Fleet Management News & Business Info | Commercial Carrier Journal
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JOURNAL TRUCKGAUGE The little guys behind the CCJ Top 250 Owner-operators represent a sizeable share of big carriers' capacity A s always, CCJ's August issue recognizes the top 250 for-hire carriers operating in the United States, but there's one important group you might overlook: Owner-operators. CCJ's ranking methodology doesn't distinguish between owned capacity and leased capacity, so you might not notice the importance of independent contractors. But the significance of owner-operators is apparent when you dig a bit deeper. In compiling the data that drives the ranking, we ask carriers to break out company drivers and independent contractor drivers. This year, about 160 of the 250 did so, and a bit more than 29 percent of their drivers are independent contractor drivers. Indeed, at least 26 carriers in the CCJ Top 250 use 1,000 or more independent contractor drivers. At least another 13 carriers use between 500 and 999 independent contractor drivers. Among the carriers that did not provide detailed information on driver type, you can find clues in the portion of tractors listed as leased: About 31 percent. In the for-hire segment, a leased tractor usually is an independent contractor unit since trucking companies typically don't use 25 largest users of independent contractor drivers Based on carrier reports in CCJ Top 250 ranking Landstar System TransForce Sirva Moving Services North America UTSI/Universal Truckload Services UniGroup CEVA Logistics Americas 3PD Acme Truck Line Atlas Van Lines CRST International Quality Distribution Mercer Transportation Comtrak Logistics Bennett International Group Dart Transit United Vision Logistics C.R. England Schneider National Carriers Cardinal Logistics Management Corp. Arkansas Best Corp. U.S. Xpress Enterprises J.B. Hunt Transport Forward Air Corp./FAF Bridge Terminal Transport Wheaton Van Lines 26 Independent contractor drivers 8,523 6,740 4,197 3,370 3,095 2,941 2,917 2,900 2,894 2,762 2,647 2,327 2,287 2,151 2,087 2,081 2,033 1,970 1,700 1,501 1,481 1,388 1,370 1,297 1,147 Total drivers 8,523 12,778 4,197 4,079 6,699 3,413 2,917 2,900 2,903 6,885 3,277 2,327 2,651 2,222 2,087 2,081 8,792 13,070 4,700 7,092 9,332 12,436 1,800 1,297 1,147 BY AVERY VISE At least a quarter of the group's drivers are independent contractors. traditional leases. There are cases where carriers will lease from an affiliated company – often to try to protect assets from big-ticket verdicts in accident litigation – but that doesn't appear to be common in the CCJ Top 250 reporting. So it seems that between a quarter and a third of the capacity operated by the CCJ Top 250 likely is provided by independent contractors. These are not all one- or twotruck owner-operators; at some of the major household goods operations, entire trucking companies – some of them fairly large – may operate as agents for a national brand. But even if you remove all of the household goods carriers from the calculation, the reported share of drivers that are independent contractors drops only slightly to just less than 27 percent. So the traditional concept of the "guy and his truck" apparently remains a big part of the capacity for the largest carriers. Use of independent contractors is fairly concentrated. The 14 carriers reporting that they are 100 percent independent contractor drivers represent a third of all the independent contractor drivers among the roughly 160 carriers reporting detailed driver information. Meanwhile, 22 of the reporting carriers don't use independent contractors at all. Most carriers use either mostly owner-operators or very few; there isn't much middle ground. Only a quarter of the 160 carriers reported that more than 20 percent but less than 80 percent of their drivers were independent contractors. The concentrated distribution of independent contractors among the largest carriers does not diminish their importance; capacity is capacity. When someone tries to argue that the owner-operator is dead, you can point out that he is all over the CCJ Top 250. AVERY VISE is executive director, trucking research and analysis for Randall-Reilly and senior editor, industry analysis for Commercial Carrier Journal. E-mail avise@truckgauge.com. COMMERCIAL CARRIER JOURNAL | AUGUST 2013 CCJ0813_TruckGauge.indd 26 7/25/13 11:12 AM