Not a driver, considering getting authority.

So just out of curiosity, if you recommend people not bother, why do you do it? Are you super passionate about trucking? Do you own multiple businesses and like to try new things? Do you feel like what you do is worth the time and effort now, and potentially later?

I’m sure you’re 100% right on the workload, it’s definitely naive of me to think I hold that much weight. I will say though, currently our office consists of 2 people. Me and the actual “operations manager”. He actually drives frequently so there are many weeks when he is out on the road and essentially if I didn’t show up, business would stop for everyone but him. Even still though, I’m sure there’s tons to it that I have yet to scratch the surface on.

The 1099 vs W2 is definitely where my ignorance shows. As you stated, I have no business experience. I’m trying to learn as I go and research when I can. There is a little bit of a language barrier with the owner, and he is pretty set on keeping the accounting/legal side private between him and the accountant. That’s another big issue I have. He wants us to run the company, yet he withholds certain things and assures us he can handle it.


I agree 100% on the lazy owner. He is so focused on $$ that he will fire drivers who are not only bad workers, but just bad people overall and give them second/third chances to fill trucks. The owner is 90% of the reason I’m considering trying my own thing. He wants to essentially be a “silent investor/owner” but won’t give us full control of the things we need to do it right.

So the PROPER way a 1099 company works, is you hire drivers who own their equipment and cover their expenses, while they get to operate under your authority? And they can book their own loads, or have someone dispatch for them?

Ultimately I think the company grew way too quickly while doing things the wrong way. Now we are in a position where we have so many normal daily operations on top of problems that it’s hard to find the time to hit the brakes and solve internal issues. And it’s tough to convince the owner that we’d probably be more profitable doing less work, if we started doing it right.

 

I’ve been a driver since the 70’s on and off, when I didn’t find work in my profession, I went back to trucking which isn’t what it was.

Nope, not at all, can walk away from it any time.

yep, just have two new businesses up and running using the same core principles I used for this one.

there is a huge difference between running and owning a business.

well it is hard to answer, mainly because if I remove the driver section out of it, it isn’t worth it. But I am loyal to those who are loyal to me.

Tons isn’t the word that you need to use. The best way to learn about the industry is start from the bottom and that means driving.

Well first this is where you need tools to advise you. A good lawyer that you can talk to and bounce ideas off of and a good account, don’t need a trucking accountant but someone who knows how business works.

it sounds like the owner is worthless. But then I can say that because I’ve seen more crap at the owner level than most drivers see.

then he runs a business and it will fail.

No, that is a lease arrangement, the 1099 is the portion that goes to the truck, not the driver. This isn’t a lease purchase but legally defined in the fmcsa regulations.

that is one way to go but remember that any and all contracted drivers or leased trucks are free to refuse work and you can’t tell them how to drive or what go actually do … it is their show.

lease arrangement can be either or both, it is how the contract is structured but again they can refuse work, that is a very important legal requirement.

Any business can pause, but coming from someone who I has bought up a few fleets like this one, failure is always the end result.



also one thing that I didn’t mention is you better have a good amount of capital, everything costs. Coming into a very hard times soon and you are employing drivers, you better have money to pay them for their work every week.

and another thing is don’t patchwork the fleet, there may be an issue with the older junk trucks that are skirting eld regs and/or late model emissions. I sat in a bs seminar about electrification of mass transit because of the diesel particulates are killing kids and elderly not to forget the climate change, so there may be a very hard shove to get fleets to have late model trucks or new technology trucks by this present administration and congress and this may mean NO grandfathering in older or “out of band” (term used by the presenters) trucks and no compensation in any way for the loses.

 

Starting a trucking company if you are passionate is a good thing but my advice is simply get your CDL and do some driving on your own. Times are the best I’ve seen it in 34 years of being in the business but that being said it will fall and you better be prepared for it.
The quality of drivers out there is very thin. If you want the good ones you will pay big bucks. It can be done but you need to know this business. You could lose everything faster than you think.
Trucking successfully means a passion for what you are doing. If you are doing this for the money you will be best served investing elsewhere. Just my 2 cents.

 

How is it the immigrants always wind up owning businesses so quickly?
Feds give them easy loans or something ?

anyhoo, I’d consider looking into maybe getting hired at a larger trucking company and learning more about the business. There’s pretty good money in the management side if you know what you’re doing . And you get to sleep at home every night.

 

Lets put it this way.

If you already have the mindset to move half the world away to a country where the predominant language usually isnt your mother tongue, 3 things are the case
1. You are very unlikely to listen to people that play it safe, so youre already more likely to be in the correct mindset to be a buisness owner
2. You either had enough cash that starting up a buisness is just another bit of the gameplan upon arrival, OR you just dont care because you have nothing to lose already arriving while penniless
3. You are by definition a hustler and have the drive to get things done

 

You’ve seen what it is.
Or most of it.
You think you can do it better.
Don’t listen to nay-sayers.
You sound like a perfect fit to go on your own.

 

I would say you DID start at the bottom (not pay or status wise, just literally and the best place to start IMO!) and you are going to be fine!

This is all about maintenance, preventive maintenance, maintenance, maintenance, answering the phone, quoting tons of loads, securing freight, answering phones, filing filings on strict schedules, maintenance, relationships with brokers and/or shippers, answering the phone, maintenance, securing freight and running loads, filing filings filing filings!

It sounds to me like you got it!

 

Why?

Because they come from a country where they don’t have the opportunities we do and had to hustle to live. As one Russia said to me life is so easy here, why shouldn’t he and others from the old country take advantage of it?

 

Well the first thing is filter carefully who you listen to on this site. Let's just say there are some people that you know when the party has started because the pooper will show up.

You've got everything going for you. If you want to go into this business for yourself there's no reason for you not to do it. You are actively working at a trucking company dispatching trucks. I think most owner operators never saw that side of the business and probably even most Fleet owners haven't seen that side of the business really before they started.

Everyone comes into this with different strengths and weaknesses. You see what the trucks do you see the problems they encounter you see the problems the driver's call you with you see the day-to-day operation. You just need to fill in the blanks of whatever knowledge you need that you don't have.

Understand that most people fail in this business for two reasons. By far the first is they run out of money. Often they'll put 5% down on a truck and finance colossal payments and buy a brand new trailer and of course buy the Big Pete with the big cat with the big chicken lights with the big payment and they end up going broke in a big way. Bad choices like that will do it. Some have one big break down and that's it they can't fix it because they don't have the money. Some buy the truck during the expensive times and then when times get lean they have a big payment and they can't make it.

The second reason is responsibility. I really think there are people out there that just think if they buy a truck and put a tag on it they think they are rich. Some work for a while and then they'll take time off and work a little bit and take more time off and work a little bit and take more time off and more time off and they don't have enough money. Or they work for nothing and they don't make enough money. Or they make a little money and decide to buy a Corvette and buy their girlfriend diamonds and things like that. The responsible people take seriously what they're doing and they make their money and put it in the bank and make sure they have it for when they need it.

You are a mechanic. My advice to you is to start out with one truck and learn the mechanical aspects of maintaining that truck and buy a garage rent a garage build a garage whatever you have to do but set yourself up that you can do all of your own repairs. Going from working on cars to working on trucks isn't that different it's all still mechanical knowledge. You just have to see how it works and you'll be fine.

Start with one truck that you drive yourself and run it make your money. Don't be in a hurry to grow. It's going to take you at least three trucks with drivers in them to make what you will make driving your own truck. When you are ready to make that leap you can do it and then you'll have the garage that you can service and maintain and repair the other trucks that you will have. You can start to look at and think about having someone help you or however it is that you're going to do this.

But again with the money. Because you're going to have to have three trucks that either are paid for or they have a payment. You're going to have at least three trailers that you're going to have a payment on or you're going to have to pay for. You're going to have three trucks that are out on the road with other people running them that any time they could have a catastrophic failure that you're going to have to pay for. You're going to have three trucks that you have to put tags on you have to put tires on and you have to pay insurance on which that in and of itself could stagger you if you don't know what that costs. And you're going to have drivers that you're going to pay before you get paid. And if you don't get paid you still have to pay them and you still have to be able to keep going.

And this is another reason why people go broke is because they want to have a fleet and they start buying more trucks and they start expanding and they really don't have the money to do it.

So if you wanted to start a small Fleet that's the way that you go about it. You may even decide you like just having your own truck and maintaining it because when you have other people running your equipment your maintenance costs are going to exponentially multiply. On top of that it's very difficult to find drivers and you may even with three trucks have one or two trucks sit occasionally or even maybe regularly who knows?

But once you get past the point that you had three then you can multiply that to four or five and then if you want to multiply that once that's under control you can do that to whatever size you're really looking for if that's really what you want to do.

Read through all these different forums the answers are all here. All the answers are here for how to bid on freight the answers are here for how to get your CDL the answers are here for how to deal with Brokers the answers are here for mechanical repairs. Think about what you don't know and ask questions and like I said read through the threads because there is a lot of information here.

And do like we all do at the party when you're having a good time. When you see the pooper go the other way.

You'll be fine.