Movers Put Volume First When Eyeing Equipment

This story appears in the March 4 print edition of Transport Topics.

When it comes to what relocation companies want in the vehicles they use to move household goods and similar items, fleet managers said two words come to mind — cube, as in cubic feet, and customization.

Jeff Coleman, president of Coleman American Moving Services Inc., based in Midland City, Ala., said moving vans are all about cube.

He said the latest trailers give him 4,700 cubic feet of load space. Reckoned at an average 7 pounds per cubic foot for household moves, this adds up to just short of 33,000 pounds, and that scales easily with the trailer and tractor combo — even the big sleeper, “long-and-talls” popular with the owner-operators who provide much of the power in this trucking segment.

As for customization, for the most part, the high-cube van trailers are operated by the movers’ agents such as those that work for Coleman American — which is an agent for Allied Van Lines — and its partner Covan World-Wide Moving, also based in Midland City, Ala. The parent company has an ordering spec guideline and will help finance the deals, but the agents have the final say in the finished product from Kentucky Trailer, said Coleman, adding that Kentucky enjoys a strong position in the market.

While household moves have been fairly consistent over the years, Paul Young, senior director for Atlas Terminals, said Atlas Van Lines — a unit of Atlas World Group, based in Evansville, Ill., and ranked No. 33 on the Transport Topics list of the 100 largest U.S. and Canadian for-hire carriers — has applications that are more like general freight. He cited the moving of new fixtures for stores like The Gap or medical equipment.

“It’s closer to general freight but still needs specialized care,” he said.

For these types of moves, the electronics van is adequate. But while that’s the generic name for the drop-deck, high-volume trailer, he said it’s not like the old days of a 13-truck move of a mainframe computer.

“It now moves in a cardboard box,” Young said, referring to computers.

“My job is to make sure doors are big enough, in the right location, those sorts of things,” he said.  “They all look the same till you get up close; then there are a lot of differences.”

“There’s a lot of customization,” he continued, “and Kentucky has got it down to an art.”

He said that’s especially important with some of the specialized needs for museum hauls or the shipment of wine. Then the moving van is equipped with a climate unit — a Thermo King in the case of Kentucky.

“Most of the others that have delved into the moving van market have found it is not huge and quickly determine that there just isn’t the volume to make it worthwhile,” said a spokesman for Sirva Inc., Westmont, Ill. — the parent company of Allied Van Lines, North American Van Lines and Global Van Lines. Sirva ranks No. 12 on the for-hire TT 100 list.

The Sirva spokesman, who did not want to be identified, said he has seen changes in the equipment over the past two decades.

“For a while, there was a tri-axle offering, but with the change of regulation for a spread tandem, that axle configuration has become very popular, particularly to the owner-operators who have their own van,” he said.

A 10-foot spread allows for scaling of 40,000 pounds on the two axles, greatly adding to the flexibility of loading, and scaling a combination truck with a conventional 34,000-pound tandem-axle configuration, the spokesman explained.

“Also at one time, we tried 17.5-inch tires to gain a little more cube, but they had a lot of blowouts — so while they added cube, they couldn’t tolerate the weight. And there was a problem with finding 17.5 tires out on the road,” he said.

The spokesman also said that several of the Sirva owner-operators were looking at custom designs, stretching the overall height to 13 feet, 8 inches to gain just a little extra cube.

“They want to be bigger and better than the best,” he said.

“Doubles are still occasionally used by drivers who don’t want to rent a straight truck for shuttles in places where you can’t get in with a 53-foot trailer. They can drop one of the trailers of a double and get in pretty much anywhere. But they have their drawbacks: You have to break them apart to load and you can’t back them up. But having to rent a shuttle truck presents the problem of double handling the shipment and increases the claims risk” the spokesman added.

Joe Larsen, fleet asset coordinator for The Suddath Cos., Jacksonville, Fla., which is an agency for United Van Lines, has a few Wabash and Strick trailers for special applications, generally flat-floor electronics vans.

Suddath, which ranks No. 64 on the for-hire TT 100 list, uses single-step freight vans on special services such as trade shows and office relocations.

For the most part, Suddath companies and agents carry household goods in regional and longhaul moves, using Kentucky trailers for the task, Larsen said.

“I make sure we get a deal, but without breaking the relationships,” he said. “Kentucky vans are a good fit for what our agents need.”

Interstate Van Lines, Springfield, Va., owns its trailers, which it buys from Kentucky, said President JD Morrissette.

“Budget and imagination are the only constraints,” he said of the trailer manufacturer. “It’s a great company and easy to deal with.”

Coleman said the average family move is approximately 9,000 pounds of furniture and other household property, so the trailers usually can accommodate a three-family move, consolidating in one region and delivering to homes and businesses in another, similar region.

“The household goods moving industry is a less-than-truckload, irregular-route carrier, one of the most difficult to operate in,” he said.

“With three to five families on the truck, you have to have [several] doors because the last load [on] may not be the first off,” Coleman said.

“And talking of doors,” he added, “Kentucky makes absolutely the best door in trucking. The inset door hardware system keeps the locking mechanism from damage.”

“When we were a dealer for Kentucky, we had what we referred to as a standard spec. That’s pretty much a single drop with either 19.5- or 17.5-inch tires so the drop would be 14 or 16 inches. Then we had four doors along the curbside and two on the road side, with two swing doors and a tailgate at the rear,” the Sirva spokesman said.

“Generally, that is what the agents spec, but sometimes if they have a driver they’re really keen to retain, they may get into the bells and whistles. But everyone is looking for maximum cube and curb appeal,” he added.

Louisville-based Kentucky isn’t the only manufacturer in the niche.

Strick Trailers, based in Monroe, Ind., makes trailers that are 53 feet long by 13 feet, 6 inches high and have a base spec that is popular in the industry: additional side doors — four on the curbside with one to the front deck and three main side doors, and two doors on the road side. It has a sheet-and-post design, like Kentucky’s, and has a single 14-inch drop that can accommodate the 22.5-inch wheel and tire equipment. It has a straight floor back from the over-the-fifth-wheel deck to the rear doors.

Strick’s TF1 furniture van has an optional 48-inch slide-out tailgate that is also popular in moving vans for loading versatility, and a customizable belly box for walk boards and household overflow. Its other features include a translucent roof and lots of lighting to aid evening loading from homes.

Dorsey Trailer, Elba, Ala., offers a full trailer line that includes single- and double-drop trailers and has experience building fully optioned moving vans.

“We do build moving van trailers but on a very small scale,” said Trey Gary, Dorsey’s vice president and chief operating officer. “We can offer side doors and options, but our dealers can also customize. We’ll build single-drop or double-drop, and the dealers can modify for applications like moving, race cars, TV studios.”

In interviews with several agents, the Stoughton name came up. Stoughton used to build moving vans and still offers a step deck trailer as part of its product range.  Sales Vice President Dave Giesen said there may be the occasional sale into the moving industry, but they are for the plate trailer and hence have no side doors.

“Moving vans are ‘high-hour,’ ” Giesen said, “and they take too much time on the line to build. We don’t see setting up to do it again, and we only sell a handful a month of the step decks.”

A similar sentiment was expressed by representatives at Wabash National Corp., Lafayette, Ind., and Great Dane Trailers Inc., Chicago.

Hyundai Translead Inc. and Manac Trailer USA did not respond to requests for comment.