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FIFA. Freight. Fierce Winds: Episode 70
105 Plays19 days ago
We're talking about things keeping the tenting industry on its toes lately — dangerous weather, freight logistics and FIFA World Cup events.
This episode is brought to you by Anchor Clear Span Tents & Structures, learn more at www.anchorinc.com.
PS, if you want to join ARA and you tell them you heard about it from Nate and Kyle, you'll get 25% off your membership! https://ararental.org/join-ARA/promo/Podcast25
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Transcript
Introduction and Theme
00:00:01
Speaker
The one you call when you need a 10 up or down I'm a 10 riddle man I'm working on all day Getting mistakes in the ground No matter what they say From sunrise to the night make sure everything's right Yeah I'm a 10 riddle man
00:00:18
Speaker
And we're back again with another episode of Under the Vinyl. As always, I got my guest, co-host, whatever you want to call him, Kyle. Hey, Nate, you'd think by now you'd know it's another episode of Under the Vinyl, a rental management media podcast. Can you please get it right two weeks in a row?
00:00:37
Speaker
All right, um let's restart
Pleasantries and Weather Talk
00:00:39
Speaker
this. ah Welcome to another episode of Under the Vinyl, a rental management media podcast. As always, thank you I have my dumbass Kyle here. And Kyle, how are you?
00:00:51
Speaker
I'm great, Nate. It's great to see you. good Glad we get this laughing. I'm glad we get to. We need this every once in a while. What have you been up to? It's hot. We're busy. I think I got two more weeks of hell and then July hits and we are smooth sailing.
00:01:07
Speaker
I like that. we It is hotter than hell, that is for sure. I feel like the humidity came out of nowhere yesterday. My wife had the idea that we were going to go ah to a baseball game last night and take the kids. And um yeah, I was completely soaked after about an hour. It was pretty
Tent Mishap Stories
00:01:22
Speaker
rough.
00:01:22
Speaker
You know, he he made he's here speaking of baseball games, you want to talk about what happened a few weeks ago at a baseball game West Virginia? Yeah. So, um, I mean, think there's some things that ah we could learn in our industry and we hit on this a lot. Um, but you know, five people were hospitalized after the winds, uh, sent that tent airborne in West Virginia, um, at the West Virginia university baseball game. Um, and it just goes back to doing things right in this industry. Um, I wouldn't,
00:01:53
Speaker
I wouldn't normally be speculating, but as you can see, the amount of weight that wasn't hanging from it, um and as it was blowing down, it's like, you know, you would think it'd be common sense after all these issues we've had in this industry and we're trying to keep eyes off this industry. And it just sucks that we bring negative information.
00:02:14
Speaker
negative impacts and negative publicity to our industry with things like that, especially in a time where we got, you know, big jobs like FIFA going on.
00:02:24
Speaker
Well, yeah you know, that line of storms ended up coming through New Jersey and I'll the first to admit we lost a 20 by 20 high peak. The fitting just snapped that the ratchet was hooked to. And once one corner was free to go wherever it wanted, it took the whole tent with it.
00:02:40
Speaker
But, Obviously no one got hurt and and we had done everything we could do. I mean, I think a weld just broke and that is, I think it's one thing that we need to start looking at as an industry. You know, this company is probably running fittings still from the early 2000s for some frame tent stuff. And I don't think anyone's really inspecting welds or ah the eye rings on there that you're hooking ratchets to. So it kind of opened my eyes to that stuff. We need to start looking at more and more um as things do start to age.
00:03:11
Speaker
Yeah, and I wouldn't even say – yeah, and I agree with that totally. But I would also think that, like, taking taken away from, like, the tent collapsing, that tent didn't collapse. That thing moved down the damn hill. Yeah.
00:03:22
Speaker
And, I mean, it didn't just move. I don't know where it came from, but if you watch the video, it moved pretty damn far down the path and then just started going down the hill. And if you watch – I mean, there were several different videos, but I was on the Twitter, and I was looking at the video of the guys that were – They were holding their pop-up canopies down and just like, like at that point, I'd let that thing fly away. I guess they're trying not to let somebody get hurt, but it just takes me back to evacuation plans.
Weather Preparedness and Education
00:03:50
Speaker
Um, you know, we talk about evacuation plans and things like that and making sure that everybody's safe. And I know nobody wants to evacuate anybody in those situations, but you know, who should have the authority to evacuate those people in that, in that moment.
00:04:04
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think it's any competent person should be able to say, get the heck out of here. Right. We had some storms roll through three or four weeks ago now at this point, um and we had a pretty big job up, and it was Brian and I out there.
00:04:19
Speaker
And we were standing, there's one ADY in the middle of a field, and him and I were just standing there watching it, because that man we were mainly concerned about, because just taking wind hard. And a bunch of people ran underneath of it and Brian yelled, hey, I own that thing and you don't see me standing underneath it. So you shouldn't be under there.
00:04:35
Speaker
And it just goes like everyone. He's not wrong. Yeah. Everyone just assumes that you're safe all the time if you're under something like that. And it's it's you're not. And now it is scary. And I think anyone should be able to say get the heck out of here.
00:04:49
Speaker
Well, it's just educating clients about, you know, weather risk and just operational decisions as a whole. I mean, anybody who's setting up a tent, you, I, or anybody else, or, you know, renting somebody a tent should should give those people the tools that they need to understand, hey...
00:05:05
Speaker
this is where you need need to get out of here. What is my evacuation plan look like? At what wind speed do we need to get out of here or start thinking about getting out here? Who's monitoring it? um Who's my emergency contacts within your company to call and go down the line to talk about this stuff? yeah Did you send a video of the sailcloth job on the East Coast?
00:05:24
Speaker
Yeah, actually, I i did. um I did through, kind i can't remember who sent it to me, but yeah, I saw that. And like all those people were still in the tent. Well, and that tent was- Kudos to that company, the tent stayed up.
00:05:36
Speaker
that's all I was going to say The tent was anchored properly. Right. And I've seen it like, you know, we've talked before I've seen my tents with nobody in them days before the event goes and it goes up and it goes down. Right. Um, and that's just something, again, you talk about the wind speed and everything else. I mean, it all just comes back to the proper weight and the proper engineering. So if you have the engineered structure, you better damn sure, make sure that the weight's on there properly. And,
00:06:04
Speaker
I get it. um A lot of people try to skimp out on the weight because they think that it's going to hurt them on freight and price and everything else, which it is. Yeah, they'll never be able compete in their local market, right, Nate? Yeah, they won't be able to compete in their local markets. But at the end of the day, like I tell people in Nashville, like, you know, for rooftop jobs, if I can't get weight up there, if I can't get anchors and anchored properly, somebody's going to do the job.
00:06:27
Speaker
It's just not going to be me because I don't want to end up picking a 10 up off of Broadway or picking a 10 up off somebody on Broadway, right? Well, the issue is, is all these people think it's okay. Cause you know, Oh, I survived that storm. I survived that storm. I survived that storm. Well, eventually you're not going to survive one of them.
00:06:43
Speaker
No. And the problem is that one storm that hits you, it's going to take down the whole damn operation. And if it doesn't take you down, it's going to put you through hell for many, many years. I've seen it happen. This episode of Under the Vinyl is brought to you by Anker Tents and Clear Spans, manufactured in the USA and built for the rental
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00:06:59
Speaker
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Speaker
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00:07:16
Speaker
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Freight Challenges in the Rental Industry
00:07:36
Speaker
freight costs. i mean, freight is, freight's going through the roof right now. mean, we get, we get emails on it daily, just on the rate changes and everything else. And, what are you, uh, for quoting purposes at this point, say you're sending someone a price for in September, are you locking in your freight now? Are you saying this is estimated and subject to change within 15 days of delivery?
00:07:58
Speaker
ah Typically, where we are putting something in there that says, hey, this is what the freight cost is. um This will be finalized within two weeks of the event. So that way we have time to change it. um You know, if you're putting enough money on there, because obviously if your freight is $2,000, you're not charging $2,000, right? Because you're kind brokering the deal. um You're charging a percentage, whether that be 20% or whatever that looks like. um So maybe you charge a little bit extra there and you're able to have some wiggle room. That way you're not going back and having to say something to the customer. But, I mean, the way it keeps changing and things are constantly going right now, it's kind of hard to lock yourself into something and and and not go back and change that. I mean, it's just...
00:08:39
Speaker
Logistics are hell right now. And even getting freight lanes, right? Freight lanes are tough. um You know, there's a lot of places truckers don't want to go currently right now with when ICE was running through and CDL drivers and all that kind of stuff. So freight's been so tough um just in general. they It's not of just fuel and things like that. It's been all all those different variables, right? Well, and the problem is, um I'm trying to say this nicely.
00:09:07
Speaker
You know, brokers promise you they'll they'll get you a truck. You know, you get into some of these remote job sites and then a day goes by and they go, I'm trying, trying, and trying. And then like I had guys stuck on a job site for a week, not a week, but maybe two extra days just waiting on trucks because I couldn't, brokers could not get me to get trucks to the site.
00:09:25
Speaker
Guys did not want to run there. Yep. And I did that. Look, I don't care what it costs at this point. I just want to get the stuff out of here. Like, can we just get this over with? Well, that that's where it goes back and forth to do you hire CDL drivers and have your own trucks or do you, you know, which is fine, but do you want your one driver running across the country, one load and coming back empty? Right. So me and my father argue about that all the time, especially because I'd be the one who has to do it, which makes it less appealing to me.
00:09:53
Speaker
Right. I mean, we have CDL drivers on staff and we have we have one tractor. And then, of course, we have a bunch of trailers that we can um we can load out. um But for the most part, we're brokering. And then our you know we'll we'll rent a an extra tractor if we need to.
00:10:08
Speaker
So we have a couple of tractors running, right? But um they're not running long distance. you know For the most part, we're trying to broker long distance stuff. And it's just... you know broken with the right person, but they even then, you know, going back to just, um, finding hubs and, um, you know, lanes and things like that.
00:10:25
Speaker
I know it's horrible that I do this, but if I get a good driver through a broker, I'll be the first one to say, Hey, can i have your phone number? I don't think it's a bad thing. I bet I got a hundred truckless phone numbers and I, I fire off texts to him all the time. Like, Hey, yeah I got this load coming out here. are you interested? And I just move on to the next one. And I've gotten some great, like local guys. Uh, like I got a guy who's got four trucks. He'll go anywhere in the country for me. So I just call him direct.
00:10:49
Speaker
Yeah. I pay a little bit more, but if I tell him to be there, and if I tell him to be somewhere at a certain time, yeah he's going to be there no matter what. And if he's not going to be there, he's communicated me to me that, Hey, something went wrong. And I,
00:11:02
Speaker
This is when I'll be there. Whereas some of those guys ghost you and then they just show up three hours late. Well, nine times out of 10, that's half the battle. Just trying to get them to talk to you or or they about 10 minutes before they're supposed to pick up. They say that they had something go wrong when in reality, you know, when they say that they just found something that was a better price or going to wherever they wanted to go back to. Yeah, exactly.
00:11:24
Speaker
Let's be honest with me. Yeah, I get
Impact of FIFA Events on Rentals
00:11:27
Speaker
it. Totally. um Well, then jumping in through that, then in the FIFA, FIFA has started. um i would assume that there's probably going to be a lack of production from um from the Hispanic side about about two o'clock today since the Mexico has... ah has gone to kick off here, but it's FIFA's FIFA is getting a little crazy now. And, um you know, even in our city of Chattanooga, we have one of the hotels that's downtown that's kind of barricaded off ah by fence for the team to stay at the entire time. And um yeah. And so it's, ah you know, I think FIFA is everywhere right now. There's a lot of demand for temporary structures um and things like that. What have you seen?
00:12:11
Speaker
We got a little bit of work, ah mainly at their local training facilities around us. um I got a nice TF job at FanFest in Philadelphia for an activation, ah which I went down there the day before they opened. I was just walking around and looking at some of the stuff people did.
00:12:31
Speaker
The activation next to the job I did had a box truck on top of just like regular AS decks with nothing on it. I'm like, what are you doing? Oh, boy. Yeah, that's insane. i' I'm more worried about what's gonna happen when all these games start really taking off and just the crowd control and the management. um i mean, who knows? The temporary structures might be involved in those. You might see people hanging from the temporary structures and things like that. So um I think that could get interesting. um
00:13:02
Speaker
And then with transportation, you know, within ah within the country and back to freight, you know, just – Just trying to get things moved around the country with all that going on. I think things might get tough there. um But of course, you know, with that comes good from that. I think that there will probably be some more opportunities for some other jobs around the country for other people that maybe you wouldn't normally see because not everybody can fulfill those jobs taking on the FIFA work.
00:13:29
Speaker
So i think that would be good as well. It was so interesting to me to see that people were so gung-ho to go after all that FIFA work. Yeah. Because, you know, it's a busy time of year. it is. Let's just use let's just use the mid Mid-Atlantic as an example.
00:13:44
Speaker
I had a ah book of business I do every spring, basically. I can only take on so much work. So I couldn't go after too much FIFA work because I didn't want to jeopardize ruining a relationship with a current client who's going to be there next year.
00:13:57
Speaker
FIFA's not here next year. Mm-hmm. so do I mean, that's just like going to the border camps, right? So when everybody, that big craze came through, what was about a couple of years ago?
00:14:09
Speaker
When that big craze came through and everybody wanted to go do the border camps and run down to Texas and do all this work. And then now they're out of tents or they can't fulfill stuff. So it's like, again, finding your lane in this industry, right? So are is that you?
00:14:22
Speaker
Are you just trying to make a quick buck? And some people have. some people Some people have made a quick buck off that and done well and either got out or... you know done something else and there's other people that specialize in it. that That's what they do. And is that you? Is that something you want to do? Do you want to specialize in that or do you want to continue to do what you're doing? And it's finding your niche, man. We talk about that all the time, but it doesn't matter what size company you are.
00:14:47
Speaker
Don't go chasing just a dollar. Make sure you're make sure you do what you say. Don't go chasing waterfalls, right, Nate? Yeah, just do what you say you're going to do and do it right. And so, you know, that's that's the tough part. But yeah, I think the FIFA fifa craze has taken off. um But I mean, a lot of those big companies have called or stuff's got outsourced and things like that. So i think it can be good for everybody, even if you're not directly involved in it. but yeah But ah what do you got
Upcoming Events and Opportunities
00:15:15
Speaker
coming up? Anything looking forward to you?
00:15:18
Speaker
I got ah one more big job this spring, summer, whatever you want to call this season right now that we're in. And I'm looking forward to that to be over, to be honest with you. Yeah. I'm on my last one big one in Nashville and for a little bit. We've got more work, but just last real big one. um And I will say I'll be happy to get that monkey off my back. You know I'm looking forward to, Nate?
00:15:42
Speaker
What's that? You and me of Broadway in August. I was just going to say, before we close out here, don't forget, I've got to do it, Kyle. Got to promote it. So we have the boot camp for ARA in Nashville at C2C Nashville. um And if you haven't signed up, get signed up. It's going to be a good time. We've actually got, ah I think I signed up our good buddy Joe from United. he is ah Really? He's a wonderful he's a wonderful he's a wonderful cook.
00:16:11
Speaker
And so he has a gigantic grill, ah pull behind grill, and he barbecues and it's phenomenal. So we are actually going to have him on site ah for one of the days and we're going to do do some good barbecue and food.
00:16:24
Speaker
And so, ah yeah, if you haven't got signed up August 18th, 19th in Nashville, come hang out, um get your certifications, get everything done, and we will provide the beer after.
00:16:36
Speaker
i heard Darren Randall was paying for the beer. Yeah, I'm going to get Stephen to bust out that credit card and make sure we're a part of that strategic partnership. so Thank you, Amogee Bank. Absolutely.
Safety Tips for Hot Weather
00:16:49
Speaker
All right, Kyle. It's good talking buddy, as always. Stay ah stay cold. Do what you can. Stay hydrated. And ah for everybody else out there, stay safe in this heat. Remember, take breaks, get water, do your stretches, and yeah, it's been another episode of Under the Vinyl, rental management media podcast.