Safety and uptime. Those were the top two items on the list of items fleets value most when determining proper vehicle specs. CK Commercial Vehicle Research recently surveyed a small sampling of fleets to see what they thought were the most important factors in the vehicle spec’ing decision. The survey participants were asked to rank more than a dozen factors on a scale of 1 to 5 from least essential to most essential.

While safety and uptime topped the list, satisfactory ROI and fuel economy were not far behind. The other factors (in order) on the list were: maintenance costs, driver recruitment, improved productivity, customer satisfaction, parts inventory, acquisition costs, CSA impact, ability to absorb change, fleet growth potential, availability at preferred OEM, and weight and compatibility with other systems.

Of course, I was thrilled to see safety as the No. 1 most important factor because I, too, think it should be in the No. 1 slot. The survey probed a little deeper and found that air disc brakes and collision mitigation systems were two technologies that were very well received by fleets that valued safety.

The one that surprised me was “where available at preferred OEM” fell in the ranking. I always assumed that fleets were—for lack of a better word—loyal to a manufacturer and once they settled on a brand, they stayed with it. While I admire loyalty, it makes sense that if a fleet can’t get the other factors it values from one manufacturer it may have to look elsewhere.

It’s also interesting that ROI was not rated No. 1. So often we hear that all fleets focus on is the cost. I understand that a positive ROI is important, but items like safety and uptime make sense from a total cost of operation standpoint. I believe more fleets are looking at TCO when making their asset spec’ing decisions and are factoring some “soft” costs into that equation.

While it’s interesting to see the response from the fleets in this survey, the reality is that each fleet places value on different factors. Before making a spec’ing decision, I encourage each fleet to review the asserts currently in their fleet and use the data they have—hopefully including maintenance and repair data with VMRS codes—to determine specs that have worked well for them and those that have caused issues.

Also, review all of the new technologies that have come on the market since your last spec review (I hope you are conducting regular spec reviews) to see if any of them make sense for your operation.

If you take these steps, you are more likely to get trucks that will be right for your operation and deliver on both uptime and safety.

Jane Clark focuses on managing the member services operation at NationaLease as vice president of member services. She works to strengthen member relationships, reduce member costs, and improve collaboration within the NationaLease supporting groups.