Armagedon:
To reply to adycross who posted this quiz, first point, as you will be aware £45k today is not a great deal of money.
Second point,are you totally debt free if not pay off your debts.Still got your £45k…Premium Bonds your money’s safe but not very productive,
I or we/she have £100k in bonds and the last two years they have returned 1.1% or £1,100 per annum. Rental property, well the problem is the
people who rent,two I had in,new cars,the latest techno for the kids,exotic holidays,they didn’t work and didn’t pay the rent.
So still fancy being an OD well you can have my place, retired recently and for the last 37 years was an OD,made money,went everywhere and had fun but since I retired the phone hasn’t stopped ringing,everyone seems to be desperate for drivers,just shop around till you find the job that ticks ALL
the boxes and save your £45k for a rainy day.And if you find the money burning a hole in your pocket,my richer friends are into classic cars big time
seems to be where the money is.
All companies are desperate for drivers until you tell them your rate is £13/hr and time 1.5 after 8 hours then suddenly they’re not as desperate as they first made out.
Started doing ferry trailers last year. No trailer hire to worry about. I clear after fuel on average £1500 per week based on 5 days, could work a Saturday if I wanted. Most I’ve done in a week after fuel is £2k., least I’ve earned is £1.2k in a week. Thing is with Ferry trailers weights are completely mixed, some trips are 3-4 tonnes and maybe run back empty. I run a 10grand Scania bought and paid for which is great on fuel. Today’s run down to London and back, now parked up and computer is showing over 11mpg. Today’s run has cleared me over £300 for the day! Take an average month and I’m clearing 5-6k excluding maintenance. Don’t get me wrong, things go wrong and I’ve spent a small fortune in repairs but I’ve paid for it out of my profits and still have a growing surplus pot.
Too much negativity surrounding being an owner driver. I have been on this forum for over 10 years and have read every post regarding setting up prior to me giving it a go.
My advice to anyone is give it a go, it works for me.
Important factor in all this is fuel consumption. Pick a motor with good fuel economy. You cannot change the rates payable but you do have influence over your costs!!!
Started doing ferry trailers last year. No trailer hire to worry about. I clear after fuel on average £1500 per week based on 5 days, could work a Saturday if I wanted. Most I’ve done in a week after fuel is £2k., least I’ve earned is £1.2k in a week. Thing is with Ferry trailers weights are completely mixed, some trips are 3-4 tonnes and maybe run back empty. I run a 10grand Scania bought and paid for which is great on fuel. Today’s run down to London and back, now parked up and computer is showing over 11mpg. Today’s run has cleared me over £300 for the day! Take an average month and I’m clearing 5-6k excluding maintenance. Don’t get me wrong, things go wrong and I’ve spent a small fortune in repairs but I’ve paid for it out of my profits and still have a growing surplus pot.
Too much negativity surrounding being an owner driver. I have been on this forum for over 10 years and have read every post regarding setting up prior to me giving it a go.
My advice to anyone is give it a go, it works for me.
Important factor in all this is fuel consumption. Pick a motor with good fuel economy. You cannot change the rates payable but you do have influence over your costs!!!
Three things.
When you say today has cleared you £300, do you mean profit after standing costs and diesel, or just that you’ve used £200 in diesel and the run paid £500?
Are you not concerned about LEZ, ULEZ and Leeds, Glasgow, Manchester, Sheffield et. al.'s Clean Air Zone?
What is a bloke who goes by the name Megaspacedout1 doing driving a Scania?
I do 5 jobs a week.
Yesterday’s job meant a run back into the dock this morning where my next trailer is ready for collection. The mileage yesterday is 406.5 mile equating to a revenue of £569.00 my fuel burn for the trip is 37.98 gallons (10.78mpg) costing £189. Deduct ins and tax leaves me with £360 for the trip excl maintenance.
Just got today’s job on 7 tonne 3 drops and will do in excess of 300 miles today.
It’s not all like this but more smooth than rough…hopefully
Old John:
I started in 1978.
I’ve never had my name on the door. Never had alloys. Never had Kelsa bars. Never had a new truck.
If I’ve had success, it’s been by tackling the difficult and dirty or smelly jobs that the shiny boys turn their noses up at. If you’re prepared to do the unpopular jobs you quite soon become the go to guy and the customers come to trust you, and often don’t even ask how much the job will cost. Providing you don’t rip the p- -s out of them, they are grateful for what you do, and your phone keeps ringing. I think this is the only viable road for an owner driver to go down, as simple sub contracting for big operators seldom , but not always, ends well. In short, if you can’t identify a niche which you can cater for, then it’s going to be difficult.
This week, I did 1087 miles and grossed £3730 net of vat. I’m quite happy with that.
That’s a good business model and an excellent way to get your foot in the door, ask potential customers what their most problematic job is, the one nobody wants to do, offer to take it on and before you know it, you get some cream to go along with it.
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Sound business advice in pretty much any environment.
In my humble opinion, a business has to either fill a gap or do something different/better than the other gap fillers to actually grow and be successful. I started out two years ago now, low debt and cash in the bank - cash flow (or lack of) kills more start ups than anything. I started with Class 2 work and did as John has suggested - picked up other peoples problems and solved them. And made mistakes too, but alwas grasped the nettle and left the customer satisfied. I knew early on that the Class 2 work I was getting was becoming more constrained so I used the business to pay for my Class 1 licence, I re-configured the business towards a proper ‘niche’ market and now, two years down the line, I’m making a reasonable return.
To put some figures into this - I’m forecasting a 42 wk yr, 4 day/48 hr week, with a turnover of circa £100k pa. Of that, I expect to retain iro £45k profit within the business - I pay myself a pittance of a wage to keep tax/NI contributions low, but my pension payments are on a par with my old £35k a year employed position. The company pay for all CPC and other licences (cranes/forks); business trips to chin wag with ‘partner’ agencies. In due course, I intend to take on a driver and add a Wag and Drag to cut back into the class 2 work I was doing but with the ability to now offer greater volume to other potential customers…
By far and away the main benefit for me is having the ability to drop a day/week when I need to as most of my work is managed as I see fit. I appreciate that is unsual in the logistics world but…niche is what it is.
My aim is to keep at least 50% of gross revenue after paying myself a realistic wage, keeping a careful eye on costs is paramount to achieving this, saving a pound is much better than making a pound as you get to keep every penny of a pound you save, until the taxman takes his cut.
If I knew what I knew now when I started out, I would have made a bit more money, but I also think I would have enjoyed it less, part of being an entrepreneur is the learning and recognition of mistakes, that can be very rewarding.
