One Year's Worth Of Experience ...

as I continue to research the idea of pursuing driving a truck after i retire as a public school teacher, I see more and more advertising by companies offering many incentives and (much) higher pay after the first year of experience. As this site repeatedly emphasizes the value of getting through that first year of driving, I'm coming to the conclusion that the real money to be made as a trucker comes later ... after that first year (or three).

as an example I found an ad (they seem to pop up all over the place now) that guaranteed 4000 miles a week at .48 cents per mile. 51 weeks of that and you'd be making nearly a 100k per year. Is that realistic?

And as a follow-up .. will the company that already employs you be competitive with those higher rates and miles?

All assuming that you are an excellent trucker in all regards of course! ;-)

No that's not realistic. 4000 miles in a week, if you could AVERAGE 55 MPH would take 72.72 hours. You can only have 70 hrs in an 8 day period, and that's not even leaving time for loading,unloading, breaks, or the fact that your not going to average 55mph the entire time your driving.

But yes from what I have seen things do get better after that first year.

Woody

That's kind of what I was thinking ... perhaps the guarantee of that many miles is basically them saying we'll give you as much driving as you can handle and as you want. Which is still cool by me ...

Those miles are impossible to achieve legally. Its extremely difficult to manage to do 3400 miles, but 4000 is simply out of the question. The pay is also false.

Some companies give pay increases if the amount of miles on a load are low, some also give pay increases if you'll be driving in the deep NE. So you'll be making .48cpm driving through the worst places in the lower 48 (the NE), and your load will be only 100 miles. That's when you will make .48cpm. Otherwise it will be much lower. That pay that they are advertising is their maximum potential pay. That is not what they will pay you on a 1200 mile load.

You pretty much won't ever make 100k no matter what you do in trucking. And the company is wrong to guarantee such high mileage consistently. Sometimes the freight is just slow, sometimes the roads are closed, your truck will break down, you'll go home. There's no way you can put up consistent high numbers. That's just trucking. Trucking is inconsistent - one week you can do 3200 but the next week you'll get nothing but short loads and only manage to do 1300. Your mileage is extremely hard to predict because there are just so many factors that come into play.

The reason we stress that first full year of safe driving is because it opens up a whole new world of opportunities for the driver. We don't talk about it because you'll make slightly more money, we talk about it because after a year of safe driving you can pretty much do anything that you want to. A lot of drivers want to be local so they can see their families, but they have to do OTR first. A year of safe driving opens the portal to local driving as well as regional positions. Most drivers don't plan on or don't even want to do OTR, but if they get that year in they now qualify for what they wanted to do from the start. So its really more about the opportunities that arise after that year more than it is about the increase in pay.

And its doubtful that your current company will keep up with current rates to keep you. They don't just give raises like that. Specialized divisions pay a lot more than refrigerated or dry van. If you currently make .33cpm and you decide to pull a flatbed and you'll get paid .41cpm there is no way your current company will increase your pay to keep you around. I am switching companies at the beginning of next year. I will go from .31cpm to .43cpm. Needless to say, my current company will absolutely not price match with my future company to keep me around. Even though I'm 100% on my on-times, that's just not how they operate.

Hope I helped. Please ask if you have any questions!

On the other hand, they could be talking about team driving..in which case, take those numbers and divide them in half..they just won't tell you that up front...

Roadkill !!!!! My very favorite Knuckle Dragger !!! Good to see you back in here !!! I sure enjoy the pics you put on FB. ..But I like ya here better...your easier to pick on !!!