Raymond runs RPM Trailer Rental out of Callander, Ontario, just south of North Bay, with a six-trailer fleet built to cover as many jobs as possible. Ten months into the business, the most telling detail isn't the size of the fleet; it's where he runs it from. Since switching to HQ Rent, Raymond books trailers from his phone, and his booking process has effectively doubled.
He means that literally. Raymond has landed rentals from his phone without ever touching a computer, including one day when he booked two trailers while driving two hours to pick up supplies. Both trailers left his yard without him having to turn back.
That's a long way from how RPM started. Before HQ Rent, everything was manual: booking, receipts, customer information and deposits, all handled by hand. For a one-person operation, that paperwork was the ceiling on how much business the yard could take. The switch changed the pace of the whole operation. By Raymond's account, his booking process doubled in the first week alone, and customers move through checkout so smoothly that when he raised his prices, not a single renter hesitated to pay.
The piece he calls out first is the customer records. RPM's customer CRM now holds every renter's details in one place, replacing the contact information he used to track by hand. "I love that the contact list is working perfect," he says.
The fleet itself is deliberately broad. Raymond keeps two flat decks, a 24-foot tilt and a 20-foot float; two dump trailers, a 7-by-14 and a 6-by-10; and two enclosed trailers, a 16-foot and a 22-foot, both 8.5 feet wide. The trailers ride on 14,000-lb axles and come equipped with winches and vehicle strapping, which is why RPM's renters lean on them for everything from ice shacks to vintage tractors across Callander, North Bay and the surrounding townships.
His advice for owners just starting out is blunt: don't cheap out on software. Raymond's take is to invest in the most reputable option you can find, even if it isn't the cheapest, because the time it saves pays for itself. For a solo operator, the hours he isn't spending on paperwork are hours he can spend renting trailers, or driving two hours for supplies without missing a booking.
Ten months in, RPM Trailer Rental is running lean and growing, with a goal of doubling the fleet next year. The system that lets Raymond book from anywhere is HQ Rent's trailer rental software.