Freight capacity due to shortage of trucks and drivers, especially drivers. There is more freight chasing fewer available trucks. Just that simple. Has nothing to do with fuel costs. The top players in freight are getting the trucks. The low tier shippers and receivers are having to fight for any trucks. Why should I haul for a loser company that only wants to pay peanuts when I can haul product for a stand up company that is willing to pay for quality service? Like I stated, if someone has product on the dock right now that they want me to haul for the same rate as 6 months ago, it will remain sitting on the dock. I will not show up. Capacity (trucks) is down and the rate indexes are up. You want to play in the game, you have to ante up. We fought thru the recession and high fuel periods and lost over 80,000 available trucks.... in just one quarter! Now the economy is coming around and those trucks we lost are not in the system. So, more freight chasing available trucks. A very great thing from my vantage point! A tough one for the shippers, receivers, and consumers. I pulled my truck away from a dock recently just because the shipper wanted to act like a moron. Their load got to sit right where it was. I can get a load anywhere and I don't have to settle for some low life that wants to treat me like dirt or low rates. For those of us that endured the hard times, we are now in a position to call the shots.
And you can't just add trucks. You have to add drivers to operate them. The pool of available drivers that can meet all the regulatory requirements that have also been dumped on us in the last decade is just not there. You can order up all the trucks from the truck makers you want. If you can't fill them with drivers, you are no better off than before. It is the world as it is. So don't expect price decreases because oil and fuel are down. Just doesn't work out that nicely.
But there are good deals on oil, depending on source brand and amounts. I get most of my oil in bulk, usually by the drum. But I also have them throw in a case or two of full synthetic for my pickup here and there. I get it delivered free to my front door. The synthetic I get from them is a 25% Group IV PAO and 75% Group III blend. Darn good stuff. Last time I ordered it was $67 for a case of 5w30 synthetic quarts, delivered free with the rest of my order. They also include free oil sample kits and free analysis with my oil orders also. Factor that all in and it is a good value.
Check for sales. Most any oil is on sale somewhere at any given time. Check the farm and home stores, the home improvement outlets like Lowes, Home Depot, Menards, etc. Don't just limit your searches to auto parts stores and Wally World outlets. I have seen some killer sales on motor oil at times, yes, even full synthetics, in the home improvement stores.
