Compactor Sales & Custom Solutions: Building a Family Business in Waste Equipment

Compactors are become more and more prevalent throughout the waste industry because there's a lot of value in them for customers, end users, manufacturers, grocery stores, multifamily, multi multifamily. Any, any locations that have, uh, generate enough trash. There's an ROI on having it compacted versus just having, you know, a waste hauler.

Just pick up. Loose, loose trash. So, so when you're doing that analysis, you start with the volume that they're producing. So yeah, we start, right? So we start with volume. We start. With how they plan to use it. And we really just ask a lot of questions about what problems are they having with removing waste from their facility, and how can we then use equipment and engineer solutions Yeah.

For them selling to the pain points they have versus selling to a price point. Exactly. It's a much better place to be.

Welcome to the Waste Nexus podcast. We have Charlie with us again, and today we have our guest from Ohio. Eric, and I'm not gonna butcher your last name. Just go ahead and explain Eric, because I butchered that earlier when we were talking and even there, you weren't copying and saying, I'm still afraid.

I'm still afraid. Even with the answer to the test. Yes. I, I have not known to be. The best at pronunciation sometimes. You're not always known as AOR though. You know, A little hesitation there. It's, there is a little, I'm learning as I get older. That was, yeah, like in school it would always be, there would be a teacher that, and I, as soon as they got down to the Ws, there'd be like Eric, why don't you just say it yourself?

Go ahead. Uh, well, so Eric, how did you get into. Uh, not just this podcast, but how'd you get into waste as a space? Uh, 'cause you didn't start there, right? I didn't. Um, so, uh, my company is Reddy Equipment and it was started by a guy named Jim Reddy, who was a part-time fireman and sold trash compactors on the side.

And, um, so that's where the ready name comes from. And so he did that for. A number of years. And then my dad worked for Allied, uh, waste as a sales manager and he lived in PA a couple different places with, with Allied and then came back to Cleveland. Um, got exposed to the trash compactor side of the waste industry, and, um, bought the business from Jim Reddy in 1996.

So my dad and my mom, uh, you know, carried that small business, got exposed to a, a service business, bought a, a service business because they needed to be able to deliver and do the installs for the, of the equipment for, for his customers. Um, and so he carried that through. Um, and my brother and I who are both in the business.

Bought the business from my parents beginning of last year, and, um, my brother and I both joined. I joined in 2013. My brother joined shortly after my younger brother. Yes. Um, you didn't want to change the name from ready to your last name. It wasn't a No, you know, I don't know why, but it didn't have the branding that, uh, you know, ready to Yeah.

Right. Solve your problems, you know? Right. It is a great name for that. Um, so, uh, so yeah, I, we both my brother and I worked in, uh, corporate America. Different, different, uh, doing different things. Got relocated back to Cleveland. And went more the, uh, small family business, entrepreneurial route. And, um, we've been growing ever since.

Ever since. Yeah. Doing, uh, we do service, we do rentals and we sell equipment, um, in Ohio and in our Midwest region and nationally. Yeah. And when people are looking at compactors, what do you think, you know. What's a standard sort of process someone goes through when they're thinking, okay, maybe I should get a compactor.

How, how do you walk 'em through that? So compactors are, um, have become more and more prevalent throughout the waste industry because there's a lot of value in them for customers. They end users, um, manufacturers, um. Grocery stores, multifamily, big offices, multifamily, any, any locations that have, uh, generate enough trash.

Um, there's an ROI on having it compacted versus just having, um, you know, a waste hauler, just pick up loose, loose trash. So, um, it's become much more prevalent. It, it's, uh, another variable that of cleanliness. Um, for, for an operation. It gives that operation more capacity for growth, just a way to manage trash, um, better with a compactor if you're generating enough of it versus just having it.

So when you're doing that analysis, you start with the volume that they're producing. So, yeah, so we start, right? So we start with volume. We start. With how they plan to use it. And we really just ask a lot of questions about what problems are they having with removing waste from their facility, and how can we then use equipment and engineer solutions Yeah.

For them, right? So there's a lot of questions, there's a lot of details that go into providing trash compactors, um, or bailers, things like that. Um, so our approach is really to just. Talk to the customer, get to learn where their business is going, what, what pain points they have, and really look at, you know, taking it as a full process improvement, um, process.

Yeah. Selling, selling to the pain points they have versus selling to a price point. Exactly. It's a much better place to be. Exactly right. Exactly. Well, so then when you look at the history, when you guys were talking before we started about some of the funny stories from the past, Charlie, you had one about, uh, a compactor at a hotel.

That. Yeah, we, at one point I think were helping manage something in the convention center in Ohio and the one of the Democratic or Republican conventions had to be there and that's looked at as like more of a risk, right? The trash compactor than it is an asset and that type of scenario. And so I think they had us, and we asked for your help on, okay, we gotta get this compactor out.

They need to do an analysis of the loading dock and make sure there's nothing, uh, inappropriate there. And then when it comes back in, and probably run into this in other situations like. They wanted to like open up the back door to the compactor, see what's inside of it, make sure they can see inside and behind the, the ram and stuff like that to make sure there's no, you know, bad material.

Didn't they wanna do it every time it came on and off they did. Yeah. And then they wanted it emptied like every day to. Up to and after this. And I, you know, I just, well the only way to check it would be empty. 'cause you wouldn't want to try to open that door when it's got trash in it. Right, right. Yeah.

You might be on the un uh, unsavory side of that. But, um, you know, it's just, it's, it's amazing to see the other types of things that no one worries about garbage until it's, in that case, a safety, uh, you know, for security type thing. Or it's backed up almost as though it's then treated with the same priority as a sewer pipe.

But until then, it's kind of outta sight out. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's, I said probably my service guys could give, could give great stories about actually working on this equipment, seeing rats and, uh, different things that people throw down at a trash shoot. And, um, but yeah, I've seen, speaking of that, thinking of, um, seeing, uh, you know, we were at a big food manufacturer and the, and the trash hauler didn't close the door.

Speaking of that, the door, the big door didn't close the back door. Yeah. When they, when after they emptied it. Oh yeah. Brought it back and you know, it started loading up. Yeah. Two weeks, you know, a week later or five days later, whatever. However it gets hauled. Yeah, yeah. It started to creep open and open, and then you had 30 yards of compacted trash.

I've seen some creative solutions with that though. Like I've seen the property manager take a door, open it when it is empty, put in their bulky items in the way back of the compactor, which. You know, then they're not gonna get crushed, but whatever, uh, to get a bulk service basically as part of the, the compactor.

And then as it fills up with the rest of material, when it's full, they finally take it away. But they kind of got rid of a, a mattress or a desk or whatever they had to, which I thought was kind of smart. Yeah. Yeah. And they're not supposed to do that with a mattress, right? I don't think so, but you know.

Oh, the amount of things that shouldn't go in. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Um, yeah. Is high is a very long list that Yeah. Well it's actually, it is a longer list than you would think, um, just of, of some of the products that can, you know, destroy it. Like even, and that's where, you know, what we, what we get into of why that's so important in our process of making sure the customer actually gets the right thing.

Because if, you know, you want to throw wood pallets away. Or you want to throw bulk items or different things like that. That's why we kind of offer, offer a different, a lot of different solutions that then come back to, to management of it with the tonnage. So if you get into an auger style compactor versus a, uh, you know, a basic hydraulics, uh, stationary, you might be getting more tonnage.

There's more equipment, you know, there's more price point. Yep. A higher price point for an auger. But you're gonna get. More densified. Tonnages. Yeah. Um, with the right equipment. So that's why, you know, when we go through our process, that's, that's really important for the longevity of the equipment and for the right, um, you know, making sure we provide the right solution that gives that customer, the, the ROI of why they chose a compactor in the first place.

Have you seen, um, a lot of stuff online about fires at Murph's and on, uh, residential? Packers that are picking up people's houses, trash. Have you seen that happen because of vapes and those things with vapes? Batteries? Yeah. Yeah. Things with batteries. Have you seen that with the compactors? We've, we've, we've put 'em in, um, like we've had augers in, at, uh, you know, big, um, customers.

Just customers, yeah. Yeah. Big, big bulk compacted trash. And that takes, you know, random. Tons of random stuff. Puts it in this auger and yeah, there's, there's been fires in the, in the machine. 'cause it does such a good job of compacting that. It also breaks the battery, breaks the battery and pops a fire.

And when that happens, they end up pulling the box and having it repaired and then brought back. Is that usually how they do it? Yeah, I mean, most of the time, you know, we, especially with the auger, there's not as much hydraulic um, components. So like. You, you don't have to worry as much about like, hoses getting burned up.

Right. Things like that. Um, but yeah, I mean, you could significantly damage, damage the machine. Mm-hmm. Obviously damage your, your whole building. It could get into the, as a practice, they're generally gonna pull that whole machine off and send it to you to get looked at. I think by general practice, they, yeah.

First is like, try to get it all the, you know, all the way out. Get the fire out and then we will get the call and say, Hey, can you. Come inspect this and make sure there's no problems. Right. Right. So, but you do that on site first if you can. Yeah. Unless it's just to melt. Especially if it's a stationary, obviously it's gonna stay on site.

Yeah. So, so yeah, we'll get technicians out. Um, but yeah, there's, there's lots of crazy, they're just very dangerous machines at the end of the day that Yeah, you gotta make sure you're careful how you use 'em and, and what you're throwing away. And so, yeah. Well, that's, uh, one of the things that we looked at in the past with you was how sensors are changing some of that work.

Um, from what you're seeing, from where you sit, uh, obviously you're familiar with what we've done, but what do you see in terms of the technology aspect of this? What's changing or what's new since you started, I mean, you're almost 15 years into this. Yeah. I mean, I think, and, and you guys obviously know as well, just the amount of technology improvements has dramatically.

Changed the waste industry on the whole, and, and obviously with, with ai there's gonna be even more dramatic changes. Um, so yeah, it's been crazy from from truck truck, uh, you know, asset management and GPS trackers and, and what you guys have done with the monitors and, um, analysis of, of your waste stream.

Um, just the amount of information, uh, that's, that's come into the space in general has, has, you know, changed it and there's just much more intelligent, um, there. The intelligence of the space has, has dramatically increased Right. As well. Um, well, and do you find that it ends up putting you in a position though, where you have, it's helping you create more human to human interaction and you don't have to do as much, you know, background baloney.

Yeah, I mean, I, I would say we're, you know, we're constantly looking at what technologies can do to improve process and workflows to, to make that human to human interaction more meaningful, rather than just spending a bunch of time doing, doing tasks or doing things that, that. You know, no one really wants to do.

Right. So there's, I I feel like that's huge. 'cause you mentioned earlier like the, the, the technology improvement in my mind comes, uh, visually with the control panel. It doesn't have physical relays anymore. It's a lot simpler. There's, you know, PLCs and all that kinda stuff, and that's been something that we see through photographs and stuff of installations and big, but it never really gets to the, the question that you couldn't put on the spreadsheet, the part that you didn't necessarily have in the process that.

Was not necessarily able to be foreseen in advance. Like what caster setup do they need? What exactly is this equipment gonna look like when it gets in a trash room? And that's where you really want to drive those, that time for the human to human interaction. 'cause you're often gonna have something go wrong that you didn't expect and have to figure out.

Exactly. At the end of the day, you know, we are providing a solution and when we're providing a very custom oriented solution, we're going to use technology tools to help us. Work quicker, right? Um, but right now in the way that our, uh, you know, our expertise comes from that human interaction that, that, uh, trust building that you need in, in any sales process, but especially one that gets into custom engineered, uh, solutions that.

Um, that change your, you know, the way your customers work or, or your people work, um, you know, in your, in your plant, at your property. Um, you know, there's still a lot of value in behavior. Change is the hardest man. We see somebody put the bag next to a compactor in a multifamily building, and then all of a sudden everybody thinks it's broken.

It's, no, you just gotta put it in and let it run. Correct. Yeah. That's the last, the, the last guy there can mess it up for everyone. Yeah. So where do you see. Ready going over the next maybe two decades. Don't want to, don't wanna retire You too soon. But yeah, these, the, the gray hairs aren't giving me away though.

That, not at the reason I don't grow a beard anymore. I think you're getting to more since the last time I saw you too. I would give, Santa wouldn't run for his money if I grew a beard. Let's just say that. Yeah. Um, you know, I think we talked about beforehand, but I mean, I think what, what I think both of our companies are trying to do, we're trying to get, um, you know, bring in.

Great talent, um, into the, into the waste industry and just continue to, to grow our, our, our customer base, our, uh, geographical reach. Um, you know, we, we, we kind of touch all parts of trash compactors and Baylors and, um, you know, we're just continuing to look to, to, to grow. Um. Here in the Midwest and then and nationally with, with adding great people.

So, um, it's a great industry. Um, people that get into it don't, don't leave easily. You get a lot of, a lot of people that, that once they're in, they'll, they'll be lifers because it's got everything you want. You can scratch your entrepreneurial spirit. You can compete. There's opportunities for growth. You work with great people, interesting places.

Usually you get to it's, it never stops. Um, which can be exhausting at times because it, it doesn't stop. It's super urgent. But the beauty, beauty of software is usually no one bugs us after certain hour. And no one, there's not much you can do on a weekend typically. Well, for us, we offer 24 hour service and trash compactors break at any point, you know, at, at hospitals or, you know what, wherever there's places that trash is always, yeah.

Well, trash is always, it's a million dollar problem if it breaks at the end of some sort of production process. Right? Yeah. They're, they're, yeah. Yeah. I mean, if your hospital trash compactor breaks at midnight, you still. Need, still need it running by 1:00 AM. Right. So, you know, it's, it's, uh, I mean that's the, you know, the blessing, the blessing of it is that's the opportunity is solving those problems that, that exist in this very urgent, uh, important space.

Right. So, well, speaking of problems we need to solve, we need to put you through the rapid fire questions that, um, love it. I hinted at these earlier, but don't. Don't go too long on answers. You gotta try to be brief. Right. That's the idea of rapid fire. That's fire, that's hard for me, but yes. Uh, okay. So your college football team, the Ohio State University.

Yeah. Good job getting the V in there. Yes. Otherwise you'd be cast out, right? Yeah. Oh yeah. You gotta see, you have to move out of Ohio, I think. Now the, the guy says the, the world famous. Oh, is what? Um, oh, it's expanded. Josh Johnson on the, on the. Big noon kickoff says, so, um, did you hear about Notre Dame's situation with the playoffs and the ball games and the whole thing?

I, I heard that, that they were debating not playing in the bowl game, but I didn't know it was, it was a Okay. So if your Notre Dame, would you have made the same choice of not playing in a bowl game if, 'cause they didn't get into the playoffs? No, because I, I mean, I think Marcus Freeman. Ohio State, former player.

I think he's, he's a competitor. I, I'm surprised he didn't. Okay. Wanna compete? Um, US Open or? Masters? Masters. Masters. Okay. Uh, which hole? At the Masters? Number one. Number one, teeing it off. Right? You get to see all the legends. You know, the legends tee off. Um, okay. One hour flight or five hour drive. Uh, five hour drive.

Five hour drive. You don't like going through TSA, taking your shoes off? Yeah, I think I said much anymore. Think, you know, I think the, uh, I would've probably said one hour flight 10 years ago. Nowadays. Yeah. I think when your flights get canceled enough that you Yeah. Comes five hour, one hour flight isn't a five, it comes a five hour flight.

Correct. Uh, alright. If you could run a public or a private waste company, which would it be? Uh, private. Private. Any particular one? Mine. Yours. That's a fair answer. Um, not changing the name, still, still convinced you, still we're still ready to go. What's one thing in life you'd wanna automate? Uh, an example someone gave before was they wanted their phone to call their grandmother for them every Sunday automatically.

So they just had us pick it up and start talking. I would say any household chores, but in particular. Uh, the shelving or bed frames or these different things that my wife asked me to put together for our kids, for their bedrooms. Um, if you can automate that, then that, that would, Christmas decorations, just at Christmas, decorations at my house.

Christmas gift assembly is coming up. Chris, Chris Christmas wrapping. I mean, any, anything like that. I think I'm, I'm, uh, are you a Christmas after Thanksgiving people, or are you Christmas after Halloween people? We, we start Christmas, my wife is a Christmas fanatic, and then we have a, starts after Halloween, 7-year-old, a 5-year-old, and a 3-year-old.

So Christmas starts early. Hi kids. Yeah. Love you. Yeah. Alright, well kids, thanks for watching. Hopefully other people do too, Eric. Appreciate it. Yeah. Great guys. Thanks for having me on. Yep. Cut.

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