Hi everyone,
I’m wondering how you go from being an owner operator to a fleet owner of multiple trucks and what the gross profit margin is like per truck.
Also are there any lucrative niches within the haulage industry that may pay a better margin than others.
Thanks for replying!
Get work, get more work, have more work than Trucks, buy more Trucks, employ more staff. Then go what a trucking headache staff are.
biggriffin:
Get work, get more work, have more work than Trucks, buy more Trucks, employ more staff. Then go what a trucking headache staff are.
Or my bosses case
Get Mk2 Ford transit and trailer , get busier get an Iveco extra long van and trailer , get even busier get first truck 30odd years later have about 30odd trucks and still do work for the same factory you started doing spot work for when you first started
Sent from my truck
contacts, money and luck.
Many fleets started as one man bands as subbies, get asked by customer to provide truck. Provide good service asked to provide more trucks.
Have good Bank Manager or finance company to fund the extra work as it becomes available.
Hope your best customer does go bust or give the work to another company, undermining all your good work.
As for niche markets / more profitable, well that’s the golden goose everyone is looking for, small and large.
The joy of transport everyone is looking to undercut you to get profitable work or fill empty trucks.
Many fleet expansions happened on the back of a single key customer expanding.
Or, in the case of Stobart, for instance, doing more work ‘along the chain’… started delivering empty tins to a food cannery for Metal Box, offered to take the filled cans on the next stage of the journey, then offered a warehouse to store canned peas etc after harvest until they were needed, then offered to deliver them from the warehouse to the supermarket RDC.
When he needed another warehouse, he’d sell the existing one, lease it back, and use the capital generated to buy another warehouse in the next area to fall in the ‘green invasion’.
It worked, for a while…but eventually they ran out of warehouses and the wafer-thin margins on the transport side got clobbered by rising fuel prices.
Stay as a one-man band. You’ll thank me later. You’ve no idea what headaches and nightmares you’re about to bring upon yourself by hiring staff.
When I was an owner driver I had good direct work and was doing well
,.I then had the brilliant idea of thinking if I buy another one I’ll make twice as much…wrong,.I started diversifying, subbying etc.
Instead of realising my mistake,.I ended up owning about 6… 
Today it will be 10x harder with the likes of Stobbie and Wincanton to try and compete with,.and all the strict rules and regs in comparison today.
I was given advice (too late) either own 1 truck or 20…really wish I’d stuck with the one
.
Would I buy a truck today the way things are?
I’d rather play Naked Twister with Elton John and Julian Clary. 
Mick Bracewell:
Stay as a one-man band. You’ll thank me later. You’ve no idea what headaches and nightmares you’re about to bring upon yourself by hiring staff.
This. A mate of mine was an owner driver, expanded to 5 trucks. Said to me many times he made more money in a 7.5 tonner delivering furniture than he did from a fleet of 5 artics.
robroy:
When I was an owner driver I had good direct work and was doing well
,.I then had the brilliant idea of thinking if I buy another one I’ll make twice as much…wrong,.I started diversifying, subbying etc.
Instead of realising my mistake,.I ended up owning about 6…Today it will be 10x harder with the likes of Stobbie and Wincanton to try and compete with,.and all the strict rules and regs in comparison today.
I was given advice (too late) either own 1 truck or 20…really wish I’d stuck with the one
.
Would I buy a truck today the way things are?
I’d rather play Naked Twister with Elton John and Julian Clary.
To be fair, Elton John has the financial backing… so might as well be paid to be shafted.
Our lot did it by being relatively early as in 1970s from memory and at some point going into pallet work. Then they specialised into ADR loads which I think is partly how they stayed ahead of all the other pallet companies.
Over the years they opened depots around the country and now run effectively a private pallet network doing std and ADR pallets.
Niche is, we can pickup your 1, 10 or 400 pallets in the afternoon in say Southampton and they’ll be delivered to every corner of the mainland by the next afternoon. Since it usually stays within the network, theres no paying people like Palletforce so you keep more of the money.
However it takes years and luck, and 2 generations so far, and there’s no guarantees. Plus not having debt probably helps if possible especially when a year like this happens.
If you want to have a small fortune from the trucking business, then start with a BIG fortune.
you’re not going to make money doing subby work. some of the rates in Scotland that I took was from as low as £1.05 per mile to a “good” rate of £1.50. £1.50 a mile is OK if you have 200+ trucks on the road and averaging 2500 miles a week but if you running less than 10 trucks, you’re only going to break even 
trevHCS:
Our lot did it by being relatively early as in 1970s from memory and at some point going into pallet work. Then they specialised into ADR loads which I think is partly how they stayed ahead of all the other pallet companies.Over the years they opened depots around the country and now run effectively a private pallet network doing std and ADR pallets.
Niche is, we can pickup your 1, 10 or 400 pallets in the afternoon in say Southampton and they’ll be delivered to every corner of the mainland by the next afternoon. Since it usually stays within the network, theres no paying people like Palletforce so you keep more of the money.
However it takes years and luck, and 2 generations so far, and there’s no guarantees. Plus not having debt probably helps if possible especially when a year like this happens.
Clarke Transport
If so their a shower of ■■■■■
robthedog:
trevHCS:
Our lot did it by being relatively early as in 1970s from memory and at some point going into pallet work. Then they specialised into ADR loads which I think is partly how they stayed ahead of all the other pallet companies.Over the years they opened depots around the country and now run effectively a private pallet network doing std and ADR pallets.
Niche is, we can pickup your 1, 10 or 400 pallets in the afternoon in say Southampton and they’ll be delivered to every corner of the mainland by the next afternoon. Since it usually stays within the network, theres no paying people like Palletforce so you keep more of the money.
However it takes years and luck, and 2 generations so far, and there’s no guarantees. Plus not having debt probably helps if possible especially when a year like this happens.
Clarke Transport
If so their a shower of [zb]
Rob got it in one [emoji6] they still run from that stupid yard on tower lane when just around the corner Roberts transport old yard is still empty and twice as much uard space
Sent from my truck
bbez:
you’re not going to make money doing subby work. some of the rates in Scotland that I took was from as low as £1.05 per mile)
Bloody hell.I was on a pound a mile in 1990…think diesel was about 50p a litre then.
How tf can you make a living at that…and why the hell would you want to try.
robroy:
bbez:
you’re not going to make money doing subby work. some of the rates in Scotland that I took was from as low as £1.05 per mile)
How tf can you make a living at that…and why the hell would you want to try.
Blooming heck [emoji47] my boss gets 400ish for a load from Tilbury to the south coast
£1.05 from Scotland is financial suicide
Sent from my truck
I worked for a forwarder, 91 started working for myself with a van having made contacts. Another van followed, started working for a start up company doing plastic conduit. Couple more vans, 7.5, and worked for sonar company. Worked for MoD, worked for a few defence companies. Plastics company got bought out and haulage went in house. By early 2000s, 90% defence work. Two bases.
I retired last year, by which time I had whittled down customers to those I wanted to work for, around 80% was 1 firm. That goes against what is advised but was right for us. Very good margins. Enjoyed the business until the last 2 years when red tape and corporate card made me lose the will to live, so I gave my customer notice. 25 staff when I finished and I would have gone a year earlier if I hadn’t felt so guilty for leaving them.
Now much happier.