Wasson’s pro guide to booking spot market loads

If Shakespeare was a trucker, he would ask, “What’s in a load?” While I’m not as eloquent, I hope to answer this question in the frame of what a carrier looks for when attempting to book spot market freight. Load bidding can be just as much an operational art as a science, and below are a few key factors to consider when slumming up the load boards looking to book some spot market freight. Disclaimer: Things I won’t cover include how to leverage dropped trailers to get extra revenue; how to wait until 4 p.m. and attempt to extort novice brokers for inflated rates; and finally, how to post my truck on a load board to get tons of phone calls by incorrectly putting the states I’m willing to haul into.?

This one is one of the most important things to consider, as like any good real estate agent knows, location matters. Knowing your truck’s starting location, empty time, driver availability and preferred lanes are key factors to setting yourself up for success. Failure to take any of these into account will result in an angry driver calling you and possibly yelling at you for failing to meet their needs.?

Important load characteristics:

• Origin/destination pair.
• How many miles??
• How many empty miles?
• Appointment windows?
• Commodity (we’ll come to this part later).

Knowing origin and destination determine if you are going into a favorable market or if you will need to book a return trip earlier at the expense of future revenue. Total loaded and empty miles are crucial as most drivers can go between 400 and 600 miles per day depending on region and driver characteristics. Finally, appointment windows are notable, as a live load appointment versus a first-come, first-served window will greatly impact your driver’s, and therefore your, day. Preferably, you will want generous live load windows from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. and live unload times in the early morning. Unfortunately, the freight market and the brokers who work the spot market often deal with customers that set unfavorable times. That will require a pricing strategy to overcome this lost utilization.?

Pricing characteristics

You’ve found the load, now it’s time to price it. Unfortunately, spot market conditions are rapidly deteriorating, so the old strategy of calling and asking for $1,000 over the market rate no longer works; neither does immediately hanging up on the broker when he or she counteroffers. This now requires savvy business skills that I hope were paid attention to after signing the loan on a used truck that is rapidly depreciating in value after paying $75,000 and having over 500,000 miles on it. Key factors to consider:?

What is the market rate?

• What direction is this rate moving?
• What is the high/low/median price?
• How is the market going? Do I have pricing power?

Often when attempting to negotiate with a broker, try to ask for a higher offer than what is posted, but be ready for a counteroffer or get hung up on depending on the broker. I forgot to mention that when the market turns, the brokers like to hang up on the carriers, the cycle continues. Knowing that the average margin for a broker is around 10%-15%, you can reasonably expect some level of haggling, but depending on market conditions and pricing power, you might have to settle for the posted rate. Speaking of brokers, a few things to consider below:

Customer/broker characteristics:

• Which broker?
• Does it use a TMS?
• Load board?
• Frequency of tracking updates?
• Tracking required like MacroPoint or project44?
• Commodity.

Honestly I consider commodities to be a major indicator of one’s quality of life after booking the load, followed by the broker themselves. Going to a grocery or beer distribution center for a live load or unload appointment could be a recipe for disaster if late, or even on time, as they often deal with internal supply chain inefficiencies or spend a few extra hours counting the product. You also have to deal with lumper services or ready labor, and depending on the broker, could waste an hour trying to get a payment authorization code.

I personally prefer plastic products as most of those shippers may be run by engineers and want you out the door faster than you want to be there. Also avoid things such as floor-loaded tires, furniture, flour, poorly stacked beverages and baled recyclables or garbage. Yes, it turns out in parts of the upper Northeast they literally ship trash from landfills to other landfills and while you get a load, you’ll spend the next few days washing out the garbage water from the trailer’s wooden floors.?

The downside with all those mentioned commodities to avoid is that they are the ones most likely to utilize brokers to haul their goods. Therefore, a good strategy is to avoid underperforming shippers, brokers or commodities as much as possible to minimize the wasted time and higher blood pressure from your driver berating your load-picking skills.?

If you’ve made it this far, congratulations! You have hopefully booked a load! While some of this article is tongue and cheek, the fundamentals of location, commodity, customer characteristics and time apply to most loads and knowing some of the extra effort a carrier goes through can help everyone appreciate the challenges we face daily in this chaotic supply chain.?