3. Paying for Can Trucks 



Less than half the truckers paid 

 cash for their trucks, and a minority 

 used finance companies and equip- 

 ment dealers' purchase plans. The ma- 

 jority of them financed their pur- 

 chases through the banks. 



The milk haulage check was the 

 only source of income to pay for the 

 truck for 60 percent of the truckers. 

 Twenty-seven percent paid over half 

 of the truck costs (but less than total 

 costs) from milk haulage returns. 

 The remaining 13 percent paid less 

 than half of their truck costs from 

 milk trucking and were probablv 

 producer truckers who used their 

 trucks for other work. 



4. Opinions of Can Truckers 

 On Conversion Problems 



A third of the truckers expressed 

 the opinion that the seasonalitv of 

 production on their routes would be 

 unfavorable for the use of a farm 

 tank and tank-truck pickup. Another 

 third of the truckers said farm lanes 

 were unfavorable for tank trucks of 

 1500 to 2000 gallon capacity. 



The majority of truckers believed 

 that the volume on their present can 

 routes was inadequate to pay for a 

 tank truck. It is generally agreed that 

 the introduction of tank trucks will 

 require some reorganization of routes 

 with perhaps the elimination of 

 routes now followed. This risk is 

 carried by the trucker and he recog- 

 nizes this when considering the pur- 

 chase of a tank truck. Many ex- 

 pressed their reluctance or inability 

 to buy tank trucks without milk 

 dealer backing. This could change 

 the ownership pattern and the past 

 dealer-trucker relationships, in which 

 truckers received little or no assist- 

 ance from dealers to buy a truck. 



5. Tank Truckers 



As with the can truckers there 

 were no instances of written contacts 



between truckers and dealers. Some 

 form of unwritten agreement guaran- 

 teeing a minimum gross income was 

 mentioned in 42 percent of the cases 

 of tank truckers interviewed. These 

 arrangements were highly diverse, 

 but very little information was avail- 

 able from dealers or truckers as to 

 the exact amount of supplementary 

 payment by the dealer. One inde- 

 pendent tank trucker was guaranteed, 

 by the dealer, a minimum gross in- 

 come of $30 per day. Another, pick- 

 ing up bulk milk at farms in a north- 

 ern New England state and hauling it 

 to Massachusetts, had a special type 

 of guarantee for the period of transi- 

 tion from can to bulk assembly. 

 Each time when he had covered his 

 pick-up route, he was to drive to a 

 country receiving station of his deal- 

 er, fill out his load with can-assem- 

 bled milk, and proceed to Massa- 

 chusets. He thus was paid on the 

 basis of a full load. Another dealer 

 charged the producers 20c per cwt. 

 for tank trucking of milk from farm 

 to plant, but paid the trucker 25c 

 — a 5c per cwt. supplement by the 

 Healer. 



Over 50 percent of the truckers 

 relied entirely on the assembly of 

 milk for their income while the 

 others had supplementary sources. 

 The supplementary income was 

 earned from interplant hauls or by 

 working in the dealer's plant. 



Most of the trucks in use for 

 assembly from the farm had a con- 

 ventional 2 axle chassis with dual 

 wheels on the rear axle When fullv 

 loaded, the trucks weighed from 

 17.000 lbs. (1000 gal." tank) to 

 30,000 lbs. (2000 gal tank). The size 

 of tanks varied from 1000 gallons 

 to 2000 gallons. Thirty percent of the 

 tanks were 1800 gallons; 30 percent, 

 2000 gallons; 20 percent, 1560 gal- 

 lons; and the remainder were dis- 

 tributed in the other size groups. 



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