When 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 owner-operators made a change to address a problem. The age of their trucks was falling outside Prime’s leasing guidelines, Crawford says, but the Springfield, Mo.-based company wanted to keep the longtime haulers as a reliable service option.
The truckers got their own operating authority, and today, Crawford continues to haul virtually exclusively for 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,” he says.
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 a crucial point 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 respondents indicated that regulatory and economic pressures were such that profitability was extremely difficult to achieve. Another 10 percent cited the new norm of slow economic growth as a prime limiting factor in obtaining new freight contracts with shippers. In the decades since deregulation, owner-operators able to secure shipper-direct freight serving a particular niche typically have been the most profitable. Full poll results follow.
