Back to OVM's original post, I think he is right. Thinking about freight opportunities only for a moment,
As far as expedite or emergency freight goes, a van is good economic option for a customer. 1 0r 2 skids of product will generally get an urgent supply problem solved and then the remaining product can be LTL'd or sent Truckload. Is a customer willing to pay a 60-100% premium just for a dock high vehicle, they can sure save a lot of money by driving the freight down thier ramp or out the level door.
If you look at it from a carrier prospective, the market is very competitive right now, I can offer my customers a rate of $1.50 a mile, pay my vans 60 (ish) percent of that (or flat rate them...whatever) and make a 50%gross profit. If I offer that rate to my customer to get the load but then have to give up over $1 a mile to keep a C unit happy (or to get them to take the load) my profit margin just went down quite a bit. It pays me (as the carrier) to tell my customer service agents to ask the "will it fit in a van" question to the customers. The carrier looks like a hero for offering a lower rate to the customer AND they have a higher profit. As a company, I can also recruit vans waaay easier than trucks, especially if am the kind of carrier that takes advantage of newbies for my own profit.
I have asked a few of my customers in the past few weeks about how much they get ship/get delivered as expedite and the answer is usually "we try to keep the quantity as small as possible and use regular freight for the rest". I have asked at what point they would ship it all as expedite giving them a scenario where they are only going to order/ship 4 skids and the answer usually doesn't change, they will expedite what they absolutley need now, and LTL the other 2 or 3 skids.
I think more of it has to do with the improved speed and cost of dedicated LTL operations (the guys pulling double 28 footers like Saia or FedEx Freight) and this is maybe......maybe making it less attractive to expedite in a standard C unit for general freight.
Have I been asking these questions because of OVM's idea's....no (sorry Ken). When I first got into this my idea was always to have a C or D unit but went with a van for the lower economic risk considering the softening economy when I started this (Feb 08) and the start of the rise in fuel prices. I have always kept my eye on what people shipped and how much to see if it was feasible to get a big truck again at some point. More and more, I see the D unit as being the better choice vs a C as it is just to easy to put a lot of C freight on a van (especially a Sprinter/CargoMaxx). I think unless a C unit has a reefer, the competition from the vans is slowly eating into the freight.
For all you C owners, you can use the convenient message link (click on my user name) to send me your hate mail, just like Santa, I will read every one.....honest.
