Jack Hammer, Dumb and Dumber: Part 3
Jack Hammer went outside to let his driver know the deal, and low and behold while they were talking and waiting to finish getting loaded here pulls up a big old nice Peterbilt with a raggedly old trailer behind it. The driver pulls up right in front of Jack's Volvo and starts yelling and cussing about the dock, and wants to know when Jack's driver was going to get that Piece Of Shit Volvo out of the dock. Jack went over to the driver and explained to him that Mr. Cheepass would be a couple of hours on loading because his dockworkers failed to show up for work this morning, and that he was loading the load himself. This infuriated the driver even more, and he explains to Jack that he is in a hurry because the broker told him that this was a hot load and he needed to get home in order to service his customer. Jack said “ Hey why don't you just park over there and I will buy you a cup of coffee across the street until my guy is loaded?”
The old timer agreed. They went across the street to have coffee, Jack introduced himself, and the old timer stated that he was the owner of Dumber Trucking Services. Jack sat down ordered the coffee for both of them and asked Mr. Dumber how much he was getting paid for his load.
Mr. Dumber stated that he was getting $500.00 for 500 miles but that the load was a back haul. Jack then informed him that the Mr. Dumb Brokeragent was making $800.00 for the load, and that he himself was making $1500.00 for the load. Mr. Dumber about choked on his coffee and then told Jack that he was full of shit. Jack showed Mr. Dumber his rate card from Mr. Cheepass and then asked Mr. Dumber how much he generally got for his 500 mile load coming down.
Mr. Dumber said that he was getting $800.00 for his load coming down because there was not a broker involved in that one.
Jack then asked why he was not getting at least $1200.00 for his load coming down?
Mr. Dumber said he had been working with that shipper for years and that had always been the rate
Jack asked Mr. Dumber if he realized the cost of everything had went up over the past several years, and that he needed to adjust his pricing structure accordingly.
Mr. Dumber then responded that he owned his truck and trailer and that really did not matter to him.
Jack informed Mr. Dumber that the reason he charged $1500.00 is that he had to bounce 250 miles out of the delivery to get the next load back to this shipper, and that rate kept his truck moving at the appropriate amount so he could continue to run the necessary equipment for the job and make sure his drivers were making the wages they needed to pay their bills as well.
Mr. Dumber then told Jack that he had been trucking since 1972 and that he knew exactly what he was doing and that he did not need some young punk that ran Volvo's to tell him how to run his business.
Jack just sighed and said “ Just because you have been doing it wrong all these years does not make it right, you have a good day sir and remember this that chrome does not put food on your table”.