Self Brokered vs 3rd Party Brokered...

I've seen other owner ops hauling the same freight as me while I'm on a direct/non broker load and I was getting exactly double the rate as the guy hauling off the loadboard. Very few guys run direct freight and even fewer run only direct freight.

 

I always assumed the Big Carriers had all Direct Freight. I worked a while for a Mega as an O/O. I was only at any of their Terminals, maybe 7 times in 7 yrs. They would answer almost any question asked by a Driver. They said 50% of their Freight is Brokered. Very high same day bookings, to maximize revenue. Explained why Drivers sat all day, getting a short trip late, running all night to deliver. Also explained how they could service their valued Customers despite high turnover. Plenty of available Drivers, running extra Brokered Freight, weeding out the good and bad. The better Drivers getting dedicated runs if they wanted, usually staying. others would get starved out, used and abused till they quit. More where they came from.

 

I run a lot of direct freight.
But usually call 2-3 brokers to get me back, (same ones, i’ve dealt with for couple years) but if not my rates are exclusive so it pays out and back anyway.
One thing I learned dealing with tankers.
If i could just get them to pay for washout it’d be great.

 

the reason Mega’s run such a high volume of broker freight is capacity. Say they have a contract with Walmart, that contract might specify 500 dedicated trucks with the need for a maximum of 1,500 trucks within X time frame.

Now they don’t find 1,000 broker loads for tomorrow and put them trucks on that Walmart account for as long as needed.

That is the huge advantage mega’s have over a smaller trucking company is shear capacity. They can dedicate X number of trucks for normal day to day transfer of goods, and triple it on very short notice. A lot of times that is how they secure contracts.

i watched this go down years ago when i worked for a company that had roughly 100 company trucks and another 25-30 O/O’s. The owner was on the phone when i walked in, his door open. He told the person on the end of the phone of 25% of his fleet was kept available for high volume times. And assured him that we could always have a truck available at a moments notice.

One thing i always hated when it rolled around around to me was that he did always leave at least two trucks at home & on call per day. He never told us he did that, but it was clear as day, even when we were busy you’d see a couple trucks parked in the yard in the middle of the day.

 

That's how a lot of places roll. I don't agree with it but on their end that's what they do Incase one of their big money accounts call last minute they don't wanna say no we don't have a truck today so they hold a few guys back