With the rise of vehicle dash cams over the past 15 years, we have seen just how much careless drivers will try to get away with. They will claim to have been driving perfectly before getting hit through no fault of their own. Then, they realize there was a dash cam on the other vehicle and the tables are turned. But what happens in situations where the incident happened off-camera? What if your truck’s road-facing camera couldn’t capture what was going on behind you?

When it comes to the safety of your drivers and timber trucks, you need to make sure you’re getting the full story on video. Vestige is now offering 17% off all of their safety solutions when you use Timber Hauling’s exclusive coupon code.

Unlike a standalone dash cam, Vestige offers multi-camera setups that capture every angle around your truck. This allows you to capture sideswipes and other incidents that would normally go unrecorded. “Even if your driver wasn't at fault, without video to prove it, you're going to be to blame,” says Corey Hanvey, Director of Sales with Vestige. “When something happens, you want to make sure that you have the coverage to prove that you weren't at fault.  If you were at fault, the videos will expedite claims and litigation and save money in the long run.”

The functionality of Vestige’s camera systems goes beyond that of traditional dash cams available to everyday consumers. In the event of poor driving, an accident, or anything else that alerts the system, the videos will become available to you on any computer or mobile device. “They're automatically going to upload to your computer. You can sit back and get a notification and click on them.  You can also live stream from all camera angles and retrieve non-event footage remotely.  Most companies require pulling the memory card to retrieve non-event footage, not Vestige” says Hanvey.

Vestige not only offers cameras, but other products as well, including personnel trackers with duress buttons, trackers for equipment, and more. “We've been around since [2013] providing safety solutions for, really, anything you can think of,” says Hanvey. “We have tool tracking where we can track things like chainsaws, ladders, expensive things that you typically wouldn't put an asset tracker on.”

This tool tracking is part of ArgoTag, a new service recently rolled out by Vestige. “What's cool with ArgoTag is we pair those tools or whatever you want to put it on with the GPS,” explains Hanvey. “And if that GPS gets more than a certain distance away from the tool that's associated with it, it'll say, ‘Hey, you left the chainsaw at the job site!’”

While the technology is cutting edge, Hanvey says that their main focus is in quality service. “We want to give you that small town customer support that you had back  when you first signed up for GPS and the person that sold you was the person that picked up the phone when you called.”

If you are already a member of TimberHauling.com and want to take advantage of this exclusive offer, you can sign up for a demonstration. Vestige’s safety services are available to small companies with a single-truck fleet, large companies with 50+ trucks, and everyone in between. After filling out a quick information sheet on Vestige’s website, one of their representatives will reach out to assess your company’s specific needs and go over safety solutions that work for you. 

Any logging operation that’s hauled so much as a log knows about fuel, the price of fuel, and fuel cards. But for the uninitiated, Jim Yates, Director of Partner Services at TCS Fuel Cards, will cheerily tell you about them. “There are two types of fuel discounts: retail minus, where the discount is a fixed amount off the retail price or cost plus, where the fuel discounts are derived from a cost-plus factor, which is what ours is.”

TCS is the newest addition to Timber Hauling’s growing list of timber and logging industry discounts. Their fuel card’s “cost-plus” model is similar to the way most large fleets negotiate and purchase over the road fuel. For businesses lacking scale and with only a few trucks, this option is usually unavailable, but now it is through TCS.

“Our discount is not fixed, it’s based on the daily costs of fuel for a given location, plus a pumping fee,” says Yates. “For 2019, based on all In-network purchases, our clients saved an average of .35 cents [a gallon]. Last year the average savings was .45 cents and in Q2 2020 it reached a high of .63 cents per gallon.” At the end of April 2021, the 30-day running average was .43 cents a gallon.

For a truck filling up with 120 gallons, at a .43 cent discount as a hypothetical example, $51.60 goes back to the business in savings. Filling up 10-12 times a month becomes $619 in reduced fuel expense. Annually, the savings could easily exceed $7,000 per truck. 

How does a TCS fuel savings account work?

Timber Hauling members can get instant access to the TCS network when they sign up. Users then cash-secure their cards with TCS by depositing funds into their account to create a credit line.  The card can be used at participating truck stop locations nationwide for fuel and other trucking related expenses and as needed, your TCS credit line can be replenished through several options including Bank Wires, ACH, Blynk (Zelle) and Western Union transfers. 

“Our cost-plus pricing model and our truck stop partners sets us apart,” says Yates. “Most of our competitors offer retail-minus based programs and they don’t match our pricing and savings,” he adds. “We’re the only reseller integrated into EFS and Comdata’s systems and we have a 24/7 customer service line that can take care of client needs.”

TCS’ network covers 8,000 locations across the US, including our nearly 1,100 In-Network fuel stops anchored by TA Petro (also known as TravelCenters of America) as a major network partner, which has excellent coverage in the Carolinas and the southeast US.

“We charge $0 transaction fees for fuel at our In-Network fuel stops. If you go out of network, there’s a $3 fee. There are no hidden fees, setup fees, and no monthly fees,” says Yates.

“We also offer a ‘better of’ price at most In-Network locations so you always get the most discount at the pump based on any available discounts or the retail price,” adds Yates. Additional perks include the ability to find participating fuel centers through their Fuel Finder app and website, managing card controls including usage and cost limits for drivers on the road, and the ability to see fuel prices along a route.

To get saving, sign up for Timber Hauling now.

Plus, they’re offering hoses and fittings at 40% off for Timber Hauling subscribers.

At 8:15 on a Friday morning, just as the sun starts to shine above the trees in Taylor County Florida, Richard Schwab arrived at the mouth of a logging area where he and his son-in-law Ryan Wood, and a small logging crew hiked into the woods with their equipment. Ready to start an honest day’s work, they fired up their equipment only to have a hose failure. 

Hot, irritated, and now losing money by the hour, they’d hike back to their truck, drive an hour into town, buy a hose and the fittings, drive back, and try again. “What we used to be able to do 30-40 years ago is the equipment was designed with a low-pressure hose you could rebuild in the woods,” says Schwab. 

He adds, “With tech the way it is and everything having higher pressures today, you need a crimped hose because it’s a bigger, heavier-duty product. We asked ourselves, ‘How can we go back to the old way of doing things to let a wood producer make their own in the field?’.”

Meet CHAD

Schwab and his team made a Compact Hose Assembly Device, or CHAD. “It has its own crimper, foot pedal, and other supplies to get it done on your own in the woods,” he says excitedly. The whole thing was made to eliminate as much downtime as possible. 

It’s the sort of American ingenuity that only comes from people who live and breathe the work and problems they’re solving for. Wood proudly notes, “With us operating in the logging industry and understanding what people were going through, it was easy for us to see how to improve this. Others aren’t involved in the labor of the logging or paving or construction industry. They’re not dealing with the headaches we all deal with.”

“We developed that product in several sizes,” says Schwab. “Nobody has been thinking about that along those lines and we’re excited about that and more with Timber Hauling.” 

While the family still works in the logging industry, they now also run Schwab Bros. Hydraulics. The company is one of the inaugural vendors offering substantial discounts for Timber Hauling members.

As Wood explains, “On average, based on our customers, in their annual usage of hydraulic hose plus calculating for downtime and the cost of hose and fittings: loggers are going to save 40-50% to what they’re accustomed to paying. Schwab Bros. says they spend roughly $10,000 per crew per year on all hydraulic hoses & fittings. Across five crews, they experience $10-$20,000 in total savings for the company. 

Discounts come from efficiencies, not cutting corners

But those discounts don’t come out of their margins, or by cutting corners. As Schwab says, “Even though you might be working near a NAPA store, you still have to pay 100% markup and leave the job site and come back. Nine times out of ten that’s a three-hour ordeal. That’s crucial because if I can build it in thirty minutes, I can save two hours.”

He continues, “The way we’ve factored the cost savings in is through distribution and marketing. Ours don’t have four or five hands in the pot. It’s just our distributor and us, only two people in line. There’s not a 10-15% markup each time it’s touched. Others have three or four more people touching it. That’s how we can save loggers money — as much as 40%. We’re not cutting corners, except on who’s touching it.”

He adds, “The fittings are non-corrosive Zinc plated metal. It withstands the different arduous environments customers are in. It holds up quite a while.” To be sure, the team used it themselves for a long time before they decided to put their name behind it. As for fitting and crimp failures on their hoses, “I cannot recall one customer bringing up the fact it was a failure due to a manufacturing defect,” he says. “Most failures are overuse or abuse, and every hose will eventually fail in due time.”
 
The Schwab family is opening up their hose and hydraulic offerings to a national audience through Timber Hauling. And the company is excited for customers to sign up and see the difference. 

While most loggers surely have a go-to vendor or process, the small amount of time it takes to switch could be too economically significant to ignore. As Schwab points out with their own teams as an example, “If you take what we’re doing at $50k a year in hoses, with 5 crews, that’s $4-6,000 a year per crew to save.”

Chad Richard Vanderford describes a scenario as plain as it sounds: “A lot of loggers out there go to local stores to grab a bucket of engine or hydraulic oil when they need it.” A scene akin to a suburban dad running to the big box hardware store for a single screw to fix a loose shelf. That’s fine if you just need the one screw — or the one case of oil. But what if you know you’re going to need a lot more? 

Vanderford is a Regional Sales Manager for Cadence Petroleum. The company has 23 locations across the Southeast US. They’re also one of the inaugural vendors in the new Timber Hauling platform. “I knew we could partner with the Timber Hauling group to help these guys out with pricing on Oil and Lubricants products they need every day,” he says.

Timber industry pros working in the woods experience significant downtime each time they need to grab more Lubricant products for their equipment. A logger who runs to town for oil can save time — sometimes hours — getting it delivered from Cadence. 

“Overall we can save folks tons of money. They can be on one platform and everyone out in the woods can look at pricing and get deliveries when they need it,” says Vanderford. The savings can be significant, too, depending on usage. For most, savings of 15% are not unheard of.

Loggers and timber industry professionals don’t need to worry about the revenue loss to a small-town hardware store. Cadence itself is a moderately sized business, having purchased additional companies such as Apollo Oil and Pugh Lubricants in numerous states over the last two decades. 

“We’re very customer-based,” says Vanderford. “Every customer to me is important.” So important, Vanderford has no qualms about any logger calling his cell phone directly, a number he shares freely with Timber Hauling members. 

“A lot of these guys don’t have a single person to talk to for their equipment needs,” he adds, noting he and his team of five are routinely a go-to contact for their customers. 

Once a customer, Vanderford pushes himself and his sales team to be more proactive, making sure everyone who needs something gets it before they even think about calling someone. “We know the products they need. And if we don’t know something, we have engineers who can identify answers to all sorts of equipment questions.”

Cadence delivers to its name, with select routes and deliveries automatically scaled to meet customer demands. “We deliver what we promise,” says an emphatic Vanderford.

Cadence Petroleum has been in discussions with Timber Hauling for over two years — often delayed heavily by the early days of COVID-19 shutdowns. But Vanderford has high hopes and expectations for customers and as a vendor in Timber Hauling. “We already work with a lot of loggers out there. Many are here, there, and everywhere. Sometimes it’s hard to find these guys their offices maybe located at their house. “When we talked about Timber Hauling, we thought it was a great opportunity to reach new customers who might have never heard about Cadence,” he adds. 

Loggers and timber industry pros ready to save money on petroleum products can join Timber Hauling now and get 15% off in the southeast United States, including North and South Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, and more.