Looking for any advice about starting up small trucking business...

NOPE. I wouldn't bother doing it. The IRS alone is too much of a hassle now. Plus it's too hard to get and keep good drivers. It's a driver's market, really. Most drivers are younger and have other options besides driving trucks. And with truck driving paying about the same as those other options, with those options offering constant home time and sleeping in a real bed, most of those younger drivers will look at trucking as a temporary, stop gap job to tide them over. And with a small company, empty, cleaned-out trucks will cost you a hell of a lot. You should look into getting a truck and teaming up, signing on with a good outfit. Forget great outfit. There's no such thing as a great outfit anymore. Settle for a good one and go at it for 5 years as a team operation. Then move to Mexico or some other American-friendly country and retire.

 

It's not a drivers market, if it was we would see drivers wages be higher, a lot higher.

 

I agree. One of the biggest lies in driving is "There's a driver shortage". But drivers today are younger across the board and they have options. They don't have the experience to get the big per-mile good jobs yet, so the pay rate they get is about what they'd make doing something like driving a fork lift. They aren't like the old guys who are still out there who are stuck in driving because they've spent their lives doing nothing but driving and haven't learned to do anything else. Young drivers can walk away from it, so in that sense, it is a driver's market. You give them what they want or they go do something else with ease. They may still be eating ramen noodles living in a dumpy apartment, but they're home every night and sleeping in a real bed. That goes a ways. And the reason the pay rate is so low is companies know they can use the trucking school diploma mills to replace their quitters, which they will have a lot of and even expect to have and plan for. In some outfits, they WANT high turnover. New drivers don't know about the business and are cheap. Plus they're younger and are cheap as far as health benefits go. And they accept being paid chicken scraps.

 

To add to that, with social media, they can actually see what they are missing at home. If they aren’t making substantially more, they aren’t going to last in this industry.

 

The sad part is....the trucking companies have modified their business model to fit the reality of high turnover. They now run their businesses with high turnover being a main factor. They know their pay won't appeal to young guys for long, and those guys will exit the industry fairly quickly. They know they can pay low wages AND always have a supply of new drivers to fill the voids left by turnover.

 

I somewhat agree but here is what I see.

Drivers are a commodity, they are not professionals AND I truly beleive a majority DO NOT want to be professionals because it is too hard.

So they are treated as a commodity which effects all of us, drivers, owners and so on.

If we really want to do something, then we want to stop this crackerjack licensing and bring serious changes to the work to force those who want to be drivers to be actual drivers and not commodities.

I get the crying about ELDs, I get the crying about the regulations and so on but until we get the right attitude, stop with this idea that this is just a job and start being nasty about being professionals to anyone including our brethren, we are only going to be a commodity and we won't see a thing changed.

 

Gotta disagree. Drivers aren't a commodity. Commodities have value.

A generous over estimation of quality drivers that being value to their employer would be 1% of all truck drivers.


Op you asked how much would be a good number to start with. 50 grand should do it. But that's fifty thousand dollars after initial starry up costs including trucks trailers insurance and all licensing and permits. Tho honestly, you guys could start with a million and it won't be enough. This has guaranteed failure written all over it.

 

It's a good time to get in right now because capacity will shrink soon. Anytime change hits this industry, people bail, and that affects rates.
I started a trucking company in 2008 during the recession as everyone was getting out. I was able to operate in a market and snapped up a nice fat lane that I drove myself.

There is some good advice in the past threads here, but doom and gloom aside, if you can made disciplined financial, business and ethical based on what you experience, not on what you hear (in a truckstop) you can operate.

Two trucks isn't a company, it's two people who are owner operators. Company's park hundreds of trucks at a time while thousands deliver loads.

Best of luck

 

Again...The IRS is one of the main reasons you do NOT want to start your own outfit. Just that reason alone would keep me from doing it.

 

Start with a FedEx Ground Linehaul route. It's not the best money but you'll learn trucks without a lot of risk. After a year go independent.