TQL - "What kind of a rate would you need to make that work?"

Two problems with lumber is that the margins aren't great, and there's a hell of a lot of it that's just sitting around waiting to be moved. Just judging on some of the load lists I've seen, they're not in any great hurry to move any of it, either.

 

That last part is the crucial part. When a customer really truly doesn't care when something moves they actually do get a better rate for that... from a broker who isn't me.

Yeah I'm not going to spend my life making 75 phone calls per load cover for a 150 dollar profit that actually goes all the way through MAYBE 50% of the time.

Anyone who wants to do that is basically saying they're fine with being spit on constantly all day for 15 bucks an hour tops.

 

250 miles paying $500. $2.00 per mile
Brokers: I don't have to go out of my way to beat those prices.

 

Something I have noticed. Anything that is produced on a massive production line, lumber, brick, shingles. Doesn't pay good.

Other thing I noticed. Good paying freight is not in major citys where interstates are close by. Want good paying freight off the loadboard, don't look in big citys

 

The freight market runs off supply and demand, and the cities demand a lot of incoming trucks to meet their daily needs.

Let's imagine a world that is just a square map with a giant city in the middle. All of the raw materials and some of the raw material processing happens outside the city and everything else happens inside the city. The city is going to demand all of the raw materials for its factories, all the consumer goods for its citizens, and that stuff is going to be 300-400% of what is coming out in terms of freight size. The actual value of the product flowing out of the city might well be higher (a truck load of cell phones is worth ~50-500 loads of potatoes... and I really doubt they are optimizing the heck out of a shipment of cell phones in terms of space and weight used) but the square footage and weight of the freight will be substantially lower.

The result of this is that squareworlds freight market will look a lot like FL vs the rest of the country. Freight rates into the great square city are probably going to be in the 3-4 dollar a mile range and rates coming back out will be lucky to see a dollar a mile long term. This doesn't mean there will be 'no money in trucking in squareworld 2018' it just means the market is paying people most of the money to go into the city instead of come back out.

Now obviously in the real world cities are different. My city for instance is Louisville, KY and we generate an unholy amount of freight here. In fact so do most of the cities in our region. (I'm speaking of OH, PA, MO, IL, WI, IN, TN, GA, MN, IA so not a small region at all) This is more than made up for by the various cities that produce almost no freight at all because their dominant industries produce highly finished goods or just plain services.

But yes the best freight markets in the country are usually areas with LOTS of production but very few people. There are a few agricultural areas with hot seasons that are very very hot. But of course the market corrects for that by making the rates going into these areas pay terrible lol.

 

I called the loadboard one day I had a question. Where does the loadboard get its rates for "lanes"?
They said factoring company invoices.

The supply and demand is basied on statistics of how busy a "lane" is and what it pays.

Are you going to MATS?

 

I might. I have a tendency to tell myself I'm going to something like MATS and then just stay home when the actual day comes.

 

We really like the Spaghetti Factory.

 

You can do even better in Louisville. It's turned into quite a food city the last few years.

 

I agree, every time I'm here I try something new. Have you tried Jeff Ruby's steakhouse at 4th & Main st? Excellent.