Earthmovers Equipment Sales and Leasing is a local distributor in Charlotte, NC, with a worldwide perspective.
This spring, the company will move to its new headquarters on I-485 in Charlotte, but the company’s existence is rooted in the emergence of the global market for heavy equipment.
This global perspective is nowhere more evident than in the 44-year-old company founder and president, Rick Stidham.
Earthmovers Equipment was one of the first equipment supply firms in the area to go overseas to find deals that would benefit its customers.
“I was sort of early on to do this, as far as someone our size,” Stidham said.
While larger firms had searched internationally to find heavy equipment sources, many smaller distributors hadn’t when Stidham started exploring. Some distributors remain content to bid and buy in the domestic market.
Stidham recognized the possibility that international deal-making could produce savings for his customers.
His world view developed after his entry into the domestic heavy equipment industry 20 years ago. In 1981, after attending West Virginia University, Stidham was hired by Mountaineer Euclid. The West Virginia company was the exclusive area distributor of Euclid, Komatsu and Ingersoll-Rand.
By 1991, several things had become clear. One was that Stidham was ready to start his own firm, which he did in Charlotte.
A second factor was the increasing popularity of the heavy-duty articulated truck, a leading maker of which was a Swedish industrial manufacturer, Volvo. Volvo happened to be Stidham’s principal heavy equipment offering.
And a third factor was the arrival of Hurricane Hugo in Charlotte in 1989. The storm blasted its way clear across South Carolina to reach the inland North Carolina city, felling trees and buildings in its wake. The cleanup increased the need for trucks, and consequently, businesses like Stidham’s.
“Volvos were already getting very popular. They started to be recognized as good trucks,” Stidham recalls of that period. “And I realized they could be bought overseas.”
In 1993, he acted on a long-felt desire to visit other countries with the express purpose of finding less expensive equipment.
He found favorable prices on machines in Japan, as well as in European countries like Germany, Holland, Belgium, France, and England. With the added benefit of a strong U.S. dollar against foreign currencies, Stidham found savings he could pass on to his customers. His final hurdle was to overcome the obstacles of importing equipment.
“At the beginning, I didn’t know much about customs, ocean shipment, ocean bills of lading, letters of credit and international wire transfers, but I learned fast,” said Stidham.
Volvo A25, 30 and 35 off-road trucks, new and used, remain some of the best sellers for Earthmovers Equipment. The firm has sold around 300 Volvo trucks in the last three years, which accounted for a chunk of the company’s $25-million business volume in 2000, up from $23 million the year before.
Caterpillar 943, 953 and 963 crawler loaders also move steadily off the lot. In addition, the company offers Cat and Komatsu excavators and numerous other Cat products.
“We’re a low-hours, late-model dealer,” said Stidham. “My focus has been that we want our yard to appear to have all new, or like new, equipment. We want to separate ourselves out that way.”
Making a favorable first impression will be easier at the company’s new headquarters.
Currently located in Pineville, NC, Earthmovers Equipment will move 3 mi. north to a new location in Charlotte with 700 ft. of frontage along I-485 and another 700 ft. of frontage along Nations Ford Road.
“As far as I know, we are the only new-and-used business in the area that’s going to have frontage on a major highway,” Stidham said.
The 7-acre (2.8 ha) site will have a 5,000-sq.-ft. (450 sq m) office, behind which an approximately 3,500-sq.-ft. (315 sq m) shop will be constructed. The shop will be divided into separate bays for service, light repair and welding. Facilities to steam clean machines also will be built. The machines for sale and lease will be arrayed along the interstate’s edge.
Project costs total about $1.5 million.
The company is serving as its own general contractor on the project. A “low country” style wood-frame office building will feature a high-pitched roof and a brick facade.
The acreage was relatively flat but contained “quite a lot” of timber, which the company used its own machines to clear. Stidham said a Cat D6H dozer pushed growth together and a Cat 953 loader dumped the debris in the bed of a 25-ton (22.5 t) Volvo truck. A Komatsu PC400 excavator helped prepare the actual construction site.
Company staff will grow slightly in the new year, with three inside salespeople and three outside salespeople, as well as another mechanic and a welder.
A key employee came aboard in 1997, Stidham’s brother-in-law and now partner, Thad Throneburg. After practicing law for 17 years, Throneburg now handles legal, banking, accounting and administrative duties, as well as development of the company’s Web site, which went live two years ago.
As was cited in the recent CIT Equipment Financing annual survey, just 60 percent of equipment distributors had a Web site last year.
The company’s Web site at www.earthmovers.com helps it maintain its worldwide presence and stay in communication with equipment buyers and sellers. Its customers regularly log on to view weekly updates of available equipment.
With its Web site and new headquarters on track, Earthmovers Equipment next plans to focus on local rental of equipment.
“We’ve never really concentrated on rentals,” the company president said, citing the 10 to 15 units usually rented at any given time. He said he wants to triple and quadruple that number.
“Our next goal is to build a local rental fleet,” Stidham said.
He plans to accomplish that by filling a niche in the rental market by providing customers with flexible daily, weekly and monthly rentals. “Our lack of bureaucracy allows us flexibility with customers when rain days foul up work schedules,” said Stidham.
Stidham said he sees opportunity in that area because some other rental companies are “not as personal.”
This story also appears on Crane Equipment Guide.
Today's top stories
