Trucker owner operators?

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Just a few #'s for ya . On the AVERAGE year we run about 2800+ miles a week hauling anhydrous, ( some weeks more some weeks less) at $4.25 a mile is around $11,900 a week X 8 weeks is only $95,200 before expenses . Take out the expenses and you've made a good chunk of change. This year there was quite a bit more hauling to do and why I don't know. I'm just giving #'s for an average year, but use these same #'s but use 16 weeks instead and you still come up with some cash after expenses.

At one point in time about 7years or so ago the trucks were barely making their payments. We ran cattle and farmed in the summer and drove over the road with them in the winter. We did haul some good paying loads only to lose that money hauling a load just for fuel to get moving or to get home or even worse was bouncing empty to get a load that only paid fuel. Things needed to change and that is exactly what we did. We changed our way of doing business with the trucks. They have been very profitable since, we even have up graded to newer trucks. We no longer do over the road, it was a loosing game.

Many people in our home town have wondered the same thing you are .. how do they do it. Why haul for just fuel or just a payment . You can bet if our trucks are moving they are making cash! I see it getting tougher this next year do to the cost of fuel, but our trucks are paid for and are not our main source of income so they can sit.

We have donated our trucks time and fuel to help out after Hurricane Katrina. We hauled sheet rock from North Dakota to New Orleans to help rebuild churches. We also have donated our time and fuel to haul donated food to Churches on different Indian Reservations through out the country. I my opinion our trucks income has been blessed. The good Lord knows he's going to get it back in time of need.
 
We've got one semi to haul our own grain and feed with . Around here you can't make enough money hauling grain to starve to death on .

Larry
 
Who said $8.50 a loaded mile??? You guys are looking for a fault that isn't there. 2800 loaded miles X $4.25 ??? pretty simple guys. If you are not making money with your truck park it and drive for someone who is . This is ND it is in the middle of now where . Check out the price for hauling oil field pipe from Texas to ND. It's really good money but there are no loads going out of here. Gets back to makeing good money just to loose it trying to find a load just to pay for fuel, to many guys haul just to haul. If your not making money hauling grain quit, if we don't get a certain price they can call someone else. This has happened and that someone else is usually only in business a year or two because he's hauling for a payment and fuel. If our trucks don't move agian this year or even next big deal they have already paid for them selves.
 
What are you able to snap your fingers and you magically appear back at the pipeline terminal to reload? Or maybe you have a backhaul of NH3 to the terminal.
 
i know 25yrs ago we used to make dang good money running dump trucks.we would work them 6 to 7 months a year laying asphalt on the roads.an we had all the work we wanted for several years.an made some dang good money.with todays high fuel costs youd be doing good to clear $100 to $150 a day after fuel.depending on how good the job paid.
 
ND Angus":3i2otcmo said:
Who said $8.50 a loaded mile??? You guys are looking for a fault that isn't there. 2800 loaded miles X $4.25 ??? pretty simple guys. If you are not making money with your truck park it and drive for someone who is . This is ND it is in the middle of now where . Check out the price for hauling oil field pipe from Texas to ND. It's really good money but there are no loads going out of here. Gets back to makeing good money just to loose it trying to find a load just to pay for fuel, to many guys haul just to haul. If your not making money hauling grain quit, if we don't get a certain price they can call someone else. This has happened and that someone else is usually only in business a year or two because he's hauling for a payment and fuel. If our trucks don't move agian this year or even next big deal they have already paid for them selves.

Know little about trucking but if you run 2800 loaded miles hauling anhydrous then you also run another 2800 miles hauling "sailboat fuel'... (air...empty)..right?? How do you run 5600 miles a week legally?? That's 800 miles a day for one driver working 7 days a week. he can't legally drive that long. I think you need to go crunch some more numbers. And oil field pipe? I'm trying to visualize that on a tanker. And parked trucks whether paid for or not are pure dead weight. Don't let them sit too long. They won't be worth scrap.
 
Did I say legally?? or even illegal?? When we MOVE we MOVE!!! 2800 LOADED MILES yes that would mean about 5000 to 6000 miles WEEKLY!! but for only a very short time. In North Dakota if you are hauling AG BASED products and you are the owner/operator you are not required to keep a log so that makes us LEGAL. When the truck leaves the terminal we "buy " the load of anhydrous making it ours then we can drive how ever long we want LEGALLY. We don't haul oil field pipe, you need to learn how to read things a little more carefully . We have been asked to go do it but there is nothing to haul out of ND to even get us close to Texas and besides Cattle is our main business. Like I said earlier you guys are looking for something that isn't there... Jealous I guess . We make money . By the comments and anal questions here it is no wonder you guys can't make a living driving truck.

That last comment was rude but I call it like I see it . I worked as a fleet manager for a MAJOR company for 11 years. I was in charge of over 100 trucks and drivers . I know how to make efficent cash.

I'm done with this topic.

Good luck truck'n
 
Well toot your horn J.B. Hunt cause I think everyone eles is thinking "huh?????" .... :lol: :lol: :lol: Say it enough and even you will begin to believe it. If I could make that kind of money with a few trucks I'd sell the cattle, double the number of trucks and sit on my butt and let somebody else make me a living. Sounds like you've found your niche in ND.
 
ND Angus":zfx3sa69 said:
Did I say legally?? or even illegal?? When we MOVE we MOVE!!! 2800 LOADED MILES yes that would mean about 5000 to 6000 miles WEEKLY!! but for only a very short time.
So now you are down to $2.12 per mile yep your gettin rich now.
ND Angus":zfx3sa69 said:
When the truck leaves the terminal we "buy " the load of anhydrous making it ours then we can drive how ever long we want LEGALLY.
I don't care if you buy it or not it is still a reportable quantity of a Hazardous material requiring placarding and hazmat insurance on file with the FMCSA. Care to provide us with your MC number? Oh thats right you first claimed you leased on to someone else to haul anhydrous now you buy it and don't lease on to anyone. US Dot number or MC number will do wonders to seperate the wheat from the chaff on this one.
 

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