Overdrive Magazine | Trucking Business News & Owner Operator Info
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/232692
Be your own b W Prime's brokerage wing, Prime Logistics, as an independent carrier. "Instead of making $50,000 to $60,000 a year," he says, his flatbed loads on exceptional weeks net as much as $3,000. "My wife likes $3,000-a-week take-home." Not to say that carrier authority comes without added costs. The biggest share is the necessity for true independents to carry primary liability insurance. The yearly premium of $6,000 to $10,000 or higher is one obvious hurdle to consider before making the move. Crawford draws a broad analogy for a typical progression in trucking: "Running as a company driver is like being in middle school – your parents still do most everything for you. When you buy a truck and lease on, you're in high school or college. You've got some freedom, but your carrier still shoulders a good bit of responsibility for you." When you get your own authority, Crawford says, "it's like your dad finally kicking you out of the house." Getting kicked out, at least in this day and age, can be tough. Among Overdrive readers, roughly half of whom run under their own authority today, 61 percent of respondents to a December poll probing industry conditions relative to new operating authority responded negatively. Nearly half of all Todd Dills hen Overdrive profiled its 2010 Trucker of the Year, "Mustang" Mike Crawford, the Long Lane, Mo.-based owner-operator had his 1994 Freightliner leased to Prime Inc. Within a year, however, Crawford and some other Prime owneroperators made a change to address a problem: The age of their trucks was falling outside Prime's guidelines. However, Crawford says, the Springfield, Mo.-based company wanted to keep the longtime haulers as a reliable service option. So the truckers got their own operating authority, and now Crawford continues to haul virtually exclusively for Running as an independent offers a chance at higher net income, though a poll of Overdrive readers shows most are pessimistic about current conditions. Such skepticism drove James (pictured) and Jan McCarter, under lease with M&M American's air freight division, to back off plans to establish their authority fully to do the holiday mail run with the U.S. Postal Service in late 2013. James decided the mail run "would have paid close to the same," so he stuck with M&M. 22 | Overdrive | January 2014 Going independent cover story_0114.indd 22 12/20/13 10:01 AM