ForConstructionPros.com

Great news — the equipment rental business is still the resilient growth business it has been for the past five years. The rental industry is still growing in size and customer awareness, and it still has a long way to go. My congratulations to all of you who are making this growth happen.

I still see the enthusiasm and the eagerness to learn. People outside our industry have no idea how hard all of you work and the number of hours of each day that you devote to the business. So, simply, the state of the equipment rental industry is solid.

If you read or watch the news, you might really wonder how the predicted spending slowdown in the national economy will affect the rental industry in the months to come. Almost every economist is predicting slower economic activity, although the national economic forecasts seem to fluctuate wildly from day to day.

The logical conservative move by some of your customers to restrict some of their capital spending will actually benefit equipment rental companies. These traditional customers will likely rent more to conserve capital. The big question is will they rent from you or a competitor?

There are so many ways to grow your business and no shortage of ideas and good intentions on the part of rental business operators and their employees to capture additional business. But, what are the most pressing needs? What should you and your staff be focusing your energies on? It doesn't make sense to do a little patch work on key foundations of your business (like personnel structure or your inventory) without analyzing what is really needed and what are the priorities. Like repairing one of your rental items — don't just patch it. Do an analysis to determine what is needed for a quality repair.