Am new to this forum and hope i will get some soumd advice from all those experienced.
Have been stuck in a dead end job (work in financial services) my whole life and been quite unhappy being an employee. The entrepreneurial spirit in me keeps trying to come out. So am going to let it. [SMILING FACE WITH SMILING EYES] I am well educated in business as have an MBA and have had an apithany to start a business of my own and go into the haulage industry. I am starting my research into it and have read articles and forum posts from all over. Basically i understand not everyone has had the same experience out there, so any valuable and constructive advice would be most appreciated. I am a glass half full kind of guy so will take the negatives in good spirit.
I have the following questions:
a. As im new to the industry, what are the good books out there to get up to speed on the industry. I just bought a book called A study manual in professional competence in road haulage by David Lowe. An will ve looking for more.
b. Do i need to get a CPC if i am not going to drive the vehicle. The book above covers the CPC knowledge part, but do i need to sit the exam.
c. Is it a good idea to work my current job and run haulage business on the side. Current job pay well and will put me in good stead for financing options. Also how demanding is the day to day running of business to be able to do both. Have wife and possibly a very trust worthy partner.
d. How many units are advisable on startup. Im looking to run 1 unit for now until i get better aquanted with industry and till i see growth potential.
e. How scarce are drivers really? Heard plenty of negative post, and how have each of you overcome this? local or internatoonal drivers?
f. What haulage type would you recomend for start up. I was planning on general for now (sourced from ports, store chains, building contractors etc) then branching off into a niche. Which segment would you say the better rates per mile are?
Appologies for all the questions, am just excited to get stuck into this. I have a tonne more questions but let me stop there for now.
1: The best book is the university of the roads / life, go get your licence if you don’t have it and spend a year or two on the road.
2: Refer to 1
3: You wont have enough hours in the day. Its either one or the other.
4: As many units as you want and get work and good rates for them.
5: Not scarce at all just treat them well and pay them well and they will stay with you for life.
6: Any its all basically the same their is so many undercutting every segment of it and believe me if their was a niche in the market surely someone would have found it in the last 100 years.
Put the book down, go and get a job as a truck driver. Around two years should cover it. If you don’t have a license, get one before you think you can know anything about what the job entails.
You need to have someone in your business that has a CPC, it doesn’t have to be you, though I think in your case, it will help.
Depends what you do. Trucks aren’t really a load and go job; there will be trouble, there will be a need for you to interrupt the day job and sort out the delays, the refused load, the blowout etc.
Growth potential, yeah, stick with one and see how it goes. Trucks, unless you are very niche, are all operated on a very narrow margin. Industry average is 2-3% return, that’s what the Wincantons and Gregorys of this world are operating on.
Good drivers are always scarce. There goes one of your biggest problems. I pay reasonable and more importantly I take care of them and even more important, I know what I’m talking about from experience, so we have a good working relationship. If you pay carp money, you get carp drivers. You pay good money, watch that margin disintegrate.
General haulage pays the lowest rates, but specialist haulage needs specialist knowledge and you aren’t going to get that from starting from square one.
And there are lots more posts about starting up from people who seem to think it’s the road to riches…
Two replies so far, both with extensive advice from people with enormous knowledge of the haulage game. I won’t re-cover the same ground, but the best nugget of advice in both posts is the same, get an HGV licence and do the job for a couple of years before you even think about operating.
Don’t forget, if you’re delivering to building sites/merchants, they drown you in H&S regs.
So, whilst you may not strictly ‘need’ FORS accreditation or a CSCS card, most large sites/contractors will generally expect them; or you’ll either get turned away or screwed about.
I can only repeat what everyone has said already, get into the industry first as an employee driver and that will give you an inkling of what you need to do and the costs, legislation and all the other day to day stuff that happens.