The great debate on how to haul 

By Jesse McCandless 

If I am anything, I’m a lover of efficiency. Love may be the wrong term — I’m obsessed with it. 

The joy I get from creating systems and solving problems can be borderline unhealthy. More than once, I’ve created problems just so I can solve them (see my first caulking SOP, Cracked or Failed Caulking Remediation Decision Matrix — a four-page masterpiece that not one of my painters ever read). 

I don’t just love efficiency, though. I love cars. Trucks. Bikes. Anything with wheels, really. I’ve lost count, but I’ve owned somewhere around 50 personal vehicles (yes, five-zero) since I got my license at 16. To date I’ve added more than 10 to that number in my business. 

What happens when you combine an obsession with efficiency, a love for all things that move, and a business that demands clean logistics? 

You spend a lot of time and money testing every possible setup, seeking perfection — only to find an unsatisfying answer. 

Worry not: I’ve done the work for you. You can learn from my obsession and make your own decision. 

We can finally settle the question I know keeps painters up at night: Trucks, vans or trailers? 

Please Say Trucks 

Let’s be honest: Some of us went out on our own just for an excuse to get a nicer truck. 

I saw other contractors driving their F-350s, and I wanted in. What a feeling it must be to have a fleet of utility bodies running around with your name on the door. Do you know what that would do for my ego? 

Are trucks actually sensible in a paint setting? The answer depends on quite a few factors: 

● What type of work do you mainly perform — residential, commercial or industrial? 

● What’s your average job size? Are you in and out in a few days, a few weeks or longer?

● How large is your service area? Do your people commute to job sites or to your shop? Are they on the road with a per diem? 

● What’s the weather like in your area? 

Before I just give you the answer, let’s first look at the basic pros and cons of each general set up, and then we can look at how those strengths and weaknesses play out in different business structures. 

Vans 

Easily the most common cargo vehicle, the van feels like the obvious choice for many. You can fit a surprising amount of gear in anything from a Dodge Caravan (looking at you, Nick) to the behemoth Transit High Roof. 

Most contractors settle somewhere in the middle — a standard-wheelbase E-250, ¾-ton Transit or Express 2500. Big enough to haul the goods, built for payload, and not necessarily expensive — you can find a solid work van for about $10,000 any day of the week. 

A van is also a giant billboard: nothing but blank space on the side that you should definitely fill if you don’t want to scare parents when you pull up. That blank canvas can also work in your favor as theft deterrence. Unlike a truck, a van’s contents are much more of a mystery box. 

Above all else, it’s just what the customer expects. No one is surprised when you pull up in a painter’s van. 

All that said, vans are far from perfect. In our experience, no matter how organized a crew lead might be, the van ends up a moving disaster by the end of the week. We tried custom shelving, bed slides, totes — every combination of the three — only to return, week after week, to the same problem: a van stuffed with drops at the end of one job, then exploding onto the site of the next. 

Spoiler: You can’t fully solve that problem with your vehicle setup. 

Vans and trucks also share a common enemy: gas mileage. If you’re lucky enough to live somewhere flat, you can get away with a more fuel-efficient Dodge Caravan, Ram C/V or Ford Transit Connect. But in the mountains of Northern California, I’ve nearly burned up two Caravans hauling normal payloads up and down the grades. Even a half-ton van like an E-150 can struggle. 

In any case, you’ll be lucky to get 15 in a full size. In the wrong area topographically, whatever your small van saves you in gas you may well make up or exceed when you replace the transmission every 100,000 miles. 

A larger van is sturdier but stout: an Express 3500 is basically a truck with a unibody. You’ll feel every bump when it’s not loaded down. Miles per gallon? You won’t keep track because it will make you sad. 

Another drawback is the unibody itself: it’s nearly impossible to seal off the cargo smells from the driver’s compartment, an issue unique to plumbers and painters alike. Spill lacquer thinner? Enjoy breathing fumes all the way home. 

Trucks 

Like I said earlier, we all want trucks to be the answer. They’re big, tough and fun to drive. Owning one feels like a perk. 

Just as with vans, size matters. A Tacoma has limited cargo space and struggles under payload, while an F-350 is stout but thirsty. 

That said, trucks have plenty of strong benefits. We currently run two E-150 vans and two F-250 trucks. The F-250s can carry just about anything — one has a camper shell — and still haul trailers with ease. The cabin is separated from the bed, which gives you options: run a camper shell or keep an open bed with a rack. Both setups help prevent cargo smells from seeping into the cab. The best upfit will depend more on your local weather and conditions than anything else. 

But trucks also come with meaningful downsides. They’re often more expensive, and upfitting is almost always required, whereas vans are usually ready to work right off the lot. Organizationally, your options are more limited, too. You can add toolboxes, but most of your gear will still end up in totes. The open bed of a truck is a pro and a con in one: endless opportunities to customize them to your needs, all of which cost money very few of us want to spend. 

So the Answer is … Trailers? 

For us, the answer is yes — sort of. We run trailers for larger crews, and trucks and vans for individuals or smaller teams. 

Trailers have worked well in our setup. Our service area is large, with one centralized shop in the middle. Having crews commute to the shop regularly would be wasteful (I tried it), so we use well-outfitted trailers dropped at job sites. With each trailer stocked in advance, the crew seldom leaves the site, even for paint or sundries. That keeps them focused on what makes money: painting. 

The extra room is another big advantage. We keep a mini fridge and microwave in ours — a well-loved perk among the crews. Eventually, we may upgrade to larger trailers and even add a small bathroom. 

Trailers are also inexpensive. We’ve never paid more than $4,500 for any of our 6×10 cargo trailers, and maintenance costs are minimal. They carry no insurance beyond theft and general liability folded into our auto policy. Breakdowns are rare because they only move a few times a month. 

Of course, there are downsides. We spend about $2,000 outfitting each trailer with shelving and racks. Moving them can be a hassle, especially on smaller jobs or when a last-minute move comes up. And sometimes we can’t get them up a steep driveway. When that happens, they sit at the bottom while the crew grumbles through extra trips up and down for supplies.

Final Answer? 

It’s different for everyone, but here are my insights: 

If your average job size is two weeks or more, especially outside of theft-risk-metros, trailers can be a great set up for you when you aren’t a huge company. I specify your company size only because at some point I do believe that our logistical demands will likely push us to mainly work out of trucks or vans. Even now we’re a hybrid of all three. 

If your average job size is under a week, you should probably run vans or trucks. Which you run depends on your area more than anything. If you’re dealing with bad road conditions regularly, trucks are a better move only because they’re easier to find in 4×4. If you don’t need 4×4, get a van. Following my experience with smaller vans, I don’t think I’d be willing to run them anywhere. Still there are many who’ve had great luck running smaller vehicles in flatter areas: you’ll have to make a decision that’s based on what you know about where you are.

I’ll say this: bad gas mileage is an easy problem to solve- charge a little more. Regularly having vehicles break down is not such an easy thing. 

I said it in the beginning and I’ll say it again, there are no genuinely satisfying answers to be found here, only a truth we already knew:

Perfect doesn’t exist.