Saturday, February 28, 2009

Ray LaHood's Comments to the ATA

Safety is important; saving lives and preventing injuries is also good business. The new Secretary of Trasnprotation, Ray LaHood, spoke to the American Trucking Associations's board of directors on February 24th. We all know that the Secretary's job is not to help us make money. However, there are some interesting ideas thoughts presented. Here are a few:

“In each of the past three years, our nation has achieved significant decreases in the number of large truck-related fatalities."

“I am troubled that last year, nearly 73,000 trucking jobs were lost,” LaHood said. “In the third quarter of 2008 alone, 785 trucking companies with a combined fleet of about 39,000 trucks went out of business.”

“We want to make sure it (the EOBR rule) is the best rule we can possibility put out.”

Safety, technology, and emerging as a stronger company are all related.

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

What will you do when the recession ends?

I was talking with a fleet owner yesterday. He indicated to me that this is the third recession he has been through as a businessman. In each of the two previous recessions, he picked up considerable business when the recession ended. He did things to increase operational efficiency and took advantage of increased demand and reduced supply when the economy turned back up. Theoretically that sounds good, but when a person puts his own money on the line - that means something. I pay a lot more attention to fleet owners than I do economists.

Today I was reading an article on Fleet Owner's web site that said the same thing about two much larger companies - UPS and FedEx. You can read the entire article at http://fleetowner.com/green/ups-fedex-economic-downturn-0204/index1.html.

If you anticipate staying in business, are you doing what's necessary to implement technologies to increase your efficiency and reduce your operating costs? It's worth looking at. Check out what a little increased fuel economy can do for you with this online calculator - http://www.loadtrek.net/loadtrek_net/FuelEconomy.aspx.