Operations
15 field notes on operations from an active FedEx Ground operation.
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Software for FedEx Ground Contractors: Tools That Run on the Data You Already Have
Operator-built software for FedEx Ground contractors: payroll, fuel-card review, and a handbook that run on data you already collect every week.
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Time and Space: The Only Two Constraints That Actually Govern FedEx Ground Routes
Every FedEx Ground metric derives from two constraints: time and space. The operator framework that governs every fleet decision.
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Stops Per Route Per Day: The One Number to Watch Every Day
Stops per route per day is the single best one-glance metric in FedEx Ground contracting. What it measures, how to read it, and when it lies.
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The Contractor's Real Job: Why Your Best Day Is the One You Don't Talk to FedEx
Your job is not to dispatch trucks. It's to build an operation that runs without you. The posture toward BCs and drivers that makes scale possible.
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How FedEx Ground Contractors Catch Fuel Theft: The Scanner Cross-Reference Method
Fuel theft in FedEx fleets is hard to prove with MPG flags. Cross-reference fuel card transactions with scanner activity for evidence that holds up.
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The 6 Tiers of Coverage: How Smart FedEx Contractors Layer Capacity
Every coverage decision is a tier decision, from owned step vans to FedEx contingency. The hierarchy that determines whether routes are profitable.
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Why Payroll Is the Best Litmus Test for Efficiency
Payroll is the largest cost in FedEx Ground contracting. If the payroll number is right, almost every other number on the P&L tends to be right.
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AVP Routes: Why the Math Looks Profitable and Isn't
The Alternative Vehicle Program is a cost-accounting illusion. Why AVP almost never makes sense, and the narrow case when it does.
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Don't Buy Used FedEx Trucks
The cheap step van you found online is cheap because it's worn out. In a FedEx Ground fleet, every truck decision is really an uptime decision. Buy new.
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Skip the Extended Warranty
On a working delivery truck, the cost of a repair is the downtime, not the part — and a warranty almost always makes the downtime worse. Pay your own mechanic.
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Never Lease a Delivery Truck
The lease pitch is a low payment plus a residual-value windfall you'll never collect. Finance the truck, own it, and run the cheapest capacity there is.
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The Owner Is the Constraint
Every system has one part that caps how much the whole thing can produce. In a struggling FedEx Ground operation, the constraint is usually the owner.
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Drive the Route or Build the Business
He drove a route himself six days a week for three years — until he lost the contract. An owner who is the permanent backstop has no ceiling.
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Why I Wouldn't Take a Partner
A repair neither partner wanted to fund stalled, and the operation lost its contract. This business punishes hesitation — forward is the only direction.
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The Southwest 737 Rule: Why One Truck Type Beats a Smarter Mixed Fleet
Why standardizing your FedEx Ground fleet on one truck type beats a clever mixed fleet — the Southwest 737 logic applied to last-mile delivery.