Renting Offers Contractors New Opportunities

Georgia Sealcoating finds several benefits with renting large equipment

Road Products, Inc., Fayetteville, GA, rents large hot applied crack sealing machines. Before renting, contractors are required to have a special insurance and declare if they are familiar with the equipment.
Road Products, Inc., Fayetteville, GA, rents large hot applied crack sealing machines. Before renting, contractors are required to have a special insurance and declare if they are familiar with the equipment.

Georgia Sealcoating began as a part-time business in 2004 for owner Greg Owens. Located in Tifton, GA., Owens business has grown into a fulltime job with six fulltime, and eight part-time employees. As his company has grown, Owens has been exposed to the opportunities with rental equipment.  

"If we get onto larger jobs we rent a crack sealing machine from a company near Atlanta," Owens says. "That's been key for us to knock out some of these larger crack sealing jobs."

With a service area including Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and the Carolinas, Georgia Sealcoating works strictly with commercial clients completing sealcoating, line striping, pothole repair, small asphalt repairs, parking lot sweeping and thermoplastic striping.

You get what you pay for

Owens first experienced the benefits of renting equipment several years ago while working on a project for Moody Air Force Base in Valdosta, GA. Georgia Sealcoating was completing a crack sealing job on the runways. Before beginning the project, Owens purchased an oil jacketed crack seal machine.

"It was an older unit, probably around 30 years old, and I got it at a great deal," Owens says. "But you get what you pay for. We used it for about 20 minutes, and it caught on fire and burned up. They had the whole airport closed down and we were on the runway with a piece of equipment on fire."

In order to complete the project, Owens turned to renting. "It was on a Saturday morning, and we called the company's emergency number," he says. "We were on the road within half an hour to pick it up. It worked really well and ever since then that's the way we go."

Owens rents from Road Products, Inc. located in Fayetteville, GA. Mike Little, manager, has been in the industry for about 30 years and Road Products was founded in 1996 as a supplier and rental store. One unit he rents is the hot applied crack sealing machines.

Little often rents to contractors who have a few years of experience in the sealcoating industry. "The entry level contractor has opted to rent one of our $40,000 machines for production," he says. Frequently, contractors rent from Road Products when completing larger jobs.

Owens is one of those contractors who rents equipment when faced with completing large crack repair jobs. Occasionally, Owens also rents broom sweepers to minimize the time of cleaning extremely dirty parking lots.

The renting process

Little goes through several steps before contractors are able to rent from Road Products. First, Little learns who the contractors are, carefully screening each account. "If they are a new business we learn who they are, where they come from, and if there is a financial history to check out," he says. "Most of these melter applicators range from $40,000 to $60,000 so we don't want one of these just going out the door."

Contractors are required to have special insurance requirements. "The burden of insurance is on the contractor. For this type of equipment it is standard for contractors to have their own insurance," he says. "Insurance requirements are different due to the specialized nature of this business with hot applied crack sealing."

If contractors meet the requirements, a schedule is set for pickup. At that time, Road Products require contractors to sign a statement proclaiming that they are familiar with the equipment. "The renter is required to certify they have knowledge of the equipment and can operate it safely," Little says. "If not, the operators will be subject to a training session done at our facility."

Road Products is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. five days a week, but an emergency number is available. "Part of the service is being able to take that call where there is a problem or issue and turn it into a positive," Little says. "Generally, within about 30 minutes or less that customer is up and running again. We know this equipment and its general operation well enough to identify the problem with just a little bit of information."

Capital outlay and quality condition

One area where Owens has found significant benefits for the company is the capital outlay. "A new one [crack sealer] is $40,000 or more, and we don't see investing that kind of money for using it once every three months," Owens says. "If I can rent it for $150 per day it makes sense."

The biggest piece of equipment Owens rents is the crack sealing machine. A recent job Georgia Sealcoating completed involved crack sealing 20,000 lineal feet. "That would normally take us three to four days with our pour pots to complete," he says. "With the crack sealing machine we rented, we were in and out in a day. It allowed us to move on to another job faster."

By renting large equipment and reducing days on individual projects, Owens is able to speed up the whole job process ultimately gaining more jobs and making more money.

Another benefit is the condition of rental equipment. "When we rent a piece of equipment it's in tip-top shape; we don't have to do any maintenance to it which saves us money," he says. "When we pick up the equipment we know it's ready and that we can turn it on and go to work."

Despite all of the positive results Owens has experienced, he acknowledges one disadvantage he has faced with renting equipment—time. "The only real disadvantage is the time that it takes us to get to where the rental company is and the return," he says. "From our office to where Road Products is located is about a two hours drive, so we have to plan ahead a little bit more than usual."

In the beginning, Owens didn't realize businesses were renting this type of equipment, but since learning of the opportunities to rent his business has seen a positive change. "Once I found out, it opened up a whole new world to us," he says. "I found out I could bid on some of these jobs that normally I wouldn't be interested in doing because there was too much involved. Now we're able to get on these jobs that normally in the past I wouldn't have considered doing."

 

 

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