TWO MEN AND A TRUCK® — the largest franchisor in the U.S. moving industry, with over 380 units and 3,000 trucks in operation — has kept its franchisees busy with plenty of service additions, diversifying revenue and creating record-breaking growth during some of the most trying times our country has ever faced.
“Although the pandemic was a little bit challenging from the recruiting and staffing side, moving services has always been such an essential business,” said Ashley Skaggs, director of sales at TWO MEN AND A TRUCK. “People are still moving. They still need to get out of apartment leases, and home sale numbers have been through the roof.”
The company eclipsed its highest month of revenue ever in 2021, surpassing $60 million in overall revenue for the first time in June.
“We ended June at $66.3 million, which was 32% growth,” Skaggs said. “And then in July, we were at $68.3 million, which was 17% growth.”
The implementation of additional services has boosted the TWO MEN AND A TRUCK brand image, according to multi-state, multi-unit franchisee Brian Stern, so much so that customers automatically look at them as a one-stop shop when it comes to moving, relocation, storage and junk removal.
TWO MEN AND A TRUCK began offering junk removal services at the end of 2019, but it really got off the ground and started proving to be a reliable source of revenue in 2020.
“Obviously during the pandemic, we needed to focus on our core services and just keep everything going,” Skaggs said. “So, we really dove into junk removal over the past year, and it has really started to pick up traction.”
There are currently 50 junk trucks across all TWO MEN AND A TRUCK locations, but more than 70 locations offer junk removal services with their standard moving trucks. Locations that offer junk removal services have attributed between 2% to 3% of their revenue directly to that service since its inception.
“Our largest franchise that is operating junk removal was our first original pilot location in Michigan,” Skaggs said. “They have two junk trucks right now, and they are averaging between $10,000 and $15,000 per truck each month.”
In Chicago, Stern said they’ve offered the junk removal service for nearly two years.
“Whenever we're moving someone, everyone has one piece they want to donate or get rid of,” Stern said. “We were an early adopter of junk removal. The junk removal trucks we have out in Chicago are busy all the time.”
Ranging between 19-25 feet long, the dumpster-style junk removal trucks are slightly smaller than the 26-foot long standard moving trucks. Some locations also offer an option to leave the dumpster at the customer’s home and return a few days later when it’s fully loaded.
As another perk for franchisees, junk removal and other additional sources of revenue help tremendously during the colder, off-season months to offset the times when TWO MEN AND A TRUCK crews aren’t as busy with regular moves.
As for long distance moves, TWO MEN AND A TRUCK offer expedited service in addition to its newer Value Flex® option that creates a way for TWO MEN AND A TRUCK customers to relocate at a longer distance for an economic rate.
With expedited service, the same team that loads the items onto the truck will drive directly to the new location and unload. It’s a quick turnaround, and customers’ items don’t intermingle with other people’s belongings.
“Previously, if a customer was moving just a few items or maybe even a studio apartment from Chicago to California, we’d put it in our big truck and drive it all the way over there, which was labor-intensive and expensive,” Stern said. “Over the past eight or nine months, we’re now creating smaller shipments, getting people’s belongings onto cross-country driver trucks using a third party and getting their things to them at a much more cost-effective option for our customers.”
This second long-distance option is known as TWO MEN AND A TRUCK’s Value Flex service, which is currently offered at about 50 TWO MEN AND A TRUCK locations across the country. Most customers choosing the Value Flex option spend about $3,800 to $4,200 on the service, according to Pamela Batten, compliance director at TWO MEN AND A TRUCK.
With the Value Flex 16 ft., container moves, someone’s belongings are loaded into a portable box, which does not tilt the load and ensures the belongings stay intact while in transport. Those belongings are then driven to the TWO MEN AND A TRUCK franchise in the customer’s new city, where they’re delivered and unloaded in their new home by the local team. This option is ideal for smaller moves, such as apartments or small homes.
With the crate option, one’s belongings are placed in a crate measuring 89” L x 89” H x 47” W that holds approximately 1,000 lbs., of household goods. Once loaded, the crate is transported by a third-party carrier to the TWO MEN AND A TRUCK franchise closest to the customer’s delivery destination. There, a local TWO MEN AND A TRUCK team will unload the customer’s belongings. Crate moves are great for moving one room or a few pieces of furniture long distance.
“The Value Flex traditional container program has been in place since June of 2016, and then we added the crated portion and did our first crated move in November 2019 as a test,” Batten said. “We're still officially in the pilot phase, but clearly it's taken off incredibly, so we know it'll be a huge option for the whole system eventually.”
Although the Value Flex options may take longer than the expedited long-distance service, delivery dates are given once a move is booked, so customers know when to expect their items.
“We're serving customers we wouldn't have been able to serve by offering a service that we couldn't offer before, giving franchisees some additional revenue streams,” Batten said.
In 2020 the Value Flex service brought in just over $4.5 million for TWO MEN IN A TRUCK. Through July 2021, they’ve already surpassed $5.7 million in Value Flex revenue.
Another service from TWO MEN AND A TRUCK, storage, is picking up traction among franchisees nationwide. The St. Louis market kicked it off with the first purchase of real estate for storage buildings, and Stern said those buildings filled up within two weeks.
“Since then, they've actually purchased additional buildings for storage, and they have had no problems,” Stern said. “If anything, they have capacity issues. They sell their storage so fast they need more.”
Stern runs locations in Des Plaines, Illinois and downtown Chicago, and he said he hopes the building he’s purchased for TWO MEN AND A TRUCK storage will be ready within about 30 to 45 days.
“We get asked to provide storage every single day,” he said. “We just purchased the new building, and we're getting ready to, again, add another valuable service. We've always focused on the moving aspect of things, and we think we're in a position now where offering storage would help our clients make a smoother transition for those moves where there might be a couple of weeks between closings.”
TWO MEN AND A TRUCK’s Home Office team provides playbooks for all services, so franchisees have access to a proven strategy when it comes to rolling out new offerings.
“Our sales consultants will help the franchisees to really understand how to price their services, how to look at competitor analysis, how to handle converting all the leads they get in and also how to diversify those leads so that we can get the most out of one lead that we can,” Skaggs said. “We try to take one estimate or one customer and maximize the opportunities to the fullest extent with all of the different revenue sources we have.”
As a franchisee, Stern gave a glowing review of the Home Office team’s support for his locations.
“The TWO MEN AND A TRUCK Home Office team has been excellent to collaborate with on the diversification we need in our market,” Stern said. “We talk through things, game plan and then execute. They lean on us on the execution side of things. We lean on them for overall general support — whether it’s legal, IT or best practices from other markets.”
The variety of options, Stern said, has been invaluable to their customers, and the team at TWO MEN AND A TRUCK is always on top of the latest trends to figure out which new options can be developed down the road. The Judson Group, one of the largest multi-unit ownership groups in the system that own locations in multiple cities across the U.S., including the Chicago locations Stern references, are consistently top performers in the franchise proving that it pays off to take advantage of these different service offerings.
“What’s next? I'm not sure,” he said. “But we're always brainstorming, and we're always looking for the next big project to add more services and add more options of variety for our customers, just to make it easier for them.”
Franchise opportunities for standard markets range from $179,400 to $595,000 and mini-market opportunities range from $100,000 to $222,000. Learn more, here.
TWO MEN AND A TRUCK
SPONSORED
Services like junk removal, storage and long-distance delivery help the moving franchisor’s local owners see revenue year-round, even during the pandemic and in off-season months.
TWO MEN AND A TRUCK® — the largest franchisor in the U.S. moving industry, with over 380 units and 3,000 trucks in operation — has kept its franchisees busy with plenty of service additions, diversifying revenue and creating record-breaking growth during some of the most trying times our country has ever faced.
“Although the pandemic was a little bit challenging from the recruiting and staffing side, moving services has always been such an essential business,” said Ashley Skaggs, director of sales at TWO MEN AND A TRUCK. “People are still moving. They still need to get out of apartment leases, and home sale numbers have been through the roof.”
The company eclipsed its highest month of revenue ever in 2021, surpassing $60 million in overall revenue for the first time in June.
“We ended June at $66.3 million, which was 32% growth,” Skaggs said. “And then in July, we were at $68.3 million, which was 17% growth.”
The implementation of additional services has boosted the TWO MEN AND A TRUCK brand image, according to multi-state, multi-unit franchisee Brian Stern, so much so that customers automatically look at them as a one-stop shop when it comes to moving, relocation, storage and junk removal.
TWO MEN AND A TRUCK began offering junk removal services at the end of 2019, but it really got off the ground and started proving to be a reliable source of revenue in 2020.
“Obviously during the pandemic, we needed to focus on our core services and just keep everything going,” Skaggs said. “So, we really dove into junk removal over the past year, and it has really started to pick up traction.”
There are currently 50 junk trucks across all TWO MEN AND A TRUCK locations, but more than 70 locations offer junk removal services with their standard moving trucks. Locations that offer junk removal services have attributed between 2% to 3% of their revenue directly to that service since its inception.
“Our largest franchise that is operating junk removal was our first original pilot location in Michigan,” Skaggs said. “They have two junk trucks right now, and they are averaging between $10,000 and $15,000 per truck each month.”
In Chicago, Stern said they’ve offered the junk removal service for nearly two years.
“Whenever we're moving someone, everyone has one piece they want to donate or get rid of,” Stern said. “We were an early adopter of junk removal. The junk removal trucks we have out in Chicago are busy all the time.”
Ranging between 19-25 feet long, the dumpster-style junk removal trucks are slightly smaller than the 26-foot long standard moving trucks. Some locations also offer an option to leave the dumpster at the customer’s home and return a few days later when it’s fully loaded.
As another perk for franchisees, junk removal and other additional sources of revenue help tremendously during the colder, off-season months to offset the times when TWO MEN AND A TRUCK crews aren’t as busy with regular moves.
As for long distance moves, TWO MEN AND A TRUCK offer expedited service in addition to its newer Value Flex® option that creates a way for TWO MEN AND A TRUCK customers to relocate at a longer distance for an economic rate.
With expedited service, the same team that loads the items onto the truck will drive directly to the new location and unload. It’s a quick turnaround, and customers’ items don’t intermingle with other people’s belongings.
“Previously, if a customer was moving just a few items or maybe even a studio apartment from Chicago to California, we’d put it in our big truck and drive it all the way over there, which was labor-intensive and expensive,” Stern said. “Over the past eight or nine months, we’re now creating smaller shipments, getting people’s belongings onto cross-country driver trucks using a third party and getting their things to them at a much more cost-effective option for our customers.”
This second long-distance option is known as TWO MEN AND A TRUCK’s Value Flex service, which is currently offered at about 50 TWO MEN AND A TRUCK locations across the country. Most customers choosing the Value Flex option spend about $3,800 to $4,200 on the service, according to Pamela Batten, compliance director at TWO MEN AND A TRUCK.
With the Value Flex 16 ft., container moves, someone’s belongings are loaded into a portable box, which does not tilt the load and ensures the belongings stay intact while in transport. Those belongings are then driven to the TWO MEN AND A TRUCK franchise in the customer’s new city, where they’re delivered and unloaded in their new home by the local team. This option is ideal for smaller moves, such as apartments or small homes.
With the crate option, one’s belongings are placed in a crate measuring 89” L x 89” H x 47” W that holds approximately 1,000 lbs., of household goods. Once loaded, the crate is transported by a third-party carrier to the TWO MEN AND A TRUCK franchise closest to the customer’s delivery destination. There, a local TWO MEN AND A TRUCK team will unload the customer’s belongings. Crate moves are great for moving one room or a few pieces of furniture long distance.
“The Value Flex traditional container program has been in place since June of 2016, and then we added the crated portion and did our first crated move in November 2019 as a test,” Batten said. “We're still officially in the pilot phase, but clearly it's taken off incredibly, so we know it'll be a huge option for the whole system eventually.”
Although the Value Flex options may take longer than the expedited long-distance service, delivery dates are given once a move is booked, so customers know when to expect their items.
“We're serving customers we wouldn't have been able to serve by offering a service that we couldn't offer before, giving franchisees some additional revenue streams,” Batten said.
In 2020 the Value Flex service brought in just over $4.5 million for TWO MEN IN A TRUCK. Through July 2021, they’ve already surpassed $5.7 million in Value Flex revenue.
Another service from TWO MEN AND A TRUCK, storage, is picking up traction among franchisees nationwide. The St. Louis market kicked it off with the first purchase of real estate for storage buildings, and Stern said those buildings filled up within two weeks.
“Since then, they've actually purchased additional buildings for storage, and they have had no problems,” Stern said. “If anything, they have capacity issues. They sell their storage so fast they need more.”
Stern runs locations in Des Plaines, Illinois and downtown Chicago, and he said he hopes the building he’s purchased for TWO MEN AND A TRUCK storage will be ready within about 30 to 45 days.
“We get asked to provide storage every single day,” he said. “We just purchased the new building, and we're getting ready to, again, add another valuable service. We've always focused on the moving aspect of things, and we think we're in a position now where offering storage would help our clients make a smoother transition for those moves where there might be a couple of weeks between closings.”
TWO MEN AND A TRUCK’s Home Office team provides playbooks for all services, so franchisees have access to a proven strategy when it comes to rolling out new offerings.
“Our sales consultants will help the franchisees to really understand how to price their services, how to look at competitor analysis, how to handle converting all the leads they get in and also how to diversify those leads so that we can get the most out of one lead that we can,” Skaggs said. “We try to take one estimate or one customer and maximize the opportunities to the fullest extent with all of the different revenue sources we have.”
As a franchisee, Stern gave a glowing review of the Home Office team’s support for his locations.
“The TWO MEN AND A TRUCK Home Office team has been excellent to collaborate with on the diversification we need in our market,” Stern said. “We talk through things, game plan and then execute. They lean on us on the execution side of things. We lean on them for overall general support — whether it’s legal, IT or best practices from other markets.”
The variety of options, Stern said, has been invaluable to their customers, and the team at TWO MEN AND A TRUCK is always on top of the latest trends to figure out which new options can be developed down the road. The Judson Group, one of the largest multi-unit ownership groups in the system that own locations in multiple cities across the U.S., including the Chicago locations Stern references, are consistently top performers in the franchise proving that it pays off to take advantage of these different service offerings.
“What’s next? I'm not sure,” he said. “But we're always brainstorming, and we're always looking for the next big project to add more services and add more options of variety for our customers, just to make it easier for them.”
Franchise opportunities for standard markets range from $179,400 to $595,000 and mini-market opportunities range from $100,000 to $222,000. Learn more, here.
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