Newbie Grain Hauling Questions

Here in Indianapolis Indiana, I pull the hopper, long waiting list to haul for ADM, Bungy is cheep pay but can work 10 hours a day milage 34 mile one way 10 cents bushel plus fuel surcharge. If they have work and they have a lot of trucks on it. Check bulk loads now on web. it may give you ideas.

 

Jason,the best way to get a start is gona be at harvest time hauling for a local farmer/grain elevator.Just go to some local elevators like cargill and start asking around.The larger farmers will be your best bet as to getting some experience hauling,but the pay probably won't be to your likeing,and you will get to work long hours. Local feed stores/feed mills are not a bad source for info,or maybe some larger dairy/beef/hog/chicken farmers that buy their feed ingredients in bulk.

Jfaulk99 pulls flats and hauls a lot of steel/coils(he post in the flatbed section a lot), but he might be able to give you better info for your neck of the woods,he is a very knowledgable poster IMHO,and i think he still has a few hoppers in his fleet.

As for brokered loads,if you are gona try and run your own numbers,you'll have to establish yourself as being dependable first,and whatever you do,don't get a name for hauling it cheap,they will remember you for one or the other. And to answer your question about hours working...........well.......depends on the time of year,a bunch would be as specific as i'll get, during harvest. Right now,i've been really slow. It's a seasonal buiseness still,but it's not as bad as it used to be because so many farmers have their own bins for larger storage cap. now, But.......,they also sell their grain out of the bins instead of hireing it hauled to the elevators,so you still have to deal with the bigger grain purchasers like Cargill,Debruce,Bunge,CGB,ADM and all the rest. Your best bet is to find a few local customers that purchase fertilizer/feed in bulk because it's a little more time sensitive on P/U and delivery so the rates are better than just grain only,imo. At least that's how it has been for me.

Hope this helps some,good luck to ya. The folks over in Wheathauler's hopper/dump thread in the O/O's section were all really nice to me when i asked for help/info a few years ago.

 

I don't know about the area you specified, but down here it is almost impossible to build a business off grain hauling. Most of the farmers here run their own equipment and usually only hire in extra trucks during peak season. The guys that do haul for the farmers during peak season are usually local dump outfits that switch over during the fall. Hoppers are pretty expensive to buy for the relatively cheap rates grain is hauled for around here. Also, most of them run 24/7 to make enough money doing it. They might avg 2-3 hrs/night of sleep during harvest and peak season. There is a niche in every market, but I would think grain could be one of the harder ones to crack.

If I were to start up my own company it would def be a flatbed outfit. I have several friends that run small companies with 3-4 co trucks and 15-20 O/O leased on moving freight for them. They do really well, but they have spent lots of time learning freight lanes and how to bid them.

 

If you just want to drive and haul grain, my opinion is hiring on at an elevator or grain processor would be your best bet. As others have said, there are so many hoppers on the road, rates are dirt cheap and it is really competitive. However, the majority of elevators we haul to locally have contracted carriers in addition to their own company trucks. If you really want to run O/O with your own equipment and beat the bushes for loads, I say go for it. You can make it go.

Most growers in my neck of the woods don't have nearly enough grain storage to have someone driving full time year round. There are exceptions, but I think it would be a hard job to find, driving 100% of the time for a grower.

 

find the biggest "super farmer" in your area, and talk to them