Rising fuel costs impacting trucking companies

ESCANABA, Mich. (WLUC) - With gas prices well above four dollars per gallon across the U.P., semi-truck companies’ wallets are a lot lighter.

“You go from spending $350-$400 to fill up a semi-truck and now it costs over $1000 to fill up that same semi-truck,” said Josh Barron, a certified instructor for the Midwest Truck Driving School.

At the Midwest Truck Driving School in Escanaba, tuition increased to help pay for fuel and the school says trucking companies are also raising prices.

“We’ve talked to a lot of local trucking companies; we work with a lot of local trucking companies and every single one of them has had to increase their fuel surcharge,” said Barron.

Those extra fuel costs trickle down to the consumers.

“Everything you see, everything you buy for the most part gets delivered by a semi-truck. Semi-trucks runoff of diesel fuel so when diesel fuel goes up it indirectly impacts all sectors of the supply chain,” said Barron.

In Iron Mountain, Timber Products is facing similar problems. The company has 35 trucks that each travel 120,000 miles a year. Averaging six miles per gallon, each truck holds 20,000 gallons of fuel.

Diesel is more than $5 a gallon in many places, creating a $1.5 million increase in fuel alone for the company. The result is no surprise.

“I’ve increased all of my costs to my customers the very next thing they’re going to do is increase that cost to you and to us as a consumer. We’re seeing it at the grocery store,” said Adam Buschciski, owner of Timber Products.

Both companies don’t anticipate this will end soon and prices will likely continue to rise before they get better.

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