Gross revenue is the engine that drives your business. All things being equal (such as cost management), the higher your gross revenue the better your chances are for higher profits. There are ways to easily increase your gross revenue without working harder and without giving up more home time. One of the ways to do this is by understanding freight trends and applying this knowledge to your working time as well as to your home time.
 
First, start with understanding how many working days you have. Generally that will be around 260 to 270 days maximum. The calculation of working days looks like this:
 
 365 total days per year
 - 30 days lost for national holidays, illness, vacation, and delays for weather, congestion, etc.
 - 72 days off (1.5 days per week x 48 weeks)
= 263 working days
 
To make your job of running a business easier and get the very most out of those working days, simply synchronize your working time and home time with freight trends for the segment of trucking that you are in.

A typical monthly freight trend looks like this:
 
 One week of the month is always the busiest week and one week of the month is always the slowest. Simply make sure you plan to be available for work when freight is at the peak and reward yourself with extra time off when freight is the slowest.
 




A typical weekly freight trend looks like this:

Except for some holiday weeks, one day of the week will see the most demand for trucks and another day will see the next busiest day for freight. For most truckers, except for expediting and a few others, Friday is the busiest day with Monday being the second busiest.
 




Flatbed trends will be different than dry van. Refrigerated will be different as well. You can figure out which weeks of the month are the busiest/slowest and which days of the week are the busiest/slowest by talking to managers in your field or by looking through old log books.
 
You work hard for your money. Give it a try. You have nothing at all to lose and a lot to gain – such as more revenue! If you don’t try this, you will be running your business against a strong headwind while making your job a lot harder. Once you understand your specific freight trends and apply that knowledge to your work time and your home time, you’ll see revenue increase without working any harder or giving up more time at home.

Comments (8)

Heather Dunn

Heather started with ATBS in April of 2012 as the Digital Marketing Manager. Heather is a graduate of Michigan State University earning her Bachelor of Arts in Communication with a specialization in Public Relations. When Heather is not working she enjoys being outdoors. She loves the beach, the mountains, and riding her cruiser bike.

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April 23, 2016 21:15:11 PM

I like the bar graph

January 30, 2013 21:08:47 PM

Good article...the graphs illustrate it well...another good rule of thumb is for each operator to start his own spread sheet....separate colums for each day of the week, and across each week...track their loads or miles, as how it applies to them..over a peroid of time their own data will give them a pattern for the future..while that pattern is not fool proff as curve balls come...it will give them a good forecast....

December 05, 2012 21:06:54 PM

Good info!

December 05, 2012 11:46:46 AM

There are also trends in Expediting as emergency's are often discovered Monday morning.... The end of the month is also a busy time for us. Around holidays we usually slow for a little bit and then freight picks up quickly.

December 04, 2012 5:07:46 AM

I always communicate with my shippers to see what projects are coming up for the week, month and the upcoming quarter to plan my availibility to serve them . This also prevents me from planning a vacation during a high demand period.

December 03, 2012 21:06:34 PM

A lot of my friends who run flatbed are preparing to hibernate as this is starting to become the slow season for them. Most construction projects wrap up in late November and don't kick off again until the ground thaws late winter. Sometimes I wish I had more predictable freight, but working in an industry which has freight booms very sporadically (rail failures, product restock due to contamination) leaves me little room on planning when to be available for the busier times. I tend to stay off during the holidays as much as possible, and my fiance is a teacher, so I tend to take off more time in the summer. Being available to run the rest of the time, and able to run, is crucial to my profitability. As long as I'm available, there seems to always be something to move!

December 03, 2012 19:27:18 PM

Heather, thank you for shedding light on this very important, but often overlooked issue. I have counseled many owner operator friends of mine on this very subject. Since I run in a short haul dry van market (within a 300 mile radius) trends like this tend to be easy to track. I see the same group of customers 75% of the time and repeat routes often. Many of my friends that run the same markets that I do often make comments like, "hey money bags, how do you get to take so much time off?" I have only one reason, which is knowing when I am going to be busy and when I am not.

If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail! Analyzing trends may be something you would think a stock broker would have to do, but it is just as relevant in the trucking industry. By knowing what my usual customers are doing and when, I minimize my losses for taking time off by planning it for when I am in a freight slump. It is not that I take more time off than anyone else, it is that I plan it all together during slow times so that it looks like a lot if time off. In my area of trucking, the days following most holidays is the slowest, so I take the opportunity to extend my holiday weekends. Be sure to analyze and plan "smart" around your market trends and you too can look like Mr. or Mrs. "money bags" taking all that time off while everyone else is sitting!

December 03, 2012 8:19:54 AM