Need some advice on starting a trucking company.

Your biggest concern should be learning more about the trucking business. Soon, too.
Your students are probably not the best source of accurate information. If they haven't been actively involved in trucking for a few years they''re just repeating what they've heard.
Talk to actual owner/operators who have been out there awhile. Talk to small fleet owners. Talk to brokers. Talk to mechanics, Talk to insurance people.
Another idea would be to talk to an accountant who handles trucking companies.
Get some idea of the gross/net ratio in trucking. It might surprise you how little net profit there actually is.

 

If you have loyal customers who find great value in the service you provide, it is easy.

If you are just like every other Joe looking to get whatever scraps there are on a load board, well good luck with that.

 

I have run for small fleets in the past. Money is everything to these people when they make a decision to commit me to McKesson in Memphis from Little Rock on a load to Detriot due next morning.

Even FFE with a thousand trucks plus in my time would have us go to a position and then camp ready to get loaded at a moment's notice. Some of those were a really bad fiasco that I attribute to too many cooks in our Kitchen and so they lose money.

It's not so much the experience but finding the freight that offers you a chance to be regular like a clock. If you find it at a sufficient rate to you more than your expenses, you are going to be ok, provided you build on that 50,000 dollar rainy day fund in case one of your engines or rigs burn up.

 

Yep, I've heard it said,,"If I win the lottery, I'm buying a bunch of trucks, and run them until all the money is gone,,"

 

I asked a question and didn't get a response so I am going to assume this is it.

Here is the problem, with 100 people doing it at the level of experience you have, there is less than a 15 will have a chance to make it through the 1st year, and 8 of those will have a chance to make it through the 2nd. The failure rates of experienced people are much better but still with 70% of them failing in 2 years, so the real money isn't made in the ownership but the flipping of the used trucks to more people trying to make those big bucks.

 

Ridgeline is the guy that tells people not to get into trucking so he can make more money for himself, lol.

 

if i were to hit the lottery, i'm buying up all the donut shops and truckstops, and hot dog roller machines in American, and gonna be a gazillionaire....

cuz truckers and cops have da money to make me rich(er)

 

i am really surprised, that as an admitted former trucker (have to be, in order to be an instructor) and indeed an instructor, you ain't learnt nothing regarding these questions you posed.

you have "taught a lot of people" is what you say, and here they are, newbies/wannabes, and they KNOW MORE than you should know..???

the paperwork "does not scare you"..??

i can assure you, that if you miss one form, or forget to dot one "I" or cross one "T", you will be scared crapless, when you get hit with fines and maybe suspensions and a shut down.

really surprises me, that you were a driver, and now an instructor, and students are TELLING YOU how lucrative trucking is....

to me, that should have been class 101, when you were driving..

something else this tells me, that you have just barely the minimum amount of experience as a driver, to have applied for an instructors job.

or are you really just a "driver-trainer", with like at Swift, with 6 months experience..????

in many areas across the states, most CDL schools REQUIRE at a minimum of 5 years driving experience, to be hired on as an instructor....

Swift only requires a minimum of 3 months, to be a driver instructor......and suddenly one becomes an eggspert......CDL instructor.

 

Just about any type of business start up has a high rate of failure, not just trucking companies. To survive in any new venture you need a good business sense and are good at handling money. If you've never balanced your personal check book or done your own taxes, odds are very high you won't survive with your own business. There is much more to trucking than buying some equipment and picking loads off of a load board.

 

You know, pal, you aren't that far off. My ex's husband was a school principal, retired, opened a hot dog stand as a whim, he now does mobile events and thinking of adding another shop. Who's stupid now?