The struggle is when loads are slow or one guy reads his CPM different than others understand. The fact is that loaded or not a truck makes money on percentages. If it is off the road 40% of the year cause his loads paid .20, .30 cents higher than the guy who runs steady at lower rates because that's what he can get... 90% of 100% pays better than 60% when the bottom dollar hit the end of the barrel.

Buyers and brokers acting and charging as well as companies charging fees... we all hate to see extra cost in an industry that takes so much out of every dollar driven and worked for, but it's the drivers choice if he is willing to pay 3-10% of the shipping fee to have any revenue on the truck for the miles he will be driving anyway! Does anyone here really need the practiuce driving?! No, so it is a choice, park it and so no to the load or find a way to see if that load pay works. If it doesn't for any numerous reasons, than the smart choice is no load. Good equipment can only stay good if you can afford to keep it that way....

the loads right now are cheap everybody needs to park there trucks and go haul something that pays better  like everyone else on here we havent hauled a load in months cause the rates are too cheap you got those back door trucks coming in cutting you rates on your territoy and you got other people on here posting loads they dont have just to tie a truck up for the day.

They are cheap. But pushing frieght isn't better. At this point who has the money??? I have equipment that won't sell and looking for other equipment when that does to satisfy a low mile paying contract that guarrenties my company over $100K on one dirrection of my haul.... But like everyone else. I have the time to sit and read this because the phone only rings for the things I can't use or don't need.... sometime it doen't even relate to starting my truck!!

By the way anyone have a 47 or 48 foot with sheep rails they want to lease???

If you can stay loaded at 2.40 per mile at 100 miles that is 240 dollars and if you look the loads are still there for a back haul.  Theoretically if you can even get close to the same area on a back haul in this case you would be making the same as a one way load paying 4.80 a mile. The rates I have been seeing dont hold a stick to 4.80 so the guys that wont haul it if it doesnt pay 2.80 to 3.00 a mile but wont look for a back haul are screwing themselves making on average 1.40 to 1.50 a running mile when they could be making 2.00+. You do the math it all comes down to average a running mile doesnt matter what the load pays. You have to be smart enough to know if it is worth it to take a load or not. Not everyone can be a dispatcher, there is a lot more work in it then you think. 

Rates do suck!!! These brokers are taking money that deserve to go to the truck. However if you dont use them someone will.  You might as well get used to that or look for a new job. Use the brokers stay hooked up with loads, THIS MEANS USE SEVERAL BROKERS IF YOU HAVE TO, eliminate deadhead miles at low rates and pay per mile increases. It is that simple. Dont let a broker hold on to you for too long or they will stick you with some load that they claim is a BACK HAUL. And the rate will suck.  In most cases their backhaul load was probably charged by them as a regular load making them a killing and screwing the one that actually did the work.

I just don't see how a person can get the good rate the other guy was talking about. You can't haul these 2.20 a mile loads and average over 2.00 a mile unless you haul a load and set their a couple of days or weeks to load something else that close to keep you over 2.00 a mile. I wont let a truck set . I have not seen that many loads on here you could make work without setting a week.

Per mile figues are all based on one thing. Not the single load but load averages over a period of time. I know in my area, guys moving 65K loads on short hall were getting up to $7 per mile. Now if that moves in a regular route or round, then some get half that because it is contract cattle moving pretty much all year. The areas you travel have alot to do with your markets from beginning to end. However just because the cattle trade lower doen't meet you haul for less (like the other half of my company I just shut down after a decade), but the buyers and sellers are under contract with their order buyers or market sales yards, and they seem to trust only them to get your truck and pay then direct instead of you. Now we all know everyone has to make a buck today. It has always been the rancher gets the last of the wagon of good nad moneys, but in reality... it's the truck securing the ranches best inerest by safely moving the sensitive commidities to get all involved parties paid!!!

 Bottom line.. no trucks...no bucks. Cattle drive just aren't easily done over any distance anymore. And believe me I worked a 668 Thousand acre ranch years ago... It took three days of rounding up pairs and seperating to ship out...

Personaly I think the biggest loss for the cow truck (or any livestock for that matter) is more the regulations and exhobinant fines, high insurance, and taxes on the exempt commodity moved!! Let be frank here, stop the trucks and how many would survive on salad and non meat items.. Not ME..

Here's a question for any takers.

How many of you would put a contract to your company to run a truck on a regular weekly route with loads no more than 30K for 115K pay a year for a 1100 mile run each week. $2200 a run....  now backhauls only pay backhaul low rates ... but it makes a 2300 mile week at $3350 week... and those are only 5 months a year right now.

As slow as it is do you take what you can get or....

I have not seen $4.20 a mile here for 48K loads coming from buyers or companies subbing/brokering the loads. Like I said earlier in a post, some 65K loads on 200 mile routes were up at $7 per mile, but that wasn't to me.. I don't run 65K.

Just checking to see what anyone else thinks. That is what this is for. right?

Wow someone does pay attention!  and knows how to add.  You all go park your trucks and we will go haul that cheap freight ourselfs and count our money at the end of the day!!

Good, you go and haul that cheap loads, you are the ones that are killing the rates. I would put my dollars per mile up to your anytime. I am sure you gross as much as I do a year but you are running 75 to 100k miles a year more them me, so you keep doing your math it's all the same to me if it is working for you them good. I stay home with my family while you stay in your truck in a truck stop for days waiting for another cheap load. I'm done with trying to explain that you don't have to haul cut rate loads to make money I give up.

It sure won't take long to count your money you made after expense, couldn't take more them 2 or 3 minutes.

All of the trucks hauling for less than 3.00 need to have their head checked out , Maybe you got kicked or something. The expenses of a cattle truck are greater than any other kind of trucking.    SO  GO  BACK  TO  SCHOOL   AND  LEARN   TO   ADD.   27 years of cattle trucking tells me to stay at home and drink beer .  You can go broke staying at home you dont have buy fuel to do it.  So when your talking to someone about a load . THINK  ABOUT IT .

the last line/sentence in your message makes no sense--------Also to trash a mans name on a public foum also demands you to nut up and give your name as well-----this is one of the things that pisses me off to no end how someone will throw out a name with this kind of info that is hard to verify and prove

your mommy catch you playin on the computer again ????????

The only way to keep a good rate is to reregulate the rates. I got my wyo. authority in 1971 to get a load authority you had to show a need to the state that another hauler was needed and the board that aproved you getting the authority was governed by Wyo. livestock haulers who had to aprove your application . so you would have to hire a lawyer to go before them to prove that your services  were needed and that you had shippers that would use you. Once that you got the authority you were given a book with all the rates in it and if you charged less than what the rate book said you would lose your authority to haul with in the state of Wyo.  This kept all the rates at above break even and was allso regulated by the PSC . I don't remember any brokers back then but the order buyers had to pay full rate and could not bully any one around getting some one to haul it cheaper every body paid the rate that was set by the PSC and the Wyo Livestock haulers . what we need is a strong livestock hauler union that we can regulate a fair rate . now being that Bull Haulers are the most independant of any truckers it would hard to get any body to agree but it would be worth a try to police our selves and only haul only profitable loads and set our own price instead of the packer telling you what they are going to pay I wish I could go to the parts store and tell them what Iam going to pay or the macanic or the fuel stop . we are independant business's not hourly employee's .

alot has changed  sence 1971 and I respect  your words.   but  I dont agree that we need to have our  job regulated  by the gov. or anyone else  that is what I feel is my reason is for becoming an o/o. So I could do my own thing charge what I want work when I want ect.   please dont understand  I'm awhere that there are alot of  stuff  ( cows, grain toilet paper ect )  getting hauled very very cheap right now,  but that is supply and demand .    A  good friend and buyer told me that the cow numbers (stock cow) is the lowest it has been sence 1956.    I did web search and found  that it is as low as 1951.  all I am trying to say it is slow the #'s are down times are getting thin.    If you been out there sence 1971 or more you've seen this before as so have I.  WE will get though this slow time as before,  but some will not , and that is sad but thats is life and it will go on.   please dont take what I have said to make anyone mad  but that is what  I think about it.    To all have great day and try to find good things to do and work smart thanks for your time

  As a broker  I will post a 'fack' load going west and tell the caller I just covered it, just  so I know how little I will have to pay the truck going east by how many calls I get wanting the 'fack'load. That  is how internet trucking works.

Backhaul rate, I guess somebody figured that driving west instead of east or north instead of south or vice versa their truck used less fuel loaded and the tires wore better and the stock put less shit in the trailer and the floors in the trailer wore less and they loaded easier or something is why it can be done cheaper.  The way I look at it is loaded miles are loaded miles, bounce miles are bounce miles.  Lots of people complain about the rates going into these packing houses, dont blame the packer, blame the asshole that loaded the cheap load in the first place and all the followers that keep doing it.  This will never happen because too many people are not willing to work together but if nobody "backhauled" a load or hauled the cheap stuff, the shippers would have to pay more, its just that simple in my eyes and I think during the fall run it shows.  I dont think it will ever change because when one cut rate goes broke, 10 more are in line waiting to get started.  You cheap trucks and brokers keep doing your thing screwing yourselves out of money and others as well. 

No I am not here just to talk "trash", this is a discussion forum and as I understand it, that means it is a place for people to put in thier 2 cents.  People can talk about stuff and get other peoples opinions.  Is that all you are doing here is trash talk?  This time of year there isnt much on the board that pays worth a shit, but when the run starts in the fall there is quite a bit that pays well but I see you joined only a month and a half ago so I guess you wouldnt know that.  Rates are cheap now because people are willing to cut rates and run for a backhaul rate just to keep moving.  When there gets to be more loads shippers will have to pay decent rates again to get the trucks that arent hauling the cheap shit, simple as that.

I agree with you that backhauling and packing houses are bullshit, but have you seen one load on here worth the rate? I havent. Do you just pay to be on here so that you can talk trash on this forum?

well said thank you

Everyone seems to be forgetting something in this discussion.  We(the United States) are a "free market" economy.  Most all business have the right to set the prices of their service or product at a price they deem acceptable for their own business structure.  If not, we all would be doing the same thing for the same rate.  As an example, look at grocery stores.  There are Sam's, Costco, Walmart, Kroger, Publix, Food Lion, A & P, smaller regional stores, and even small one location single owner stores.  Not all of them sell a loaf of Wonder bread or a T-Bone steak for the same price and many of them have managed to stay in business and make money for many years.  They all have different business structures and different customers and niche markets they serve.  None of them are too high or low in their markets, they are right for each of their own markets/niche.  Not all grocery store customers want the exact same products/services.  This is where the grocery store creates their OWN value in the customers perception.  The value may mean low prices, having a bag boy, open 24 hrs.,having cashiers who know the customer personally, customers wanting to spend their money with a local business.  The list goes on and on but that loaf of Wonder bread is being sold at many different prices.  Back to livestock hauling.  We all have different strengths and weaknesses that make our individual businesses unique.  Our job as business owners is to know these and to use them to create value in the customers perception of us and turn that into a successful business.  What the other man does pertains to his business, NOT mine!!!  I look after my own six feet.  I will find customers that want the value MY business creates at a price that is acceptable to me and my customer.  There will always be cheaper and more expensive livestock haulers.  If history repeats itself, many of the cheap haulers will not be around for an extended period of time.  There is a new tribe every year.  Relax, have confidence in yourself, your business skills and have faith in whatever God you worship.  I know that's easier to say or write than to practice.  I wish everyone good fortune in the coming season.

I am glad to here that someone finally used the word business.  It is not a game, it is a business.  I will set the rates to make my business work and make my clients profitable.  If they are profitible they will stay in business and make my business more profitible.  Thanks for the great words.

yes they all want a deal and they all cut off the top the packing houses are paying 315 to 325 per mile and i was offered 250 per mile so where is the diffrance in the pockets of a broker how is not even lisenced as a broker

What a thing to admit to--------you would be a bottom feeder in the freight world.SHORT LIVED

I agree and want to do my own thing to but the states and fed regulate and Tax us to death and then Tax your family if you do have any thing left when you die the sad truth of it is that we are all working for the goverment just think about it they tell you how much you can haul how long you can work when you have to sleep where you can smoke . we as truck drivers are treated worse than any other crimnals the fines they give us are more than rapist or theives if you get put out of service at some out of the way check station you are denied food and water and toilets they cant do this to a mass murderer if we get put out of service for what ever reson we have less rights than a prisoner of war . United we stand devided we fall is  about it . there is a film on You Tube called the Obahma Deception every one should watch this and will give you some insite of what is going on with our America as long as every one does  their own thing then they can pick us off one by one .