(L-R): Michael Lanier, outside sales covering Spartanburg and Greenville; Judy Adams, office manager; and Richie Ambrose, South Carolina area manager.
(CEG photo)
National Equipment Dealers (NED), a heavy construction sales, full-service and rental company with branches in five Southern states, has recently expanded by opening a new location in the Greenville-Spartanburg, S.C., market.
The new facility, at 169 New Hope Drive in Wellford, between the two larger Upstate South Carolina cities, is conveniently situated off Interstate 85 just north of its intersection with U.S. Highway 29.
It becomes the fourth NED branch in the Palmetto State, joining those in Columbia, Charleston and Conway-Myrtle Beach, the latter of which came online in 2021 when NED bought the Richardson Service location there.
"If a company is looking to expand, as we did here in Wellford, we can go with a green system, which is essentially what we have here as this building was constructed especially for us," said Richie Ambrose, NED's South Carolina manager. "However, when possible, NED likes to partner with other companies that are already in the business. That gains people for us, which is more important than anything, as well as the locations themselves. In the Upstate, we were not capable of doing that, leading us to go with a new start-up."
Along with four other dealerships in North Carolina, the company now has expanded NED Carolinas to eight locations. The distributor also sells its many well-known lines of construction machinery and attachments in Texas, Georgia and Florida.
"We are the distributor for Hyundai construction products, Bell Trucks, both its articulated and track models, and Manitou machines, which are skid steers, compact track loaders and telehandlers," Ambrose said. "We are also the dealers for Yanmar in this location as well as XCMG construction machines, the Dynapac compaction paving lines and those made by Sakai."
The Wellford branch carries several other diverse lines like Lamtrac mulching products; Prinoth, a forestry mulching manufacturer; and Barko, makers of forestry handlers, according to Ambrose.
"So, we have a tremendous amount of capability that is spread throughout the Carolinas, specifically in South Carolina," he added.
NED's Roots in Region Go Back Years
Ambrose said the company's decision to open the Wellford branch came after it had kept a presence in the Greenville-Spartanburg area for more than 25 years — back to its lineage with MAY Heavy Equipment.
"Although we have had resident technicians in the area, [this location] makes it more convenient for customers as far as parts and service availability," he said. "The customers up here have been great for us, and this is another way for us to continue to grow that base."
NED's new Wellford facility is approximately 12,000 sq. ft. in size, and features six service bays, including one for shipping and receiving parts.
Ambrose added that the parts space encompasses about 1,200 to 1,500 sq. ft., not including the outside areas where NED can keep ground engaging tools.
If the branch does not have a needed part in stock, he said, the store can easily get it from one of the other NED Carolinas locations.
"We share our equipment lines with nearly every other NED branch between the five states in which we operate," Ambrose said. "That allows us to have more parts availability. In addition, many of the manufacturers we represent are based out of Atlanta, which is not too far from here. These factors, even amidst today's difficulties in getting supplies, allow us to fully realize our parts availability for customers."
To clean construction machines that come into the Wellford branch's service bays, NED has installed a self-contained wash-basin system that re-circulates water, he said, making the process environmentally conscious. It does so by separating the oil and dirt from the water, allowing proper disposal of the pollutants.
"There are settlement tanks inside the system that disperses the water through filters before it is reused," he added. "It will introduce a little extra water to the process because you tend to lose some due to evaporation. The dirt settles out and the cannons shoot it back into the wash pan. After that, the soil is dumped into a hopper before we get rid of it safely."
In late September, Ambrose counted 12 employees at NED's new Upstate South Carolina branch, including three outside and three inside service technicians, with the rest made up of sales, parts and administrative personnel.
"NED, as a company, is known for its service more than anything — what I like to describe as our ‘effort' — and this facility is going to help us support that attitude," he said.
For more information, call 864/284-4343 or visit www.nedealers.com. CEG
Eric Olson
A writer and contributing editor for CEG since 2008, Eric Olson has worked in the business for more than 40 years.
Olson grew up in the small town of Lenoir, NC in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, where he began covering sports for the local newspaper at age 18. He continued to do that for several other dailies in the area while in college at Appalachian State University. Following his graduation, he moved on to gain experience at two other publications before becoming a real estate and special features writer and editor at the Winston-Salem Journal for 10 years. Since 1999 he has worked as a corporate media liaison and freelance writer, in addition to his time at CEG.
He and his wife, Tara, have been married for 33 years and are the parents of two grown and successful daughters. His hobbies include collecting history books, watching his beloved Green Bay Packers and caring for his three dogs and one cat.
Read more from Eric Olson here.
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