapped on that idea because they think they know what they will pay next year.

Once you get that all figured out, then you have to know how much miles you expect to drive, which I doubt is 100k, then divide your expenses by your mileage and you have your base number, the you go up from there.

Every customer will need to be evaluated, they will enjoy low rates but some don't care what you charge (within reason) because they want the work done. It is rather myopic and stupid (yes it is) to only charge ONE rate for everyone when you can balance your customer base into more profit when you leverage one customer at a much higher rate to make up and provide a bit more for the "loss" with another.

Now you can say that won't work but this is how many of us do this and we make money so it can't be wrong.

 

BAM! Winner winner chicken dinner..

 

Can you really talk about one and not the other?

Again. I say time, reading, patience, feeling out brokers/shippers/purchasers.....over time. Know your numbers and what you need. I was wrong out of the gate and adjusted quickly after a lot of reading and listening.

 

This was not my experience. Twice. I got loads right away and 2.57 per mile from many many brokers. Of course you are right though because many different brokers called me after my 1st year or so. But then I got hurt and voluntarily suspended my MC....when I came back I looked new. I still got lots of calls but I did have to explain why I appeared to be new to a couple of them....

 

The most important information is your operating cost on a per mile base,this is different for everyone.Then there is where the freight is going and what is rate coming out of that area.A lot of people will just throw a generic number out that isn’t really going to help you much you could get say $2 a mile going to ,but sit till you’re hair falls out trying to get 2 out of there.

 

Bottom line is whatever you haul whether it's dead bodies, pig guts, truckload of blowup dolls, Mexicans across the border, DONT HAUL CHEAP FREIGHT!

 

My personal opinion is theres to many drivers ( fish ) out here. Anyone can go, run out buy a truck and boom. Look at the amount of people who come on this site after buying a truck and then basically ask "now what"???

I would think this site doesn't even account for 1% of the drivers in this industry...

Theres a Amazon thread on here that someone posted the insultingly low rates on but yet on a what seems to be daily basis someone comes on that thread asking how they can start hauling for them???

 

Ha! I meant fish is freight and fishermen - us. Unfortunately, there is a very low entry threshold, so it attracts a mass of people hoping to make quick money based on fairly tales. For example, to become a plumber it takes years of apprenticeship and a tough state exam to be licensed plus the job is kinda "dirty" and known as such. Here, the job is thought to be easy and romantic but there is a quick access for unskilled population to double their low pay salaries by getting the very CDL job within months. Even though it is required, so many have CDL without speaking/comprehending English. They at least could enforce that at CDL exams - but it is just another business to provide CDLs. There is also this unwarranted promise, also by reading here of how great money some make - that an owner will make at least 100K a year or more. So people figure, give me a truck and I'll be good just like my neighbor Charlie. They can take equity on their house go to a Freightliner dealer two blocks away and have a shiny ex Prime Cascadia on their yard within a week.