Trying to buy package of routes
- Thread starter BusVenture1
- Start date
Indeed. They make certain that you have as close to zero legal recourse as possible when it comes to taking measures to protect your investment in response to their moves to terminate you and that lack of recourse begins to knaw at you after awhile .In fact one of the primary drivers of the creation of RPS was to provide Roadway with a means to divest itself of as much risk. liability. and variable costs as possible. In fact it wasn't until 1994 that Roadway under the threat of an IRS lawsuit finally granted us goodwill giving us a chance to sell and get out with a little bit of cash to settle up with our creditors but up until then the economic loss from termination was all yours to bear.
My $22000 per year on trucks was a low conservative amount, and didn't include maintenance- just depreciation based on someone's estimate of 60 miles per day. Figure depreciation of about 15 year max in real life while being driven hard. A lot less for box trucks/vans. So a mixed fleet might have an average life of 12 years MAX. A mixed fleet might average $60k in vehicle cost. Over 12 years, that comes out to more like $5000 average per vehicle.
And my 8 drivers per 5 routes was a little high, except for the one time it isn't. I think that if you can staff with people who WANT to work less than 40 hours, maybe half your drivers, you have a lot of flexibility when you do have a staffing issue. You can have them work a little extra each if you end up short, and during peak. I don't know what a manager for 5-10 routes would make, but as soon as your manager has the title of manager, he/she wil be looking for a real job with benefits with a decent resume.
And you will be like other owners very fast- just dreading the day when the inevitable problems do come up. You might have a mgr quit and a couple drivers absent at the same time, a driver will get 'FED-UP' about 10AM and just walk off the job maybe leaving the truck unlocked in the middle of downtown.
So many things can go wrong that putting your own money up is in my opinion just stupid. If you could get the previous owner to finance 80% for the first couple years, with a balloon due then, you should by then know if it is worth risking your nest egg. You will have some carrying costs, but that is cheap insurance. Too many risks to make a giant leap like you are considering. Even if you can find a lender, worst case is bankruptcy, and you can protect your cash. Waking up every day dreading that something is going to go wrong, even if not today, is no way to live.
And my 8 drivers per 5 routes was a little high, except for the one time it isn't. I think that if you can staff with people who WANT to work less than 40 hours, maybe half your drivers, you have a lot of flexibility when you do have a staffing issue. You can have them work a little extra each if you end up short, and during peak. I don't know what a manager for 5-10 routes would make, but as soon as your manager has the title of manager, he/she wil be looking for a real job with benefits with a decent resume.
And you will be like other owners very fast- just dreading the day when the inevitable problems do come up. You might have a mgr quit and a couple drivers absent at the same time, a driver will get 'FED-UP' about 10AM and just walk off the job maybe leaving the truck unlocked in the middle of downtown.
So many things can go wrong that putting your own money up is in my opinion just stupid. If you could get the previous owner to finance 80% for the first couple years, with a balloon due then, you should by then know if it is worth risking your nest egg. You will have some carrying costs, but that is cheap insurance. Too many risks to make a giant leap like you are considering. Even if you can find a lender, worst case is bankruptcy, and you can protect your cash. Waking up every day dreading that something is going to go wrong, even if not today, is no way to live.
Star B
White Lightening
he's NYC, he could be doing one hi-rise or something.
i dunno, twelve routes covers 1200 sqmi out by me.
dvalleyjim
Well-Known Member
HaHaHaHaHa. 3 drivers for one truck. The one that's quitting, the one that's driving, and the one that your waiting for FedEx to tell you he's approved to drive 3 months after you hired him! I love that!
dvalleyjim
Well-Known Member
I agree, it can be good. I loved my business for the most part until 2008 when they changed my contract to the precursor of the ISP<CSP (what ever their lawyers call it now). You burned out in 3 years. I did it for 18!
Max driving distance for one of my routes is 20 miles.
1200 sq miles wasn't even even one of my routes. 5 towns spaced 10-20 miles apart, 400 or more driven miles daily with 40-50 stops taking 10 hours. Peak was about 70 stops in a reduced area taking 12+ hours. After I was replaced, they needed to add another route AND shift stops over to ground drivers. Contractor they replaced me with lasted less than 2 months. Manager thought I was lazy and hated paying me to deliver 40 stops. I tried to explain that 400 miles at even 50 mph was 8 hours with ZERO stops, but route had dirt roads, out and back of 20 miles to make one stop, etc.
dvalleyjim
Well-Known Member
dmac1. They are idiots. These rural routes eat time. They want you to drive 90 mph to each stop but the roads are too rough. I obey all traffic laws and don't piss people off on their farm lanes and residential neighborhood. Now I'm called slow. I just think. You deliver 18 years in Los Angeles be-atches.
It is the most city minded company that ever existed. The largest incorporated borough I covered had a population of 5900 people It was 26 "stem" miles from the terminal.What they didn't understand or realize is that every morning 8 rural mail carriers pulled out of that town's post office and went out and serviced it's 480 rural mail carrier system . It was just part of the 34 zip code 3600 mile RD carrier network I had to try to cover in a day. When they started cuffing me around I told them...."you never factored in the RD's! " And roads believe me I understand. Mile upon mile of township trails About 16-17 ft wide with base material ( in places where there was some) was nothing more than a few inches of napped in field stones laid down during The Depression. 15-20 MPH was the best you could do ,the suspension wouldn't take it and if somebody was coming the other way you had to pull over as far as you could get stop and let them go by. In winter with no cross pipes no catch basins and no way to control the run off water would run onto them freeze overnight and for the rest of the winter you had a 3/4 layer of ice. In some places the township made it easy for themselves. They simply posted "No Winter Maintenance Signs" My vindication came when the guy who bought me out had to send 2 full time guys and a half time guy out everyday to cover the area including the 40 mile round trip to do a 4-5 box pickup.....and as a result he's not making a dime in that area.But that's a nationwide carrier for you and the bad goes right along with the good.
It will be fine
Well-Known Member
I've been told by the negotiators that us city folk are dramatically underpaid for the value we produce. They underpay us to subsidize the rural areas because FedEx has to cover the whole country. It's a BS justification to underpay, but there's a kernel of truth to it.
I'd rather sit in a truck on terrible roads than have to ever lift another 149.9 lb box up a 6 floor walk up in 100 degree weather while the customer cracks another "So, you can skip the gym today!" comment. We are always asked why we need to use helpers. The answer is, it is physically impossible to lift some of these packages up 12 sets of stairs to get to Apt 6B. My only other option is leaving it downstairs and risking a $400 complaint.
I have these circle jerk conversations with management all the time. They tell me to give the guy a helper. I tell them I can't afford to send a helper out with 85 stops. And I can't fit the 130 stops in my 1200's anymore because of 50-60 daily ICs so it doesn't pay to put two people on the truck. It's just amazing. Just can't win.
I have these circle jerk conversations with management all the time. They tell me to give the guy a helper. I tell them I can't afford to send a helper out with 85 stops. And I can't fit the 130 stops in my 1200's anymore because of 50-60 daily ICs so it doesn't pay to put two people on the truck. It's just amazing. Just can't win.
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It will be fine
Well-Known Member
That's an easy one for me. Complaints are cheaper than work comp. If the customer won't help it stays on the ground floor.
That may be true and let's assume that it is but you have two things we don't have One, a concentrated revenue pool and two roads with a quality of construction sound enough that you can get away with hauling overloaded without tearing the truck apart. You mentioned your 400,000 mile vehicles. Out here you're lucky to get half that . Once again it's a damn poor setup to begin with, furthermore Sullivan never intended for it to be doing what it's doing today proving once and for all that you're only going to be as successful as the economy of the area you serve.
ISPs are going to need to set themselves up like rural post offices in rural areas. Drive a bigger truck the 'stem miles' from the terminal and transfer packages to smaller, more efficient vehicles. I was almost at that point but fedex took two months to approve the two drivers I was looking to hire, and it came down to fedex not allowing me to let my drivers use their own vehicles. Independent my ass!!!!!
Really? You thought they might actually allow that?
If Express can rent minivans and suv's when short on vehicles then why not let contractors allow certain types of private vehicles to be used?
Some years back at the other end of my state they was staff agency temp who at the end of a day during peak trying to be a" good ol' boy" decided to take an undelivered box and drop it off on his way home in his own car. Sure as the sun comes up in the morning he gets in a wreck with that box still with him. Next day a decree from King Sullivan saying no more of that. In addition who would bear the cost of setting up a substation which would be substantial ? Wasn't going to be X that's for sure but what would be for sure is that they would have complete control over every aspect of the operation and they sure as hell wouldn't want to have to pay the substation contractor enough to keep the operation going.
dvalleyjim
Well-Known Member
Your right! Today I covered a 240 mile route with 72 stops. I told them it will take 7 hours of delivery, 1 1/2 hours to my first stop and back and an hour in the morning until they let me leave. That's an eleven hour day. How the hell is the guy who owns this making money? Oh, by the way, it was 96 packages. My L.A. routes did 100 plus delivery stops, 25 - 40 pickups with 350-650 pkgs picked up and 250-350 delivered. This would take 9-10 hours.
