TR Footnotes FN.0310 : Page 1

TOWING&RECOVERY March 2010 Reaching thousands of industry professionals monthly CAR TALK Captain Kidder Having fun with creative signage Page 17 ON THE ROAD A Really Big Tow They don’t get much bigger than this load Page 12 COMING IN MAY 20th Anniversary Collector’s Edition Great time to ADVERTISE!! Call David Abraham 877-219-7734, Ext 1 Todd Suhr, parts manager for Zip's By Allan T. Duffin It’s a Saturday evening in the small town of New Hampton, Iowa. At Zip’s Truck Equipment, Todd Suhr, parts manager, is getting ready to head home when his phone rings. On the other end of the line is a tow truck operator from Spearfish, South Dakota — nearly 700 miles to the west. The tower is trapped in a furious ice storm, and his truck just sputtered to a halt. He checked under the hood and realized that his power take-off (PTO) is broken.He needs the part,and he needs it now. “No problem,” Suhr tells the frustrat- ed tower. Suhr grabs a PTO off the shelf and jumps in his car.His wife gets in the passenger seat, and the couple drives as fast as they can, crossing the border into South Dakota and motoring across the state to meet the tower at a halfway point. It’s three a.m. when Suhr hands the © 2010 Dominion Enterprises. All Rights Reserved. part to the grateful tower, who installs the new PTO and gets back to work in the ice storm. Suhr and his wife turn around and head back to Iowa — a 350-mile trip. “I don’t do that very often,” admitted Suhr. But he knew that the tow truck had to get back in service quickly, and so he took care of the problem, no questions asked. Parts experts often go the extra mile to support their cus- tomers, helping keep tow trucks on the road so that the drivers can support their customers. What They Carry Nick Kemper runs TowPartsNow. com, a supplier in Portland, Oregon, that takes orders via the telephone and over the Internet. “Wheel lift straps and lockout tools are the most com- monly purchased items,” he added. “Other big sellers are carrier skates, dollies, carrier winch cables, two-inch ratchets and magnetic tow lights.” In Shullsburg, Wisconsin, shop foreman Mark Pollock handles emer- gency parts orders, one of his many duties for Truck Country, a company with 12 truck dealerships in Wiscon- sin and Iowa. Truck Country’s shop stock primarily includes general re- pair items, which are “parts that move quickly,” explained Pollock. This in- Going behind the counter with the folks who keep your trucks rollin’! FOOTNOTES ® www.trfootnotes.com cludes cables, chains, and lights. Zip’s Truck Equipment carries parts for all major brands but focuses on Miller Industries trucks since they’re an official distributor for Miller. How- ever, they “stock parts for every major brand, and of course accessories,” said Todd Suhr. What Moves Most “Wheel lift and carrier straps and winch cable are going to wear out nat- urally and need to be replaced often,” said Kemper. “Latch kits for safety hooks — both on the end of winch cables and safety chains — replace the original latch, so that the hook retains its safety features.” At Zip’s, Suhr noted that he also sells a lot of parts that are replacements for parts that have worn out: wear pads, pivot pin kits, and bushings, to name a few. “Parts experts help keep trucks on the road so drivers can support their customers” “ ” “The majority of parts we sell are supposed to wear out,” said John LaMarche, president of Crawford Truck Sales in Lancaster, Massachusetts. This includes parts like slide-back kits for rollbacks, winch cables, and ac- cessories. “We also sell a lot of grids and L-arms that are lost due to driver error or sometimes from being stolen,” he added. If a part isn’t readily available, LaMarche keeps five to 10 kits in stock that he and his staff can disassemble to retrieve specific parts. “This usually happens for parts that aren’t wear-out pieces or aren’t a common item,” he explained, or when a truck is involved in a collision and needs a specific part. See PARTS PEOPLE, PART I, page 4 TOWBRIEFS Sign Up! www.trfootnotes.com Towing&Recovery Footnotes® 10 Bokum Rd. Essex, CT 06426 PRST STD MAIL U.S.POSTAGE PAID Hanover,PA PERMIT 117

Parts People I

Allan T. Duffin

Town of New Hampton, Iowa. At Zip’s Truck Equipment, Todd Suhr, parts manager, is getting ready to head home when his phone rings. On the other end of the line is a tow truck operator from Spearfish, South Dakota — nearly 700 miles to the west. The tower is trapped in a furious ice storm, and his truck just sputtered to a halt. He checked under the hood and realized that his power take-off (PTO) is broken.He needs the part, and he needs it now. “No problem,” Suhr tells the frustrated tower. Suhr grabs a PTO off the shelf and jumps in his car.His wife gets in the passenger seat, and the couple drives as fast as they can, crossing the border into South Dakota and motoring across the state to meet the tower at a halfway point. It’s three a.m. when Suhr hands the part to the grateful tower, who installs the new PTO and gets back to work in the ice storm. Suhr and his wife turn around and head back to Iowa — a 350-mile trip. “I don’t do that very often,” admitted Suhr. But he knew that the tow truck had to get back in service quickly, and so he took care of the problem, no questions asked. Parts experts often go the extra mile to support their customers, helping keep tow trucks on the road so that the drivers can support their customers. What They Carry Nick Kemper runs TowPartsNow. Com, a supplier in Portland, Oregon, that takes orders via the telephone and over the Internet. “Wheel lift straps and lockout tools are the most commonly purchased items,” he added. “Other big sellers are carrier skates, dollies, carrier winch cables, two-inch ratchets and magnetic tow lights.” In Shullsburg, Wisconsin, shop foreman Mark Pollock handles emergency parts orders, one of his many duties for Truck Country, a company with 12 truck dealerships in Wisconsin and Iowa. Truck Country’s shop stock primarily includes general repair items, which are “parts that move quickly,” explained Pollock. This includes cables, chains, and lights. Zip’s Truck Equipment carries parts for all major brands but focuses on Miller Industries trucks since they’re an official distributor for Miller. However, they “stock parts for every major brand, and of course accessories,” said Todd Suhr. What Moves Most “Wheel lift and carrier straps and winch cable are going to wear out naturally and need to be replaced often,” said Kemper. “Latch kits for safety hooks — both on the end of winch cables and safety chains — replace the original latch, so that the hook retains its safety features.” At Zip’s, Suhr noted that he also sells a lot of parts that are replacements for parts that have worn out: wear pads, pivot pin kits, and bushings, to name a few. “The majority of parts we sell are supposed to wear out,” said John LaMarche, president of Crawford Truck Sales in Lancaster, Massachusetts. This includes parts like slide-back kits for rollbacks, winch cables, and accessories. “We also sell a lot of grids and L-arms that are lost due to driver error or sometimes from being stolen,” he added. If a part isn’t readily available, LaMarche keeps five to 10 kits in stock that he and his staff can disassemble to retrieve specific parts. “This usually happens for parts that aren’t wear-out pieces or aren’t a common item,” he explained, or when a truck is involved in a collision and needs a specific part. Competition among parts sellers is heating up, said Butch Hogland, owner of Hooks Towing & Recovery Supplies in Wynne, Arkansas. Hooks just celebrated its 10-year anniversary in November. Hogland started out selling towing equipment, but when “ninety percent of the customers” asked if he sold truck parts, he quickly connected with several suppliers, began building inventory, and launched his new business. “It has grown so much over the years,” said Hogland. In 2007 he constructed a new building, and two years later expanded again, adding onto the original structure. “Some of the biggest challenges that we face today are supplying the product with a great price, and also with a great product to match,” he said. “There’s a lot of competition out there — tons more than there used to be. “You have ‘price buyers’ and then you have ‘product buyers,’ so you have to be able to keep up with the market on pricing and product to keep all the buyers happy.” Growing Demand Vendors use a variety of selling methods to attract customers. Kevin Hamman launched his own business, Hamman Engineering, in 1991 after towers and distributors contacted him looking for parts after the local Holmes plant in Newbern, TN, closed. “I started out supplying Holmes parts,” explained Hamman. “I soon began receiving requests for chains, cables and other accessories. The demand grew until I found myself selling parts and accessories full-time.” Hamman recently launched an eBay store to see if it would boost sales. The results have been mixed. “It has helped somewhat but the profit margins make it hardly worth messing with,” he said. “First of all, eBay’s closing-value fees start at eight percent. Then, PayPal charges around three percent to handle the transaction.” Add to that the fact that margins are low due to stiff competition in the marketplace, “and you can see why it is difficult to make money on eBay,” said Hamman. Troubleshooting When customers phone in a parts order, sometimes they request a specific part, and sometimes they need assistance to troubleshoot the problem they’re having. “Often they don't know exactly what they need, or what they have,” said Kemper. “Sometimes a lot of research is required, and a lot of interaction with the parts representatives at the major manufacturers.” Over the years Kemper has grown relationships with a network of industry sources that he taps for help when he needs it. “I send out a blanket email to all of them and see who gets back to me first,” said Kemper. “They get rather competitive!” Pinpointing the required part takes knowledge and patience on the part of the parts seller. “A lot of times they know what’s wrong but they don’t know why,” said Pollock, who then guides the customer through a diagnosis over the phone. “I ask certain questions,” he said. “What is it doing? When the customer starts leading me toward a certain issue, I can pinpoint it for them a little better.” If a customer has an idea of what he or she needs, Pollock said they can go to Truck Country’s Web site, which contains online versions of parts catalogs and service manuals. “A lot of the calls I get are towers who kind of know what they’re looking for but aren’t sure where to find it,” added Mark. Parts breakdowns are also available online at Zip’s Web site. Needed ASAP Sometimes parts managers hear from customers who need a part immediately. At Truck Country, Pollock got a call late on a Friday afternoon from a tower in northern Michigan. “There was nobody around him, and everyone around him had already closed,” recalled Pollock. “He was all Alone.” The tower had blown a pump on his Ford wrecker. “He thought he had a bad valve, but after running him through some checks he found out that he had a bad pump,” said Pollock. Pollock checked his computer parts database and spent the next 45 minutes on the phone with the tower and several parts suppliers until he located the right pump. “We were able to overnight it to him so he could get back on the road,” said Pollock. Zip’s Truck Equipment, Suhr estimates that one out of every 15 orders is from a customer who needs the part immediately. But in reality, he said, all parts orders are critical. “Most of the orders are for a truck that’s down,” said Suhr. “It makes a lot of the orders urgent in their own way.” Keep On Trackin’ Ninety-nine percent of the orders coming out of Zip’s are shipped via UPS. Suhr appreciates the delivery service’s ability to track packages as they travel to the customer. “It’s really easy to find out where the part is, from the time it leaves here to the time it gets there. I have a tracking number, so I can check online to tell the customer exactly where the package is at any time.” We have well over a million dollars in parts and accessories on hand,” added Suhr, who’s been working parts for 15 years, “so we have more direct control and don’t have to rely on others. Nowadays with people using credit cards, we can ship parts directly from the supplier to the customer. We only ship direct when absolutely necessary.” This saves on time and freight costs. Seasonal Sales At Truck Country, parts sales shift depending on the time of year. During the fall, said Pollock, “a lot of towers are looking at their wreckers, checking their cables, their chains, lights, that kind of thing.” When that happens, Pollock sells a lot of service kits — items such as oil filters, hydraulic filters, and seal valve replacements. Different types of parts begin to move in the springtime. “At that time of the year we usually sell a lot of carrier items, 50-foot wire ropes, V-bridles and the occasional light bar,” said Pollock. Hoses are an item known to wear out. “Hoses just don’t last like they used to,” said Pollock. “Some towers I’ve talked to have changed three or four hoses on one wrecker in a 12- month period.” Pollock has heard from towers who have older tow trucks and almost never have had to change hoses. However, Pollock also noted that vendors are making efforts to upgrade the quality of these products. “I don’t know whether vendors were getting bad materials or what, but that’s turned around now,” he said.

Publication List