The art and theory of deadheading. Thoughts and Opinions.

I used to add all miles, loaded & empty together & worry about the mileage rate I ran for. I have since changed the way I look at my loads. I have a daily revenue that needs to be covered. If I'm looking to dead head 250 miles to get a load then I know it's going to cost about $50 to go get the load. I subtract that amount from the revenue the load pays & then figure my loaded rate using the "new" revenue amount. My time had to be accounted for as well. The load I'm picking up has to cover my daily revenue quota for the day I'm dead heading & the days I'm under the load.

In the above scenario it makes sense to dead head if the "back haul" load is going to cost you too much time.

 

I'm genuinely trying to figure out why you don't consider all miles while figuring your end of the week numbers. It didn't cost you $50 to dead head, it cost you the exact same amount as when your under a load, minus your difference in fuel economy. So your not going to pay yourself either when dead head?

Really IMO you have to look at total revenue divided by total miles to see what you averaged for that week. Like you said, you also have to look at total time took to do the load and make sure your getting your minimum revenue goal for that day too. Using these two methods together will help you find your sweet spot and balance out how many miles you run per week. If rate per mile is too high, your miles will be lowish. If your revenue goal per day is looking high, you may be running too many miles and can find you may reduce your revenue a tad, but can run a lot less miles on your equipment.

It's a happy medium I have found. This generally is around 1800 to 2800 miles per week for most people.

Does that make sense? I feel like I'm rambling. haha

 

Yes it makes sense. I look at it like this- say I want to make $1000 a day. So if I'm going to make a long dead head to get a load that's going to pretty much kill one day then the load I pick up needs to average $1000 a day including the day I made the dead head & the days I spend running the load. By figuring it this way the truck expenses are covered including the dead head. As far as truck costs, my truck costs $75 a day minus fuel, whether it moves or not. So even taking this into consideration, if I dead head 500 miles & it takes all day it costs me $100 in fuel + $75 I truck expenses. It's kinda strange the way I look at my numbers but to me it makes sense I feel it gives me a better picture of whether or not I'm running profitably.

No, I don't pay myself for empty miles. I pay myself a % of the revenue after expenses.

 

See, that's why I look at it similar to you. I don't pay myself per mile, I pay myself a salary, regardless of how much I work or if I work at all.

 

I pay myself the same salary every month throughout the year. I'm an employee of the s corp and include per diem as part of my pay package.. I send in my taxes due from my salary every month as well. I learned my lesson a long time ago with the tax man

 

Hmmm, well I think end of day the same conclusion is drawn so whatever works best for you is all that matters.

If I was going off your way, I think I'd flip it around and put my projected dead head onto the amount I needed when booking the load. Vs having your next load pay for your current dead head. So you could be like ok it's a 600 mile run into a crappy area, I better factor in 250 miles of dead head. So I'll quote it based on 850 miles plus whatever extra time requirements may be involved. Atleast this way all your miles get figured on the total cost to operate vs just what fuel costs. Your time is factored to boot.

Just my random thoughts. Haha.

Edit: Also I'm assuming you must be running more specialty vs standard dry van. That probably is a big reason we're accomplishing the same thing two different ways. We DH extremely little but all dry van and a small amount of reefer here.

 

I found that regardless of the method I used to do my figuring the money left over after my expenses was the same. Lol.

I like the idea of the customer paying my dead head instead of me. Lol.

I don't pull specialized van freight but I don't pull a lot of typical van freight either. Not much toilet paper & shampoo. Lol. About half my freight is flatbed freight that they load in a van, tractors, excavators, plywood, forklifts, etc... I do haul van specific freight but not much of the same type of freight I moved when I was leased to Schneider.

 

I'll deadhead overnight 600-700 miles to get out of a dead area. Did it a couple of weeks ago from MA over to OH. Do it almost every time I go to FL. You have to score at the end of that deadhead or it was wasted. Sometimes it's a miss. You're not going to win every time but I never have regrets whenever I do it.

It's kind of funny how this works but my biggest regrets and the most problems I had were always with low paying loads. But anyways, I'll think nothing of deadhead in 300 or 400 miles in fact that's pretty typical on a Friday going home for the weekend. Guys will say that is foolish and some money back is better than none.

I've lost count of how many times that I've deadhead ed like that and ended up scoring very well at the end of it. I don't do it to pound my chest and chant say no to cheap freight like a hero. Time is money and IMO it's foolish to waste time with brokers, shippers & receivers who do not and will not respect your time. In my experience those cheap loads bridging gaps almost always cost valuable time/opportunity.

 

Not sure I'm following you but you take the 400 mile run at a $1000 and return empty,then I take the 400 mile run for a $1000 and pu 400 mile back for just $500.you have to run 3 trips to make $3000 while I only ran 2.You don't have to be to intelligent to figure out who is doing better.

 

As long as that $500 back haul doesn't cause problems & delays that keep you from getting the second run made. Or maybe he gets a 4th load that week because he doesn't have the extra time involved with loading/unloading the back haul.