Private Fleets Seek Cost Cuts With Focus on Drivers, Routing

This story appears in the Aug. 13 print edition of Transport Topics.

Managers of the nation’s largest shipper-owned truck fleets are taking steps to counter the rising cost of fuel and equipment by more closely monitoring drivers and using new data collection techniques to make better routing decisions and improve compliance with safety and environmental regulations.

Interviews with fleet executives for the 2012 Transport Topics Top 100 Private Carriers list also show a willingness on the part of many companies to try new fuels, such as natural gas and propane.

“The key to solving most issues is capturing better data,” said David Phillips, director of fleet operations for Sherwin-Williams Co. in Cleveland.

At the H.T. Hackney Co., the ability to monitor speed, hard braking and engine idling, along with the use of electronic on-board recorders, has led to fewer accidents and safety violations, according to Ed Meyer, director of transportation.

A new routing and scheduling system enabled chemical distributor Univar USA to more efficiently allocate freight after a merger in 2010 added dozens of locations and 140 tractors.

For some, the analysis of data can lead to more outsourcing of freight to for-hire carriers.

“As equipment and fuel continue to escalate, International Paper is looking for alternative means to move product to market and move away from operating our private fleet,” said Douglas Froehle, the firm’s enterprise fleet manager.

For most private fleet managers, the highest priority is to contain the rising cost of fuel either by reducing consumption of gasoline and diesel or by switching to trucks that run on alternative fuels.

For example, Heckmann Corp., a company that hauls water to support oil and gas drilling activity, is taking delivery of 200 tractors powered by liquefied natural gas this year.