The strong, but seasonal produce trucking rates off the West Coast sound 
pretty good, until one starts to consider what it takes to get a Westbound freight haul. The hard economic times in the USA has taken its toll on many truckers. Some in trucking report dry freight grossing as little as $2000 from the Mid-west to California.
Bradley Cook drives a truck for Frank’s Transport, a one-truck operation out of North Miami Beach, FL. HaulProduce.com recently caught up with him at a Flying J Truck Stop, after delivering a load of juice. He was hoping to get a load of freight out of Tulsa, OK for the West Coast to pick up a load of produce.
The 35-year-old has been trucking either long haul or locally since 1998, and this is about as tough as he has seen it.
“I’m working this truck like a dog trying to make ends meets,” he says, pointing to the conventional Peterbilt he is driving. The owner operator he is driving for once had three trucks, but now it is down this single tractor.
It is not easy when outbound dry freight is paying only $1.35 to $1.40 per mile, while eastbound produce loads are grossing about $2.25 per mile, “if you are lucky. The people paying for the East bound (produce) want to pay you the Westbound rates,” he says, “although they pay the better rates because they have little choice.”
It also does not help that other produce shipping areas often do not pay that well. He cites per mile rates of out of Florida being $1.25, while Texas loads are averaging about $1.50 per mile. The high cost of number 2 diesel fuel only makes it worse.
“The price of fuel is so high the produce people and everyone else are relying on the freight charges of 20 years to help make up for it (cost of deliveries),” Bradley says.
Adding to the challenges of hauling produce are the delays in loading and unloading the often occur.
“With produce, I often face delays anywhere from one to eight hours. The product may still be in fields, even though I’m at the facility on time to load,” Bradley states. “I am picking up in California and supposed to deliver in Massachusetts. If I am late for delivery (because of loading delays), that Massachusetts receiver will not pay full price for that load upon arrival.”
Another primary “beef” with Bradley is dealing with four wheelers, and particularly those driving cars who cut off big rigs.
If a wheeler cuts me off then hits the brakes, I’m going to hit my brakes, but I can’t stop on a dime. I’ll end up going five truck lengths through that guy’s vehicle,” Bradely states.
In some Western states he notes speed limits on some highways are 80 mph. “You can cut me off, and I’m going to end up killing you (with my truck, which can’t stop),” he says.
Bradley believes as part of obtaining a driver’s license four wheelers should have to ride in big rig for three weeks to get a better understanding of what it is like to operate an 18 wheeler and “experience the centrifical forces of nature.”
Similar problems exist with four wheelers who tail gate big rigs and when the trucker hits the brakes, if the other driver is not paying close enough attention he can end up “going through your DOT approved trailer bumper — and die.”