Find all the pieces of this series in the anchor story at this link: Hotshot trucking retains its fundamental allure
By April, freight in hotshot sectors had fallen off the cliff. Some direct clients had shut down entirely. Many hotshotters were relying on spot loads that everybody and his brother also were relying on — or at least hoping to.
Now imagine your three-truck business and its equipment is barely a year and a half old, truck and trailer payments continue, and you’re counting on an independent dispatcher to keep your 40-foot flatbeds filled with freight (much of it less-than-truckload in nature). Welcome to three-truck S2 Transport, headquartered in Ohio.
It’s run by President Scott Sabatini, a military veteran with prior trucking experience, and Steve Libertore, a longtime insurance agent. Libertore has specialized in insurance for the smallest of trucking companies operating with authority. He’s now with Kincaid Insurance Group, with offices in Indiana and Ohio.
His motivation for joining with Sabatini to manage a three-truck fleet while both continue their full-time jobs? In part it’s what he’s learned from hotshot flatbed, Libertore said, which gives him a leg up over competing insurance agents. “I don’t know how many agents can say that ‘I understand what you’re going through’ to a client with this or that, the ELD issues and everything,” he said, “I’m experiencing this firsthand myself.”
Problems Libertore has a new appreciation for include an electronic logging device malfunction or user error — in one case, costing one of his drivers an out of service violation that’s now dinging the fleet’s insurance. Then there’s the high cost of plates in IRP — “$4,800 for three 2018 Ram 3500 pickups” plated for 43,000 pounds, powered by Cummins diesels.
And, of course, insurance costs, which plague the entire range of the smallest trucking fleets. Libertore and Sabatini have done everything they can to minimize costs and reduce their risk profile. Nevertheless, Libertore said S2 had exactly one option for an insurer, given the risks of running under new authority: Progressive.
