Life on the Road – Trucking News Blog

Times are tough they say. Truckers must haul any available load, no matter what the rate, just to stay in business they say.

Bull.

Now with higher prices and higher operating expenses it’s even more important to “Just say no to cheap freight”. What’s more it’s not immediately apparent which load is the cheap one.

To illustrate my point I’ll go over the mistake I made last week.

Dispatch offered me a load out of Morris Illinois going to Jacksonville Florida. I was in LaSalle Illinois so there was minimal deadhead. I was notified Thursday evening so I could easily load Friday and deliver Monday. It was to pay the truck about twenty-five hundred dollars for an easy. weekend. The load was a sure thing so I said I’d think about it overnight.

Friday morning bright and early Dispatch came up with an even “better load”. Three hundred mile deadhead to Cuba Missouri and pick up a similar (weights, dimensions and like that) load going to Miami Florida for over twice as much. Fifty Five hundred to the truck.

Which is the better deal?

Yeah. I guessed wrong too. I should have taken the first one. Easy load at the CatHouse in Morris Illinois, Easy run that I’ve run a dozen times, easy unload at the best port on the Atlantic. Possibly reload right there the same day or the next day.

I went for the big bux. Three hundred miles to Cuba, load and roll and be in Miami by Monday if I made all the connections. If I missed them (curfews, hours of operation, weekend restrictions) I’d still be there about Tuesday.

Bad move.

As it happened a LOT went wrong.  I was several days longer getting the load delivered AND I had to deadhead a loooooooooong way for the next load.

Pick your freight.