From an experienced person that's owned most of the trucks I've driven, a walk away lease can be a good learning experience to find out if owning is really what you want. There is a huge difference between driving, and having to make all the decisions an owner-operator has to on a daily basis in order to stay in business. If you have a walk away lease, and find owning is just too much headache for the return, just turn in your truck and leave. If you own and want to quit, you're stuck with a truck payment and a truck.
I don't turn down loads based on weight either.My criteria are more on where is it picking up and delivering. Also special comments. I've turned them down when they read things like '1 service failure for every minute late', or 'late load will be assessed $500 fee', or 'more than 5 miles per hour at this customer will result in a service failure'. The second thing I'm looking for is whether it is a JIT load, I want to make sure if I take it that it will be a slam dunk. If I have been awake all day hitting macro 30 every hour on the hour then at 1700 they send me a load offer, pickup at 1800 100 miles away and deliver 0500 500 miles away, I'm thinking not lol. Plus, why do they hold on to loads like this all day long? If they had sent it to me say at noon, I could have prepared by taking a good nap.... I look at terrain too, trying to adjust my strategy to avoid mountains. Weather too, generally avoid the whole state of Colorado, and the little section of I80 through Wyoming unless it is the only way to get home. Pennsylvania and West Virginia are on my 'avoid' list as well. If there's a hurricane, tornado, earthquake, fire, snow and ice in the lane they are trying to send me to, that is a major factor in whether I would take that load.
Thnx for the info guys. Right now my plan is to lease a truck around march. The recruiter in phoenix said their new equipment would be arriving by then, and the slow season along with horrible weather will just about be over. Until then im studying my loads, and getting familiar with fuel prices around the country. Since there is no exact formula for picking loads, I take it there has to be a mpg threshold for l/o's . For example, I just finished pulling a 39,300 lbs load from CA to Denver, CO. Got 6.1 mpg. As a l/o I would have turned it down because the delivery time was about 3.5 days. But based on the mpg would that load have been profitable enough? What would be the minimum mpg before you guys say "no way I aint taking that load"?
something with that time frame...definate no(unless i was feeling lazy)...u just never know what your mpg will be until u are done with that load....but ca to denver co...in december?....definate no...39300 thru the rockies...definate no....knowing i will get 6.1 mpg definate no...that load would be for the most part a real loser for a swift l/op....wouldnt touch it with a 10 ft pole...let the company drivers take it...I mean it is a nice drive...got nothing against the route,the road or anything in between....just not profitable to me at all...
This time of the year, a definate no going over 15 and 70 from CA to denver. That much weight, I know what my truck would have been getting, and it would have not been good. You also have to really pay attention to the load info, and not to like I did on this one. It picked up on a Thursday. When I looked at it I was thinking that it was Friday, so 1550 miles between Friday and Monday would have been great. All in all, I have been lazy this week, so not having to push it. Also it is going back to the east coast which I avoid at all costs. With the mountains and hills from where I am at until first stop in VA, I will be lucky to avg 7 mpg. I know why I was given this pplan. Home for Christmas so they are keeping me close to home now.
Here's my take on this: I just delivered a 40,000 load from Aurora, NE to Shafter, CA. 1471 loaded miles/123 MT. I KNEW that wasn't gonna get good mileage running this weight on this route, but I wanted out of Nebraska BAD and I actually like running out west so it took me less than 3 minutes to decide to take the load. I had to bust my tail to get it here on time and now I'm stuck near Bakersfield. I got 6.7 MPG for the trip, pretty good considering the route and weight. I burnt 239 gallons total (MT & loaded). Had I gotten 8 MPG I would have only burnt 200 gallons. Call the difference $150.00. Despite burning the extra fuel I still made money on this trip and in fact have already "broken even" for the week.
P.S. Not everyone gets to haul 8,000 MT aluminum can loads out of Golden to SoCal. I got 9.1 MPG with that load!
