October 21, 2024 • 51 mins
George Rohlfing is owner of Brookline Transportation Company, Inc. a family owned & operated residential & commercial moving company headquartered in Hanover, Mass.
Starting in the moving business in the late 70s, starting as a driver/van operator and running moving crews within three weeks. In the early 1980s, he bought BTI.
Specialties include: lab moves, computer and electronics moves, trade show moves, furniture and fixture assembly and disassembly, customized crating, storage and more.
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Starting in the moving business in the late 70s, starting as a driver/van operator and running moving crews within three weeks. In the early 1980s, he bought BTI.
Specialties include: lab moves, computer and electronics moves, trade show moves, furniture and fixture assembly and disassembly, customized crating, storage and more.
Winning Business Radio is broadcast live Mondays at 4PM ET and Music on W4CY Radio (www.w4cy.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com). Winning Business Radio is viewed on Talk 4 TV (www.talk4tv.com).
Winning Business Radio Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Media (www.talk4media.com), Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/winning-business-radio--3075598/support.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
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(00:20):
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Speaker 2 (00:29):
Churchill said, those who fail to learn from history are
condemned to repeat it. Kevin Helen N believes that certainly
applies to business. Welcome to Winning Business Radio here at
W four CY Radio. That's W four cy dot com
and now your host, Kevin Helen Thanks everybody for joining
(00:54):
in again today.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I am Kevin Helenan and welcome back to Winning Business
TV and Radio on W four cy dot com. We're
streaming live on talkfor tv dot com, and of course
we're on Facebook and that's at Winning Business Radio. And
of course we're available after the live show in podcast
form on tons of platforms wherever you go for your
(01:15):
podcast content. We're there, YouTube, iHeartRadio, Spotify, Apple again, all
of those platforms and more. The mission of winning business
radio and TV, excuse me, as regular listeners and viewers know,
is to offer insights and advice, to help people avoid
the mistakes of others, right to learn best practices. Those
(01:36):
are the how tos, the what too's, the what not tos,
and to be challenged and hopefully to be inspired by
the successes of others. Those are consultants, authors, coaches, advisors,
business owners, founders, entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
People with expertise.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
But you know, virtually every successful person I've ever had
a chance to talk to has had some form of
failure in their lives and careers.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
I say it every week.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
While we all have the our knee skin once in
a while, I'm driven to keep those scrapes from needing
major surgery. Let's endeavor to learn from history so we
don't repeat it. I've spent the better part of my
career equipping businesses to grow from solopreneurs to small to
medium sized companies all the way up to the fortune fifty.
And I've seen a lot of those companies up close
and personal, and a lot of them win and to
(02:21):
varying degrees.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
I've seen some fail.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
I've had the opportunity to rub elbows with some of
the highest performing people around and with some people who
probably should have found other professions. Right. So, in my
own businesses, I've had lots of success, but some failures too,
And I like to think I've learned a lot of
those lessons from experience. So you're going to hear from
me some opinions and insights, etc. But you're definitely going
to hear from really interesting and cool guys like today's guest.
(02:46):
His name is George Rolfing, owner of BTI Brookline Transportation Company, Incorporated.
It's a family owned and operated residential and commercial moving
company headquartered in Hanover, Massachusetts.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
Here's his bio.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
His teeth in the moving business with Larkin Movers and
Maple Movers in the late nineteen seventies, starting out as
a driver van operator and running moving crews within three weeks.
In the early nineteen eighties, he bought the BTI. Under
his mentorship, the company became a Mayflower franchise and expanded
its offerings beyond residential and commercial moves. Some of those
(03:22):
specialty moves include lab moves, computer and electronics moves, trade
show moves, furniture and fixture assembly and disassembly, customized creating, storaging,
and more to meet the demands of the growing life
science and medical community in Greater Boston and beyond. Interestingly enough,
George created labmovers dot Com as a specialty division of
(03:43):
his company. With that specialation specialization in plugin transport. Lab
Movers has moved the lab of Nobel prizewinner Jack Hope.
I say this correctly, doctor Jack Zostak, formerly of Harvard
Medical now the University of Chicago. Other lab relocations include
a move of rare butterfly collection from UC Berkeley to
(04:04):
the Marine Biological Labs some of you know in Woodshole,
Mass very cool place, and the relocation of a win
tunnel from Harvard to UC Davis. George is a longtime
member of the Mass Movers Association, serving as it's president
from twenty twelve to twenty fourteen. He's certified by the
American Moving in Storage Association as an office and Industrial
consultant and as a moving consultant. George's numerous awards, including
(04:28):
BBB's twenty sixteen Award winner, the Million Dollar Plus Award
in twenty sixteen the Mayflower Excellence in Sales Award Outstanding
Service Award, and BTI is a proud member of the
Mass Biotech Consul Mary. George continues the tradition of BTI
being a family owned and operated in business, as his
wife Karen, and sons Jared and his wife Michaela and
(04:51):
Jordan all work in the business. George, Welcome to Winning
Business Radio.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
Thank you very much. Kevin, thank you for the invite.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
You're welcome.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
I appreciate you you're taking the time to be here.
Tell us about the family first, Karen. Tell us a
bit bit about Karen and also about her involvement in
the business.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
Okay, my wife and I met when we were, you know,
in high school. And I love that we've been together
for that long. So prior to twenty years then, yeah, yeah,
twenty years is right, Karen. So we dated for six
years prior to getting married, and and you know, we've
(05:33):
been married since nineteen seventy nine. And her and I
are we work together in our family and we've worked
together in our business.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
What is her role with jobs does she performed within
the company.
Speaker 4 (05:48):
Karen's the office manager at the company. She manages the office.
She does the accounts, payable accounts, receivable billing, all of
those types of things that happened every day behind the
scenes that have to get done to help our customers
with their wing needs.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Excellent. And Jared and his wife Michaela.
Speaker 4 (06:09):
Yeah, Jared has been with the companies, you know, since
he's eighteen years old. He's been working at the company.
He started as a mover driver like myself, and he
worked in the warehouse for a while. He's learned the
business from the ground up, so you can understand all
(06:29):
facets from you know, operations, and now he does sales
and he does business development. He's also a special project
specialist when it comes to handling lab and science relocation.
So he's got the he's got the goods when it
comes to you know, the specialty let lab moves, if
(06:50):
you will. He's also certified in handling chemical packing and
things of that, so he's got some background there.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
We're going to talk about a lot of those specialties.
I'm very interested to hear that.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
Yeah, his wife, Mikhaela, came to us from Trade to Joe.
She was a manager at Traded Joe's for for quite
a long time, working at many of the traded Joe's stores,
and she's working in the outfacing public side of the move,
the move management side of the moves. So she's she's
part of the team that makes sure that everything happens
(07:23):
the way it's supposed to happen. She's she's behind the
scenes a lot of times, you know, handling the emails
and the correspondents and making sure that everything ticks off
the way it's supposed to in a move that's supposed
to happen.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
That's really good. And Jordan, and.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
Jordan, he does sales and operation. So Jordan, like like
Jared his brother, he you know, had to stop from
the ground up and working in the warehouse and driving
the trucks and managing the crews and understanding how the
jobs work. Everybody in our company has to go out
on a move job to stand what a client goes through.
(08:03):
So they start even from the process of going out
on sales calls to understand what the client's expectations are.
So I really try to get the team involved. So
the operations crew goes out with the salespeople, and the
salespeople go up with the operation crews, so they have
a good understanding of what the expectations are from the
customer side of things.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
That's fantastic. How big is your team?
Speaker 4 (08:27):
Our team goes from anywhere from you know, a five
man team to a forty man team depending on the
size of the project. Yeah, and of course being part
of the Mayflower system, we can reach out and combine
all of our assets in the Mayflower system for as
much as a client with me.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
I want to ask a little bit more about your background.
Where'd you grow up?
Speaker 4 (08:50):
So I grew up in Jamaica Plane, which is part
of Boston, and you know, it was a great place
to grow up around around the city and Jamaica Pond,
and you know, up and down Santa Street and in
town Boston on the Green Line and the Orange Line.
So that's my background when it comes to growing up
(09:10):
in the city.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
So a little inside baseball. I grew up in Midfield
in the suburbs.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
But I live now in Rosendale, have been here for
thirty almost forty years. So I think we probably know
some of the same people.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Will talk later, we probably do.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Yes, Yeah, in fact, you went to Boston English High School.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
I did go to Boston English. Yeah, I did go
to Boston English during the seventies. It was an interesting
time that it was the first year of Boston in
the city, so I have that experience. But it was
a great I met some great people at Boston English.
And the building where I went to high school now
(09:48):
is a research lab for HARBD Medical.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
I understand that.
Speaker 4 (09:52):
Yeah, yeah, Right across from Boston English, I mean right
across from Boston Latin are Nemesis when it came to sport.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
That's right, which, by the way, I love saying this
because it's it's pretty cool to me. I coached Pop
Warner football youth football for many many years. My younger
son went to Boston Latin and played football, so I've
been to many not just his years, but many Latin
English games.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
It's the oldest here. It is audi audience.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
It's the oldest high school football rivalry. Yeah, I can
say that rivalry in the nation. Sixteen thirty five was
Latin school and English had to be right around that
same time time. The rivalry is one hundred something years old, right, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
Unfortunately, the winning percentage for Boston English is a little
bit lower than the Boston Latin.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Well, I was going to let you say that I'm
going to let you say that because I'm always on
the on the Latin side. But it's a cool game
and it's played, as you know, at Harvard Stadium.
Speaker 4 (10:52):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Yeah, So what did you you studied really prepared for
business at I did?
Speaker 4 (11:01):
I did study business at Boston English, and that's what
my primary concern was. And coming out of college, I was,
you know, in high school and going into college. I
ended up working for a moving company and JA make
a plane?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, tell us, how did that happen?
Speaker 4 (11:20):
It was on a win really. You know. It's like
a lot of people in business, they somehow, you know,
get introduced to something and they fall in love with
the industry and they get I would say, they get
hooked and you can't get out. You just get pulled
in and you can never get out of it. And
that's what happened to me. You know, I fell in
(11:41):
love with helping people. And when you're in the moving business,
it's a lot about helping people get on their journey
to the new space. And that's what it is. It's
a journey from start to finish, and it's it can
sometimes be a wild journey, but a journey nonetheless.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
Well, did you have any jobs, like youth jobs, any
jobs prior to that professional job coming out of college
in moving?
Speaker 2 (12:07):
So what what did you do before moving? Is my question?
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Really, I did a lot of different jobs when I
was a kid, you know, even you know, when it
was fashionable, I shined shoes. I delivered it. I delivered
I was a paper boy and we did what was
called hawking papers off the back of the American truck.
We would hawk the papers off of the truck and
(12:31):
you know, bring them to local drinking establishments, if you will,
and sell the papers at the at the drinking establishments.
And that's one of the things I did. And there
was a youth activities place. I worked for the City
of Boston for a while doing b n b L Basketball,
(12:55):
which is a summer basketball league in the city of Boston.
And I was did Jamaica Plane startup to get that
going cool. I worked for the Registry of Motor Vehicles
for a short time.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
You're the guy, Yeah, I'm the guy I was.
Speaker 4 (13:10):
I was in the cancelation department of the insurance section
of the Registry.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Oh man, your.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
Insurance got canceled. I only sent out the.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
Message yeah, yeah, Well.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
I was only the messenger. I didn't cancel your insurance.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
Well that was so you delivered papers.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
You're only the messenger and you mailed the statements or
the notification. So still again the messenger.
Speaker 4 (13:31):
Right, well, we'll still the messenger.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
Yes, yeah, all right, we're going to take our first break.
George right here, everybody. We'll be back in about one
minute with George Rolfing of Brookline Transportation.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
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Speaker 2 (14:36):
And now back to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Helene,
presenting exciting topics and expert guests with one goal in mind.
To help you succeed in business. Here once again is
Kevin Helene.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
We're back with George Rohlfang, President, owner of Brooks Line
Transportation Company moving company. So what was it about moving
that you, in your words, kind of fell in love with.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
I think it was the feeling of the completion of
a project for a customer, and and the feeling that
I got from the customers that they were so you know,
they were they were so caring and kind to me
when I was doing moves for them, and they would always,
you know, comment on how well I did the move
(15:30):
and how caring I was with their things. And uh,
it was that part of that feeling that you get
when you've completed something, that you completed the project and
you feel like you've done something for somebody. That's really what,
you know, gravitated me toward being hooked in the moving industry.
And there's a lot of that that happens in our industry.
(15:55):
People just they literally get hooked and they stay here
for life.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
So it better be hooked because you bought the company.
So tell me about that decision. How did you know
you wanted to do that? When did you know? And
I mean you were young. From the look of it.
Speaker 4 (16:11):
Yeah, I was, you know, probably twenty two. I was
twenty one going on twenty two. I just got married.
My oldest son, Jared, was was born in December the
following year. I happened to be reading the Brookline tab.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
Oh yeah, I remember that paper and saw that moving
around maybe yeah, yeah, plug for the tab.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
So I ended up looking at the company. I had
already earned enough money to buy a company. Working for
the other companies that I worked for, I saved some
money and you know, I ended up thinking, hey, I
should do this. And when I bought the company, I
only had a radius of because movers are regulated. Household
(17:00):
goods movers are regulated, and I only have state law.
By state law, yes, yeah, at the time we were
heavily regulated. I could only go fifteen miles from town
Hall Brookline. That was the radius I could go to.
And the Department of Public Utilities is a regulatory agency
(17:24):
that regulates residential household goods movers. So then I applied
for a fifty mile radius from town Hall Brookline. So
I was allowed that. And you have to go for
a hearing. There has to be public needs and necessity.
You have to prove that you can do the work
that you say you're going to do. You have to
(17:46):
publish a tariff, so the rates and everything are published
with public Utilities. And then finally I filed for my
entire state of Massachusetts if service area to do that,
and I was awarded that in nineteen eighty nine. So
(18:07):
from the time I bought the company until nineteen eighty nine,
we were you know, limited, if you will, in some
degree where we could go. That's different today. Times have changed.
You know. In nineteen eighty movers were deregulated by President Reagan.
(18:30):
You know, the Interstate Commerce Commission was shut down, and
movers were basically as a free for all out there.
So you never know what's going to happen. But the
good movers are still complying with the regulation. So there
are still regulated movers out there. And Congress does has
(18:50):
come back to reregulate a little bit, but not as
much as it was.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
Yeah, I know you've spent a lot of time talking
about ethics and moving and within your associations and whatnot.
There there had been, I think you said, kind of
a wild wester there had been a need for regulation
and a need for better behavior and I know you've
personally spent a lot of time on that I have.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
I have, and it's still a wild West out there
to some degree. So the Internet movers that are unregulated
and unethical in the in the way that they do.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Things, well, not with Brookline and uh, I know that's
a plug. But that's what I've come to understand through
people that we mutual, people that we know.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
So all right, tell me a bit more.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
I'm just trying to put your contact infos everybody can
see how to reach out to you.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
There we go, got that right.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
One.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
We'll share that.
Speaker 3 (19:45):
When you took over, you were young, you know, experienced
in moving, probably not experienced in business yet. What were
some of the changes you made when you took over.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
Well, one of the things I I ended up doing
through an acquaintance who was an accountant. They introduced me
to the Small Business Development Center at Boston College, which
is part of the SBA, and I was able to
get some more training when it came to, you know,
(20:22):
understanding the business aspects of growing understanding you know, some
of the tools and things that I needed to to
get to run my business, not just not just being
a mover in a moving truck anymore. And then of
course I joined the Massachusetts Movers Association, and I was,
you know, successful in once I joined. The people that
(20:48):
I worked with, including competitors that were members of the Association,
were very helpful in pointing me in the right direction
and doing some of the things that they did to
help me understand the moving business, the insurance behind it,
all the regulations that came filing you know, rates and
(21:08):
tariffs and applying for you know, additional space if you will,
to extend my radius from town Hall Brookline to you know,
the things that we do now. And you know, some
of my best acquaintances and friends are part of that
group of movers that helped me originally to help grow
(21:29):
my understand how to grow.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
My company, operations, best practices, accounting all of the above, financing.
Speaker 4 (21:42):
Back office stuff. And then excuse me, I got introduced
to Mayflower.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Oh yeah, I was going to ask about that. How
did you get introduced?
Speaker 4 (21:52):
It was through the association as being part of the
Massachusetts Movers Association, another agent. And you may or may
not know that United Van Lines and Mayflower Transit are
part of the same parent organization. So our parent organization
is Unit Group. So a United agent, a United Vanlines agent,
(22:12):
Conlin Moving in Storage introduced me to the team at
Mayflower who recruited me to become a Mayflower agent.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
And so what is the benefit of that and what
are you required to do.
Speaker 4 (22:24):
One of the things you're required to do is to
become a stockholding agent in the company. They want to
make sure that you have some skin in the game,
to make sure that you know you're you're you're you're
all in when it comes to doing the moves for
Mayflower customers. If you will, you do get the benefits
of the marketing team at Mayflower. You get the benefits
(22:46):
of the back office claims team, the back office registrations
and driver recruitment and background checks for team members. You know,
that's all consolidated amongst all the Mayflower and United agents
throughout the country, into Canada, into Europe. So there's that
(23:09):
connection to all of those parts of the Mayflower system
that you get as well. And then of course, you
know Mayflower being the number one recognized moving brand in America. Yeah,
it helps make the phone ring as well. People that
I've spoken to over the years, you know their parents
(23:31):
used Mayflower in the nineteen fifties and sixties and before that.
So that helps a lot as well.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
I'm gonna say that's too early for you to have
moved them, but you know, so in eighty nine you
became an office moving expert.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
What's behind that designation?
Speaker 3 (23:48):
So we I because up till now we've talked to
I mean we've touched on but not talked about we
will shortly residential moves, right, resident That's correct.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
That was than's the most To become an office moving expert.
It takes more than just going to somebody's office and
learning how to move, you know, just going in there
moving the stuff. It's a different type of process. You
have to understand the complexities of the buildings. You have
to work with the teams at both origin and destination,
(24:20):
the facilities folks understanding the height of the truck that can.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Do might need some permitting it on occasion.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
There are permits, especially in Cambridge on a Sunday, you
have to meet noise compliance and they inspect you as
you're working at a loading dock certain certain areas. You
have to meet those those compliance issues and then there's
permits on the street. So if you want to park
on Essex to Boston. You have to have moving van
(24:50):
permits and that's the same for Somerville and Cambridge as well.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
So it's not just a matter of showing up and
grabbing some stuff. This is a well planned out process.
Speaker 4 (24:59):
Well planned and we like the more lead time that
we can get the better, Although it's it seems like
we get short notices, but we would prefer to have
a good amount of lead time if we can to
get those folks moved and and get things done. And
there's a there's there's not just you know, the standard furniture,
(25:22):
the file cabinets and the chairs. You've got cubicle walls
and electricians they have to come in to disconnect.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
I was just gonna say, all that stuff has to
come apart.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Got it come apart? The power and then every everything
has to be understood that because it has to be
rebuilt on the other side.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Is it a different crew on the other side.
Speaker 4 (25:41):
It can't. Well, we we cycle. We do what's called
the cycle when we're doing an office move. If as
long as it's local, we'll we basically flow load the
truck to keep everything on wheels, and we start with
what's called the case goods. So we're moving all the
furniture first, and we're getting that in makes sense, right,
You get all the desk and all those things in first.
(26:02):
You know, this is on a job where there may
be desk and files and things like that. The cubicles
are a different model. It takes a little bit more
planning and sometimes you have to have that in place
prior to you moving in the rest of the computers
and the crates rental crates, so on a typical type
of office desk move, we want to get all the
(26:24):
case goods over to the site first and get them
in place, so when we backfill with the computers and
the boxes and crates and chairs, all those things are
in place and in the office. And of course it
takes so much planning in advance to have the full plens,
the maps in place. Color coding guys a visual so
(26:45):
we see the color, we see the label, we see
the picture of how it's laid out. We're going, you know,
we don't have to think, we just go there and
do it.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
So it was many years ago, and I don't know
who did the move, but there was a company that
was growing. We started in Walpole, Massachusetts, ended up on
Broad Street. All I remember as an employee was we
were told put everything from your desk in a box
on your desk, and then Monday we showed up at
the new address and everything was exactly where it was
supposed to be. It was pretty well, hopefully it was
(27:14):
you guys, because it was a really seamless, painless move.
But there are times when you have to be aware
of uh traffic, not foot traffic, disruption, business disruption, right,
minimal disruption. You do a lot after hours in those cases,
that's correct.
Speaker 4 (27:28):
Yeah, a lot of the office in industrial of what
we call OL and I moves will happen after ours
and because they don't want the foot traffic of all
the people going across our path during the move, you know,
there's more chance of something happening. And when that when
you have that kind of foot traffic. And sometimes we
(27:51):
even had detailed offices on the sidewalk when unloading from
the sidewalk to cross the sidewalk to get to the building.
In some case, this is not all cases, we have
to have safety office or police detail to watch, you know,
the people that are coming across the traffic there so
we don't run into them. With a desk or file.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
So that's why you know, somebody listening might think moving.
Why Kevin, did you use the word fascinating. This is
why it's fascinating to me. There are so many intricacies
and details. All right, George, we're going to take our
second break right here, everybody, we'll be back in about
one minute with George Rolfing.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
You're listening to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Helene on
W four CY Radio. That's W four cy dot com.
Don't go away. More helpful information is coming right up
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And save local and now back to winning Business Radio
with Kevin Helene, presenting exciting topics and expert guests with
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Here once again is Kevin Helene.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
Back with George Rolfing of BTI Brookline Transportation Company Incorporated.
And I know, George, you do a lot of specialty moves.
In nineteen ninety became a lab and science expert. You're
also a corporate relocation specialist. Tell us about some of
these more interesting moves. Uh. A couple that were intriguing
(30:03):
to me, is you moved a wind tunnel.
Speaker 4 (30:06):
Yes, we moved the wind tunnel.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Incredible.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
So it came from the Harvard Falds station in Bedford
and went to Stanford University. And the wind tunnel was
basically to take insects and put them inside the wind
tunnel and study them and how they would interact and
how they would, you know, turn their wings up and down,
(30:30):
you know, to understand how they react to the wind
that's you know, going against them. And how did how
how they could film them inside the tunnel. So, I mean,
there's so many things that are interesting in when we're moving.
It's it's it's really that's another thing that it makes me, uh,
(30:55):
you know, like what I do is that interesting part
of the research that the scientists do, and then our
are helping them get to their their new location then
onto their journey to their new site.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
So everybody can go to labmovers plural dot com and
see some of these moves. Uh, some of the pictures
are pretty fascinating.
Speaker 4 (31:20):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
You you moved a Nobel Prize winner from mg H
Mass General to Chicago.
Speaker 4 (31:24):
Tell us about that, Yeah, doctor Sostack, He's a Nobel
Prize winner in medicine and his area of of research
is telemeres And I can't tell you what a tell
may I can tell you that's his research area because
I would like to know what the scientist is doing
(31:46):
that we're trying to help move, so I can have
a better understanding of, you know, what what needs to
get done and how I can help them accomplish that.
But it was very interesting movement and going to the
U Chicago was one of those locations where you can't
get a truck in off the regular loading dock. You
(32:06):
have to back in through the quad. You have to
have a detail, a safety detail walk you through with
the truck to get to the loading dock. That's so
it's it's never like, oh, it's just you pull into
the dock and you're there. There's always an interesting twist.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
You may not have needed it for the butterfly fly collection,
but some of the equipment needed riggers and cranes.
Speaker 4 (32:31):
Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. We did a twenty thousand pounds
magnet labo that went up to the University of Ottawa.
The whole lab went, but one of the pieces was
twenty thousand pounds that had to be rigged up, you know,
get out of the truck, work with a team that
we work with sometimes and get those pieces of equipment
(32:53):
out there. So some of it is you know, coordinating
it with the right professionals and understanding the needs to
get that equipment out to the truck so we can
transport it to where it's going and then work with
a team there to get it off the truck and
get it into place. We do some of that, but
there are sometimes even we have to use a professional
(33:16):
to help us accomplish what needs to be done for
the lab. Could be craning in as well.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Yeah, I saw like floor jack or a floor crane
and somewhere I saw an image of a pretty big
crane as well. Yes, what are some of the intricacies
of a move across border like Canada.
Speaker 4 (33:38):
So there's a lot of different things that have to
happen when you're coming from across border. When you're doing
an international move, there's a thing called harmonized codes. So
you can't just ship or import something into the United
States without having the right codes and submitting that to
customs and have a customs broke clear of that through
customs before you can bring that either into the United
(34:01):
States or exported out of the United States. And there's
certain reasons for that. And being a known shipper, you know,
they they know that our team at Unigroup at Mayflower,
they have a good understanding of all of the processes
when it comes to international relocations.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
So you also moved a rare I mentioned butterflies, a
rare butterfly butterfly collection.
Speaker 4 (34:28):
That was an interesting move. Yeah, So it came from
UC Berkeley and I happened to get the award while
I was in Spain visiting my brother in Spain. He
owns a home in Spain. He was in the Air
Force for twenty five years and he met his wife
(34:49):
in Spain when he was stationed there, so he bought
a home there on vacation with him and my wife
and my sister and some family members when I received
the award, so I had to cut that short a
little bit and fly to California and we literally loaded
thousands of butterflies. Of course they were you know, specimens,
(35:12):
they weren't five. There were specimens for the professor, and
we had to pack those, load them, transport them.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
Very fragile, yes, very fragile.
Speaker 4 (35:24):
He was worried about that, and of course the crew
was alerted to it, so how they handle things. That's
part of making sure that when I'm on site on
a project like that, whether it's in another state or
another another location, I make sure the crew has a
good understanding of what needs to be done for the project,
(35:47):
and I educate them in advance, and we even do
training on site with them prior to actually doing a
move like that. So loading it up, transporting it three
thousand miles, then it was on to the candle factory
at Woodshull Oceanographic Institute. I don't know if you know
the candle factory, but that's when they used to you
(36:09):
bring in the the oil from the whales and make
candles out of it back on the day and would
way before my time. But yeah, that's where the professor
was moving to that area of of of Hui. So
we had to transfer everything off the truck at my
(36:29):
warehouse and hanover put it on a smaller truck and
then drive it down into Woodshole to get it offloaded
into the space down there.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
Yeah, that last part of the road going down right
to Woodsholl is very steep for those that aren't to wear.
Speaker 4 (36:42):
Yeah, it's a tight it's a tight area to get into.
And in the whole move only one stamen fell off.
One butterfly.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (36:52):
So and of course we used air ride equipment that's
specialty for the for the trailer to make sure that
it's taking the bump, if you will, across the all
across the country. And everybody on the team was fantastic,
you know, from start to finish to make sure we've
got it done, you know, in the timeframe that we needed.
(37:12):
And including the team that wounds all the facilities. Guys,
they were great the help that they provided to us.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
So a fair amount of this specialty work comes through.
You said you won the award through bid a bid process.
RFPs RFQ is something like that.
Speaker 4 (37:26):
Yes, that's correct, r FPS and RFQs. So we're always
on the lookout for projects that like this. If somebody
is looking for a move and they're submitting or putting
out an RFP or a RFQ, we want to try
to answer that and be part of the bidding process
so we can, you know, get the details down and
(37:50):
present our best case scenario for that particular move.
Speaker 3 (37:54):
All right, there's one interesting one I'm supposed to ask
you about, but for now I want to ask Planetary
Science move and the metal research moves.
Speaker 4 (38:03):
So planetary Science move was an interesting one because it
came out of the.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
Base planets are big. I mean, yeah, the planet's that big.
Speaker 4 (38:12):
So there the professor the scientists was looking at how
projectiles would hit the Earth and they had what's called
the blast containment system. So they had a forty foot
barrel that looked like a gun barrel, all steel, and
this was in the basement of a building over in
(38:34):
Harvard University and basement there, so we had to everything
had to be craned in, so everything had to be
craned out. But basically they would shoot a projectile down
this forty foot barrel at different speeds, and they would
film it blasting into a planet if you will, and
(38:55):
the planet exploding, and they would film it to see
what would happen if you know, God forbid, something would
come down and hit the Earth. So that was the research.
So we had to pack it all up, crane it
all out, put it on a flatbed, and deliver it
out to California for that particular scientist.
Speaker 3 (39:16):
So something like that, is that going to go out
a window? Is that going to go up a stairway?
Speaker 4 (39:20):
It was a hatch in the ground, so that the
folks over at Harvard opened up the hatch. We had
back into the quad area there again and then the
crane would pick up the We had to in addition
to the containment system coming up out of the basement,
we had to turn it because it came out flat.
(39:43):
We had to turn it up like this. It could
make it out through the hatch and we could get
it out and then again tip it again so we
could lay a flat back onto the flatbed.
Speaker 3 (39:53):
So what is the skill set and it's going to
be difficult. What's the skill set? And who takes a
look at that move and says, yeah, here's the way
it's going to happen, almost choreographing that.
Speaker 4 (40:04):
Well. Usually I'm working with a team that would do
something like that because we use known professionals that we've
worked with in the past that we trust to crane
out something like that. And it's important to understand that
when you're asking myself to do a lab move, I
(40:25):
have a plethora of companies in addition to my company
that I work with that can assist us to help
the lab get the job done. Instead of them reaching
out to forty different people to help with things, I
can be the coordinating person that can help that lab
get things done.
Speaker 3 (40:47):
And two more, the Einstein to UC Davis move.
Speaker 4 (40:51):
Yeah, that was an interesting project going down to Einstein
Lab in New York City and having to pack it
everything up, bring everything out, put it onto our special
Commodities fleet, and then have the special Commodities fleet take
that to UC Davis and then of course I fly out,
(41:12):
I meet the team there, and then we unload into
the lab. And sometimes some of my teammates here in
Boston will travel with me to those projects because we
have a working knowledge of what the lab needs to
have done and several times, including doctor so Stack, they
were so you know, glad to see me on site
(41:35):
because I knew what we were doing in the project.
And some of it's like you have an anaerobic chamber
or you have a mass spectrauma as part of the move.
They want to know it's handled a certain way and
they know that they can trust me to get it done,
and they're really glad that they have one point of
(41:58):
contact during the type of a project that can can
be there for their move.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
All right, there's one more I want to ask you about,
because I think there's a story behind this. At least
I'm told there's something interesting. Boston Public Libraries piano and noodles.
Speaker 4 (42:13):
Well, the noodles is something different. I'll tell you about
the library. We've been doing work at the Boston Public
Library for over twenty five years and part of their needs,
if you will, is they have a hall that sometimes
the concert pianists will bring in their own piano. We
(42:35):
have to get the piano off the stage and into
storage at the Boston Public Library and get that in
place before that happens, and then again move it back.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
But when they should just bring guitarists in.
Speaker 4 (42:52):
When we were doing the McKim building, when they were
doing the McKim building over if you know the two
buildings that there's the Johnson Building which is the newer
section of McKim building, which is the older section of
the library. When we were when they were doing the renovation,
we had to take all of the material out of
(43:14):
the stacks in the basement and on some of the floors,
bring that over to the Childs Pound Armory, including Continental
Congress records and all types of material. But the one
thing that they put a police detail on was the
comic books because really first edition Superman, Batman and all
(43:38):
the comics. So a police officer rode in the truck
with us to go deliver those to the location. So
the Boston Public Library has many many things, and it's
a beautiful library. If you haven't been there, it is, Yeah,
it's it's worth going and seeing some of the things there.
George Washington on Dorchester Heights, so we moved the painting
(43:59):
of George Washington in the Washington Room. We had to
take it down, pack it up, move it over to
the Childstown Armory. Then we brought it back after they
did the renovations help hang it, hang it back up.
That's a fascinating piece of art. If you've never seen it.
Speaker 3 (44:16):
I'm not I'll try to see it all right. So
tell us a bit more. Who needs your services. You've
described a lot of different things, so clearly labs, universities,
what other types of businesses, uh, and then even even residential.
Speaker 4 (44:32):
Yeah, I mean there's a lot of different aspects that
we touch, if you will, with our moving services because
there's such a breadth of things that we do when
it comes to moving. So for example, I was with
doctor James Weiss today over at nest Faio. They have
a new new site that they're developing in Chilestown and
(44:54):
that's incubator space. So it's not the smallest incubator space,
but he's got some you know, brand new facility over
there that is beautiful. So if you're a scientist and
you need space with all the equipment and all of
the stuff already there, they can do that and we
just move over your freezers or your contents and your
(45:14):
computers and things like that. Then you've got the expanding
bio labs that are growing that need to get everything
over from one space to another, and they need us
to plug in their freezers to keep the content, keep
the contents inside the freezers. So we have a truck
with a generator, and the generator pouse electricity, and we
(45:38):
have a backup system that's built into the truck so
if we need to, we can grab that power and
keep the the items cold as we're transporting them from
one point to another.
Speaker 3 (45:51):
I don't know if it was that one or another move,
but I saw where there were some really close tolerances
and very low temperatures that you had to maintain. Pain
are certain things. One was like minus thirty or something
like that, fair minus minus ad, minus eighty minus ad.
Speaker 4 (46:09):
The typical freezers that you'll find in a lab is
minus at minus twenty and then four degrees celsius, which
is like thirty nine degrees fahrenheit.
Speaker 2 (46:19):
So they cannot lose power.
Speaker 4 (46:21):
They cannot lose power. They have to be powered. And
during them during that that move, you know there they're polities,
and we have data systems that monitor that if for
some reason, and because it is a piece of equipment,
they can fail. You know, they can feel even during
the move for some reason, you know they're they're they're
(46:43):
just some some of these freezers are, you know, twenty
twenty five years old. Yeah, it's not that they feel
because we're moving them. They just fail because they're twenty
five years old. So sometimes we have to have backups
to that as well. If we have something that old,
we usually recommend a backup in the truck already up
to temperature in case something happens like that.
Speaker 3 (47:06):
I wasn't as finicky about moving at twenty five now
that I'm over sixty.
Speaker 2 (47:10):
Yeah, I get it.
Speaker 3 (47:11):
So it maybe twenty five is sixty in freezer years, right,
all right, you're very active in your trade associations. You're
also you're actually at today the offices of Mass Biotech.
Speaker 2 (47:22):
Tell us about that affiliation. You're members of Mass A
member of Mass Biotech.
Speaker 4 (47:28):
Yes, here, I am at the Mass bio Hub and
they have you know, space available for those those that
are members that can use the space when they're in
the Kendle Square area. So that's where I am over
at Kendle Square. And the affiliation that you know, it
was something that was the progression of our business as
we understood the need to get our name out there
(47:51):
and to be part of the community of people that
we're working with so they know that we're vested in
the community as well. So we felt in this file
was the best place to be for us. So they
can see us as a forward thinking company, training, learning,
finding new things, understanding new things, and being part of
(48:12):
the the community in the Cambridge biotech area, Boston biotech area.
Speaker 3 (48:19):
And for those who don't know, Kendall Square is really
one of the key hubs for life science, biotech, et cetera.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
That's correct.
Speaker 3 (48:26):
So last question that went quickly, Uh, what is why
tell tell the people in the in the viewing and
listening audience is why they may want to reach out
to you and the best way to contact you. We
put in the scroll. Uh, there's an email address and
a couple of websites there.
Speaker 4 (48:41):
I mean you should, you should reach out to myself
or Jared or Jordan's and our companies because we care.
You know, we care about your company, We care about
your goods. And there are times when we are moving.
In addition to the equipment, we're moving the staff, we're
moving the people, the relocation package. We bundle it all together.
(49:02):
Being part of the Mayflower system, we can put that
all together. We just did a relocation recently from Maryland
to Massachusetts where we moved the lab and we moved
all the scientists and the research team that came along
with it. So we care. That's one of the reasons why.
And you have a trusted professional that's interested in making
(49:27):
sure that your move is going to go as smooth
as possible and that we're going to get you to
your final location without the hassles that you might find
with other companies. We can handle just about.
Speaker 2 (49:38):
Anything, outstanding. Thank you for your time. I really appreciate
you being here.
Speaker 4 (49:43):
Thanks Kevin, that really went by fast.
Speaker 2 (49:46):
It does, it really does. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (49:48):
I'll talk soon. Hang on just for a minute. And
for everybody else, thanks for listening and watching. This is
the show about business and business challenges. If you've got
concerns about the growth of your company, free to reach
out to me on LinkedIn or Facebook. You can find
me at Winning Business Radio one of my many email addresses,
Kevin at Winning Businessradio dot com. Our company is Winning Incorporated.
(50:11):
We're part of Sandler Training and we develop sales teams
at the high achievers and sales leaders into true coaches
and mentors. We're not right for everybody, but Hey, maybe
we should have a conversation. Thank you again to producer
and engineer one for another job well done. Be sure
to join us in two weeks on Monday, November fourth,
I'll be traveling next week. We'll have a repeat show
(50:34):
playing on the twenty eighth, but on the fourth my
guests will be Richard Blank, He's the CEO of Costa
Rica Call Center. Until then, this is Kevin helen In
you've been listening to Winning Business Radio with your host,
Kevin Helena. If you missed any part of this episode,
The podcast is available on Top four Podcasting and iHeartRadio.
(50:57):
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(51:17):
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(00:20):
choosing W FOURCY Radio.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Churchill said, those who fail to learn from history are
condemned to repeat it. Kevin Helen N believes that certainly
applies to business. Welcome to Winning Business Radio here at
W four CY Radio. That's W four cy dot com
and now your host, Kevin Helen Thanks everybody for joining
(00:54):
in again today.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I am Kevin Helenan and welcome back to Winning Business
TV and Radio on W four cy dot com. We're
streaming live on talkfor tv dot com, and of course
we're on Facebook and that's at Winning Business Radio. And
of course we're available after the live show in podcast
form on tons of platforms wherever you go for your
(01:15):
podcast content. We're there, YouTube, iHeartRadio, Spotify, Apple again, all
of those platforms and more. The mission of winning business
radio and TV, excuse me, as regular listeners and viewers know,
is to offer insights and advice, to help people avoid
the mistakes of others, right to learn best practices. Those
(01:36):
are the how tos, the what too's, the what not tos,
and to be challenged and hopefully to be inspired by
the successes of others. Those are consultants, authors, coaches, advisors,
business owners, founders, entrepreneurs.
Speaker 2 (01:49):
People with expertise.
Speaker 3 (01:51):
But you know, virtually every successful person I've ever had
a chance to talk to has had some form of
failure in their lives and careers.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
I say it every week.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
While we all have the our knee skin once in
a while, I'm driven to keep those scrapes from needing
major surgery. Let's endeavor to learn from history so we
don't repeat it. I've spent the better part of my
career equipping businesses to grow from solopreneurs to small to
medium sized companies all the way up to the fortune fifty.
And I've seen a lot of those companies up close
and personal, and a lot of them win and to
(02:21):
varying degrees.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
I've seen some fail.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
I've had the opportunity to rub elbows with some of
the highest performing people around and with some people who
probably should have found other professions. Right. So, in my
own businesses, I've had lots of success, but some failures too,
And I like to think I've learned a lot of
those lessons from experience. So you're going to hear from
me some opinions and insights, etc. But you're definitely going
to hear from really interesting and cool guys like today's guest.
(02:46):
His name is George Rolfing, owner of BTI Brookline Transportation Company, Incorporated.
It's a family owned and operated residential and commercial moving
company headquartered in Hanover, Massachusetts.
Speaker 2 (02:57):
Here's his bio.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
His teeth in the moving business with Larkin Movers and
Maple Movers in the late nineteen seventies, starting out as
a driver van operator and running moving crews within three weeks.
In the early nineteen eighties, he bought the BTI. Under
his mentorship, the company became a Mayflower franchise and expanded
its offerings beyond residential and commercial moves. Some of those
(03:22):
specialty moves include lab moves, computer and electronics moves, trade
show moves, furniture and fixture assembly and disassembly, customized creating, storaging,
and more to meet the demands of the growing life
science and medical community in Greater Boston and beyond. Interestingly enough,
George created labmovers dot Com as a specialty division of
(03:43):
his company. With that specialation specialization in plugin transport. Lab
Movers has moved the lab of Nobel prizewinner Jack Hope.
I say this correctly, doctor Jack Zostak, formerly of Harvard
Medical now the University of Chicago. Other lab relocations include
a move of rare butterfly collection from UC Berkeley to
(04:04):
the Marine Biological Labs some of you know in Woodshole,
Mass very cool place, and the relocation of a win
tunnel from Harvard to UC Davis. George is a longtime
member of the Mass Movers Association, serving as it's president
from twenty twelve to twenty fourteen. He's certified by the
American Moving in Storage Association as an office and Industrial
consultant and as a moving consultant. George's numerous awards, including
(04:28):
BBB's twenty sixteen Award winner, the Million Dollar Plus Award
in twenty sixteen the Mayflower Excellence in Sales Award Outstanding
Service Award, and BTI is a proud member of the
Mass Biotech Consul Mary. George continues the tradition of BTI
being a family owned and operated in business, as his
wife Karen, and sons Jared and his wife Michaela and
(04:51):
Jordan all work in the business. George, Welcome to Winning
Business Radio.
Speaker 4 (04:56):
Thank you very much. Kevin, thank you for the invite.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
You're welcome.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
I appreciate you you're taking the time to be here.
Tell us about the family first, Karen. Tell us a
bit bit about Karen and also about her involvement in
the business.
Speaker 4 (05:10):
Okay, my wife and I met when we were, you know,
in high school. And I love that we've been together
for that long. So prior to twenty years then, yeah, yeah,
twenty years is right, Karen. So we dated for six
years prior to getting married, and and you know, we've
(05:33):
been married since nineteen seventy nine. And her and I
are we work together in our family and we've worked
together in our business.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
What is her role with jobs does she performed within
the company.
Speaker 4 (05:48):
Karen's the office manager at the company. She manages the office.
She does the accounts, payable accounts, receivable billing, all of
those types of things that happened every day behind the
scenes that have to get done to help our customers
with their wing needs.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
Excellent. And Jared and his wife Michaela.
Speaker 4 (06:09):
Yeah, Jared has been with the companies, you know, since
he's eighteen years old. He's been working at the company.
He started as a mover driver like myself, and he
worked in the warehouse for a while. He's learned the
business from the ground up, so you can understand all
(06:29):
facets from you know, operations, and now he does sales
and he does business development. He's also a special project
specialist when it comes to handling lab and science relocation.
So he's got the he's got the goods when it
comes to you know, the specialty let lab moves, if
(06:50):
you will. He's also certified in handling chemical packing and
things of that, so he's got some background there.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
We're going to talk about a lot of those specialties.
I'm very interested to hear that.
Speaker 4 (07:02):
Yeah, his wife, Mikhaela, came to us from Trade to Joe.
She was a manager at Traded Joe's for for quite
a long time, working at many of the traded Joe's stores,
and she's working in the outfacing public side of the move,
the move management side of the moves. So she's she's
part of the team that makes sure that everything happens
(07:23):
the way it's supposed to happen. She's she's behind the
scenes a lot of times, you know, handling the emails
and the correspondents and making sure that everything ticks off
the way it's supposed to in a move that's supposed
to happen.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
That's really good. And Jordan, and.
Speaker 4 (07:40):
Jordan, he does sales and operation. So Jordan, like like
Jared his brother, he you know, had to stop from
the ground up and working in the warehouse and driving
the trucks and managing the crews and understanding how the
jobs work. Everybody in our company has to go out
on a move job to stand what a client goes through.
(08:03):
So they start even from the process of going out
on sales calls to understand what the client's expectations are.
So I really try to get the team involved. So
the operations crew goes out with the salespeople, and the
salespeople go up with the operation crews, so they have
a good understanding of what the expectations are from the
customer side of things.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
That's fantastic. How big is your team?
Speaker 4 (08:27):
Our team goes from anywhere from you know, a five
man team to a forty man team depending on the
size of the project. Yeah, and of course being part
of the Mayflower system, we can reach out and combine
all of our assets in the Mayflower system for as
much as a client with me.
Speaker 3 (08:46):
I want to ask a little bit more about your background.
Where'd you grow up?
Speaker 4 (08:50):
So I grew up in Jamaica Plane, which is part
of Boston, and you know, it was a great place
to grow up around around the city and Jamaica Pond,
and you know, up and down Santa Street and in
town Boston on the Green Line and the Orange Line.
So that's my background when it comes to growing up
(09:10):
in the city.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
So a little inside baseball. I grew up in Midfield
in the suburbs.
Speaker 3 (09:16):
But I live now in Rosendale, have been here for
thirty almost forty years. So I think we probably know
some of the same people.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
Will talk later, we probably do.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Yes, Yeah, in fact, you went to Boston English High School.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
I did go to Boston English. Yeah, I did go
to Boston English during the seventies. It was an interesting
time that it was the first year of Boston in
the city, so I have that experience. But it was
a great I met some great people at Boston English.
And the building where I went to high school now
(09:48):
is a research lab for HARBD Medical.
Speaker 2 (09:51):
I understand that.
Speaker 4 (09:52):
Yeah, yeah, Right across from Boston English, I mean right
across from Boston Latin are Nemesis when it came to sport.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
That's right, which, by the way, I love saying this
because it's it's pretty cool to me. I coached Pop
Warner football youth football for many many years. My younger
son went to Boston Latin and played football, so I've
been to many not just his years, but many Latin
English games.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
It's the oldest here. It is audi audience.
Speaker 3 (10:19):
It's the oldest high school football rivalry. Yeah, I can
say that rivalry in the nation. Sixteen thirty five was
Latin school and English had to be right around that
same time time. The rivalry is one hundred something years old, right, Yeah.
Speaker 4 (10:36):
Unfortunately, the winning percentage for Boston English is a little
bit lower than the Boston Latin.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Well, I was going to let you say that I'm
going to let you say that because I'm always on
the on the Latin side. But it's a cool game
and it's played, as you know, at Harvard Stadium.
Speaker 4 (10:52):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Yeah, So what did you you studied really prepared for
business at I did?
Speaker 4 (11:01):
I did study business at Boston English, and that's what
my primary concern was. And coming out of college, I was,
you know, in high school and going into college. I
ended up working for a moving company and JA make
a plane?
Speaker 2 (11:18):
Yeah, tell us, how did that happen?
Speaker 4 (11:20):
It was on a win really. You know. It's like
a lot of people in business, they somehow, you know,
get introduced to something and they fall in love with
the industry and they get I would say, they get
hooked and you can't get out. You just get pulled
in and you can never get out of it. And
that's what happened to me. You know, I fell in
(11:41):
love with helping people. And when you're in the moving business,
it's a lot about helping people get on their journey
to the new space. And that's what it is. It's
a journey from start to finish, and it's it can
sometimes be a wild journey, but a journey nonetheless.
Speaker 3 (12:00):
Well, did you have any jobs, like youth jobs, any
jobs prior to that professional job coming out of college
in moving?
Speaker 2 (12:07):
So what what did you do before moving? Is my question?
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Really, I did a lot of different jobs when I
was a kid, you know, even you know, when it
was fashionable, I shined shoes. I delivered it. I delivered
I was a paper boy and we did what was
called hawking papers off the back of the American truck.
We would hawk the papers off of the truck and
(12:31):
you know, bring them to local drinking establishments, if you will,
and sell the papers at the at the drinking establishments.
And that's one of the things I did. And there
was a youth activities place. I worked for the City
of Boston for a while doing b n b L Basketball,
(12:55):
which is a summer basketball league in the city of Boston.
And I was did Jamaica Plane startup to get that
going cool. I worked for the Registry of Motor Vehicles
for a short time.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
You're the guy, Yeah, I'm the guy I was.
Speaker 4 (13:10):
I was in the cancelation department of the insurance section
of the Registry.
Speaker 2 (13:15):
Oh man, your.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
Insurance got canceled. I only sent out the.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
Message yeah, yeah, Well.
Speaker 4 (13:21):
I was only the messenger. I didn't cancel your insurance.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
Well that was so you delivered papers.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
You're only the messenger and you mailed the statements or
the notification. So still again the messenger.
Speaker 4 (13:31):
Right, well, we'll still the messenger.
Speaker 3 (13:32):
Yes, yeah, all right, we're going to take our first break.
George right here, everybody. We'll be back in about one
minute with George Rolfing of Brookline Transportation.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
You're listening to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Helene on
W four CY Radio. That's W four cy dot com.
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Speaker 2 (14:36):
And now back to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Helene,
presenting exciting topics and expert guests with one goal in mind.
To help you succeed in business. Here once again is
Kevin Helene.
Speaker 3 (14:55):
We're back with George Rohlfang, President, owner of Brooks Line
Transportation Company moving company. So what was it about moving
that you, in your words, kind of fell in love with.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
I think it was the feeling of the completion of
a project for a customer, and and the feeling that
I got from the customers that they were so you know,
they were they were so caring and kind to me
when I was doing moves for them, and they would always,
you know, comment on how well I did the move
(15:30):
and how caring I was with their things. And uh,
it was that part of that feeling that you get
when you've completed something, that you completed the project and
you feel like you've done something for somebody. That's really what,
you know, gravitated me toward being hooked in the moving industry.
And there's a lot of that that happens in our industry.
(15:55):
People just they literally get hooked and they stay here
for life.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
So it better be hooked because you bought the company.
So tell me about that decision. How did you know
you wanted to do that? When did you know? And
I mean you were young. From the look of it.
Speaker 4 (16:11):
Yeah, I was, you know, probably twenty two. I was
twenty one going on twenty two. I just got married.
My oldest son, Jared, was was born in December the
following year. I happened to be reading the Brookline tab.
Speaker 3 (16:28):
Oh yeah, I remember that paper and saw that moving
around maybe yeah, yeah, plug for the tab.
Speaker 4 (16:36):
So I ended up looking at the company. I had
already earned enough money to buy a company. Working for
the other companies that I worked for, I saved some
money and you know, I ended up thinking, hey, I
should do this. And when I bought the company, I
only had a radius of because movers are regulated. Household
(17:00):
goods movers are regulated, and I only have state law.
By state law, yes, yeah, at the time we were
heavily regulated. I could only go fifteen miles from town
Hall Brookline. That was the radius I could go to.
And the Department of Public Utilities is a regulatory agency
(17:24):
that regulates residential household goods movers. So then I applied
for a fifty mile radius from town Hall Brookline. So
I was allowed that. And you have to go for
a hearing. There has to be public needs and necessity.
You have to prove that you can do the work
that you say you're going to do. You have to
(17:46):
publish a tariff, so the rates and everything are published
with public Utilities. And then finally I filed for my
entire state of Massachusetts if service area to do that,
and I was awarded that in nineteen eighty nine. So
(18:07):
from the time I bought the company until nineteen eighty nine,
we were you know, limited, if you will, in some
degree where we could go. That's different today. Times have changed.
You know. In nineteen eighty movers were deregulated by President Reagan.
(18:30):
You know, the Interstate Commerce Commission was shut down, and
movers were basically as a free for all out there.
So you never know what's going to happen. But the
good movers are still complying with the regulation. So there
are still regulated movers out there. And Congress does has
(18:50):
come back to reregulate a little bit, but not as
much as it was.
Speaker 3 (18:54):
Yeah, I know you've spent a lot of time talking
about ethics and moving and within your associations and whatnot.
There there had been, I think you said, kind of
a wild wester there had been a need for regulation
and a need for better behavior and I know you've
personally spent a lot of time on that I have.
Speaker 4 (19:10):
I have, and it's still a wild West out there
to some degree. So the Internet movers that are unregulated
and unethical in the in the way that they do.
Speaker 3 (19:21):
Things, well, not with Brookline and uh, I know that's
a plug. But that's what I've come to understand through
people that we mutual, people that we know.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
So all right, tell me a bit more.
Speaker 3 (19:35):
I'm just trying to put your contact infos everybody can
see how to reach out to you.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
There we go, got that right.
Speaker 4 (19:41):
One.
Speaker 2 (19:42):
We'll share that.
Speaker 3 (19:45):
When you took over, you were young, you know, experienced
in moving, probably not experienced in business yet. What were
some of the changes you made when you took over.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
Well, one of the things I I ended up doing
through an acquaintance who was an accountant. They introduced me
to the Small Business Development Center at Boston College, which
is part of the SBA, and I was able to
get some more training when it came to, you know,
(20:22):
understanding the business aspects of growing understanding you know, some
of the tools and things that I needed to to
get to run my business, not just not just being
a mover in a moving truck anymore. And then of
course I joined the Massachusetts Movers Association, and I was,
you know, successful in once I joined. The people that
(20:48):
I worked with, including competitors that were members of the Association,
were very helpful in pointing me in the right direction
and doing some of the things that they did to
help me understand the moving business, the insurance behind it,
all the regulations that came filing you know, rates and
(21:08):
tariffs and applying for you know, additional space if you will,
to extend my radius from town Hall Brookline to you know,
the things that we do now. And you know, some
of my best acquaintances and friends are part of that
group of movers that helped me originally to help grow
(21:29):
my understand how to grow.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
My company, operations, best practices, accounting all of the above, financing.
Speaker 4 (21:42):
Back office stuff. And then excuse me, I got introduced
to Mayflower.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Oh yeah, I was going to ask about that. How
did you get introduced?
Speaker 4 (21:52):
It was through the association as being part of the
Massachusetts Movers Association, another agent. And you may or may
not know that United Van Lines and Mayflower Transit are
part of the same parent organization. So our parent organization
is Unit Group. So a United agent, a United Vanlines agent,
(22:12):
Conlin Moving in Storage introduced me to the team at
Mayflower who recruited me to become a Mayflower agent.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
And so what is the benefit of that and what
are you required to do.
Speaker 4 (22:24):
One of the things you're required to do is to
become a stockholding agent in the company. They want to
make sure that you have some skin in the game,
to make sure that you know you're you're you're you're
all in when it comes to doing the moves for
Mayflower customers. If you will, you do get the benefits
of the marketing team at Mayflower. You get the benefits
(22:46):
of the back office claims team, the back office registrations
and driver recruitment and background checks for team members. You know,
that's all consolidated amongst all the Mayflower and United agents
throughout the country, into Canada, into Europe. So there's that
(23:09):
connection to all of those parts of the Mayflower system
that you get as well. And then of course, you
know Mayflower being the number one recognized moving brand in America. Yeah,
it helps make the phone ring as well. People that
I've spoken to over the years, you know their parents
(23:31):
used Mayflower in the nineteen fifties and sixties and before that.
So that helps a lot as well.
Speaker 3 (23:38):
I'm gonna say that's too early for you to have
moved them, but you know, so in eighty nine you
became an office moving expert.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
What's behind that designation?
Speaker 3 (23:48):
So we I because up till now we've talked to
I mean we've touched on but not talked about we
will shortly residential moves, right, resident That's correct.
Speaker 4 (23:59):
That was than's the most To become an office moving expert.
It takes more than just going to somebody's office and
learning how to move, you know, just going in there
moving the stuff. It's a different type of process. You
have to understand the complexities of the buildings. You have
to work with the teams at both origin and destination,
(24:20):
the facilities folks understanding the height of the truck that can.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Do might need some permitting it on occasion.
Speaker 4 (24:27):
There are permits, especially in Cambridge on a Sunday, you
have to meet noise compliance and they inspect you as
you're working at a loading dock certain certain areas. You
have to meet those those compliance issues and then there's
permits on the street. So if you want to park
on Essex to Boston. You have to have moving van
(24:50):
permits and that's the same for Somerville and Cambridge as well.
Speaker 3 (24:53):
So it's not just a matter of showing up and
grabbing some stuff. This is a well planned out process.
Speaker 4 (24:59):
Well planned and we like the more lead time that
we can get the better, Although it's it seems like
we get short notices, but we would prefer to have
a good amount of lead time if we can to
get those folks moved and and get things done. And
there's a there's there's not just you know, the standard furniture,
(25:22):
the file cabinets and the chairs. You've got cubicle walls
and electricians they have to come in to disconnect.
Speaker 3 (25:29):
I was just gonna say, all that stuff has to
come apart.
Speaker 4 (25:31):
Got it come apart? The power and then every everything
has to be understood that because it has to be
rebuilt on the other side.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Is it a different crew on the other side.
Speaker 4 (25:41):
It can't. Well, we we cycle. We do what's called
the cycle when we're doing an office move. If as
long as it's local, we'll we basically flow load the
truck to keep everything on wheels, and we start with
what's called the case goods. So we're moving all the
furniture first, and we're getting that in makes sense, right,
You get all the desk and all those things in first.
(26:02):
You know, this is on a job where there may
be desk and files and things like that. The cubicles
are a different model. It takes a little bit more
planning and sometimes you have to have that in place
prior to you moving in the rest of the computers
and the crates rental crates, so on a typical type
of office desk move, we want to get all the
(26:24):
case goods over to the site first and get them
in place, so when we backfill with the computers and
the boxes and crates and chairs, all those things are
in place and in the office. And of course it
takes so much planning in advance to have the full plens,
the maps in place. Color coding guys a visual so
(26:45):
we see the color, we see the label, we see
the picture of how it's laid out. We're going, you know,
we don't have to think, we just go there and
do it.
Speaker 3 (26:53):
So it was many years ago, and I don't know
who did the move, but there was a company that
was growing. We started in Walpole, Massachusetts, ended up on
Broad Street. All I remember as an employee was we
were told put everything from your desk in a box
on your desk, and then Monday we showed up at
the new address and everything was exactly where it was
supposed to be. It was pretty well, hopefully it was
(27:14):
you guys, because it was a really seamless, painless move.
But there are times when you have to be aware
of uh traffic, not foot traffic, disruption, business disruption, right,
minimal disruption. You do a lot after hours in those cases,
that's correct.
Speaker 4 (27:28):
Yeah, a lot of the office in industrial of what
we call OL and I moves will happen after ours
and because they don't want the foot traffic of all
the people going across our path during the move, you know,
there's more chance of something happening. And when that when
you have that kind of foot traffic. And sometimes we
(27:51):
even had detailed offices on the sidewalk when unloading from
the sidewalk to cross the sidewalk to get to the building.
In some case, this is not all cases, we have
to have safety office or police detail to watch, you know,
the people that are coming across the traffic there so
we don't run into them. With a desk or file.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
So that's why you know, somebody listening might think moving.
Why Kevin, did you use the word fascinating. This is
why it's fascinating to me. There are so many intricacies
and details. All right, George, we're going to take our
second break right here, everybody, we'll be back in about
one minute with George Rolfing.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
You're listening to Winning Business Radio with Kevin Helene on
W four CY Radio. That's W four cy dot com.
Don't go away. More helpful information is coming right up
right here on Winning Business Radio.
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And save local and now back to winning Business Radio
with Kevin Helene, presenting exciting topics and expert guests with
one goal in mind to help you succeed in business.
Here once again is Kevin Helene.
Speaker 3 (29:41):
Back with George Rolfing of BTI Brookline Transportation Company Incorporated.
And I know, George, you do a lot of specialty moves.
In nineteen ninety became a lab and science expert. You're
also a corporate relocation specialist. Tell us about some of
these more interesting moves. Uh. A couple that were intriguing
(30:03):
to me, is you moved a wind tunnel.
Speaker 4 (30:06):
Yes, we moved the wind tunnel.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Incredible.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
So it came from the Harvard Falds station in Bedford
and went to Stanford University. And the wind tunnel was
basically to take insects and put them inside the wind
tunnel and study them and how they would interact and
how they would, you know, turn their wings up and down,
(30:30):
you know, to understand how they react to the wind
that's you know, going against them. And how did how
how they could film them inside the tunnel. So, I mean,
there's so many things that are interesting in when we're moving.
It's it's it's really that's another thing that it makes me, uh,
(30:55):
you know, like what I do is that interesting part
of the research that the scientists do, and then our
are helping them get to their their new location then
onto their journey to their new site.
Speaker 3 (31:11):
So everybody can go to labmovers plural dot com and
see some of these moves. Uh, some of the pictures
are pretty fascinating.
Speaker 4 (31:20):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
You you moved a Nobel Prize winner from mg H
Mass General to Chicago.
Speaker 4 (31:24):
Tell us about that, Yeah, doctor Sostack, He's a Nobel
Prize winner in medicine and his area of of research
is telemeres And I can't tell you what a tell
may I can tell you that's his research area because
I would like to know what the scientist is doing
(31:46):
that we're trying to help move, so I can have
a better understanding of, you know, what what needs to
get done and how I can help them accomplish that.
But it was very interesting movement and going to the
U Chicago was one of those locations where you can't
get a truck in off the regular loading dock. You
(32:06):
have to back in through the quad. You have to
have a detail, a safety detail walk you through with
the truck to get to the loading dock. That's so
it's it's never like, oh, it's just you pull into
the dock and you're there. There's always an interesting twist.
Speaker 3 (32:25):
You may not have needed it for the butterfly fly collection,
but some of the equipment needed riggers and cranes.
Speaker 4 (32:31):
Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. We did a twenty thousand pounds
magnet labo that went up to the University of Ottawa.
The whole lab went, but one of the pieces was
twenty thousand pounds that had to be rigged up, you know,
get out of the truck, work with a team that
we work with sometimes and get those pieces of equipment
(32:53):
out there. So some of it is you know, coordinating
it with the right professionals and understanding the needs to
get that equipment out to the truck so we can
transport it to where it's going and then work with
a team there to get it off the truck and
get it into place. We do some of that, but
there are sometimes even we have to use a professional
(33:16):
to help us accomplish what needs to be done for
the lab. Could be craning in as well.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Yeah, I saw like floor jack or a floor crane
and somewhere I saw an image of a pretty big
crane as well. Yes, what are some of the intricacies
of a move across border like Canada.
Speaker 4 (33:38):
So there's a lot of different things that have to
happen when you're coming from across border. When you're doing
an international move, there's a thing called harmonized codes. So
you can't just ship or import something into the United
States without having the right codes and submitting that to
customs and have a customs broke clear of that through
customs before you can bring that either into the United
(34:01):
States or exported out of the United States. And there's
certain reasons for that. And being a known shipper, you know,
they they know that our team at Unigroup at Mayflower,
they have a good understanding of all of the processes
when it comes to international relocations.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
So you also moved a rare I mentioned butterflies, a
rare butterfly butterfly collection.
Speaker 4 (34:28):
That was an interesting move. Yeah, So it came from
UC Berkeley and I happened to get the award while
I was in Spain visiting my brother in Spain. He
owns a home in Spain. He was in the Air
Force for twenty five years and he met his wife
(34:49):
in Spain when he was stationed there, so he bought
a home there on vacation with him and my wife
and my sister and some family members when I received
the award, so I had to cut that short a
little bit and fly to California and we literally loaded
thousands of butterflies. Of course they were you know, specimens,
(35:12):
they weren't five. There were specimens for the professor, and
we had to pack those, load them, transport them.
Speaker 2 (35:21):
Very fragile, yes, very fragile.
Speaker 4 (35:24):
He was worried about that, and of course the crew
was alerted to it, so how they handle things. That's
part of making sure that when I'm on site on
a project like that, whether it's in another state or
another another location, I make sure the crew has a
good understanding of what needs to be done for the project,
(35:47):
and I educate them in advance, and we even do
training on site with them prior to actually doing a
move like that. So loading it up, transporting it three
thousand miles, then it was on to the candle factory
at Woodshull Oceanographic Institute. I don't know if you know
the candle factory, but that's when they used to you
(36:09):
bring in the the oil from the whales and make
candles out of it back on the day and would
way before my time. But yeah, that's where the professor
was moving to that area of of of Hui. So
we had to transfer everything off the truck at my
(36:29):
warehouse and hanover put it on a smaller truck and
then drive it down into Woodshole to get it offloaded
into the space down there.
Speaker 2 (36:37):
Yeah, that last part of the road going down right
to Woodsholl is very steep for those that aren't to wear.
Speaker 4 (36:42):
Yeah, it's a tight it's a tight area to get into.
And in the whole move only one stamen fell off.
One butterfly.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
Wow.
Speaker 4 (36:52):
So and of course we used air ride equipment that's
specialty for the for the trailer to make sure that
it's taking the bump, if you will, across the all
across the country. And everybody on the team was fantastic,
you know, from start to finish to make sure we've
got it done, you know, in the timeframe that we needed.
(37:12):
And including the team that wounds all the facilities. Guys,
they were great the help that they provided to us.
Speaker 3 (37:19):
So a fair amount of this specialty work comes through.
You said you won the award through bid a bid process.
RFPs RFQ is something like that.
Speaker 4 (37:26):
Yes, that's correct, r FPS and RFQs. So we're always
on the lookout for projects that like this. If somebody
is looking for a move and they're submitting or putting
out an RFP or a RFQ, we want to try
to answer that and be part of the bidding process
so we can, you know, get the details down and
(37:50):
present our best case scenario for that particular move.
Speaker 3 (37:54):
All right, there's one interesting one I'm supposed to ask
you about, but for now I want to ask Planetary
Science move and the metal research moves.
Speaker 4 (38:03):
So planetary Science move was an interesting one because it
came out of the.
Speaker 2 (38:07):
Base planets are big. I mean, yeah, the planet's that big.
Speaker 4 (38:12):
So there the professor the scientists was looking at how
projectiles would hit the Earth and they had what's called
the blast containment system. So they had a forty foot
barrel that looked like a gun barrel, all steel, and
this was in the basement of a building over in
(38:34):
Harvard University and basement there, so we had to everything
had to be craned in, so everything had to be
craned out. But basically they would shoot a projectile down
this forty foot barrel at different speeds, and they would
film it blasting into a planet if you will, and
(38:55):
the planet exploding, and they would film it to see
what would happen if you know, God forbid, something would
come down and hit the Earth. So that was the research.
So we had to pack it all up, crane it
all out, put it on a flatbed, and deliver it
out to California for that particular scientist.
Speaker 3 (39:16):
So something like that, is that going to go out
a window? Is that going to go up a stairway?
Speaker 4 (39:20):
It was a hatch in the ground, so that the
folks over at Harvard opened up the hatch. We had
back into the quad area there again and then the
crane would pick up the We had to in addition
to the containment system coming up out of the basement,
we had to turn it because it came out flat.
(39:43):
We had to turn it up like this. It could
make it out through the hatch and we could get
it out and then again tip it again so we
could lay a flat back onto the flatbed.
Speaker 3 (39:53):
So what is the skill set and it's going to
be difficult. What's the skill set? And who takes a
look at that move and says, yeah, here's the way
it's going to happen, almost choreographing that.
Speaker 4 (40:04):
Well. Usually I'm working with a team that would do
something like that because we use known professionals that we've
worked with in the past that we trust to crane
out something like that. And it's important to understand that
when you're asking myself to do a lab move, I
(40:25):
have a plethora of companies in addition to my company
that I work with that can assist us to help
the lab get the job done. Instead of them reaching
out to forty different people to help with things, I
can be the coordinating person that can help that lab
get things done.
Speaker 3 (40:47):
And two more, the Einstein to UC Davis move.
Speaker 4 (40:51):
Yeah, that was an interesting project going down to Einstein
Lab in New York City and having to pack it
everything up, bring everything out, put it onto our special
Commodities fleet, and then have the special Commodities fleet take
that to UC Davis and then of course I fly out,
(41:12):
I meet the team there, and then we unload into
the lab. And sometimes some of my teammates here in
Boston will travel with me to those projects because we
have a working knowledge of what the lab needs to
have done and several times, including doctor so Stack, they
were so you know, glad to see me on site
(41:35):
because I knew what we were doing in the project.
And some of it's like you have an anaerobic chamber
or you have a mass spectrauma as part of the move.
They want to know it's handled a certain way and
they know that they can trust me to get it done,
and they're really glad that they have one point of
(41:58):
contact during the type of a project that can can
be there for their move.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
All right, there's one more I want to ask you about,
because I think there's a story behind this. At least
I'm told there's something interesting. Boston Public Libraries piano and noodles.
Speaker 4 (42:13):
Well, the noodles is something different. I'll tell you about
the library. We've been doing work at the Boston Public
Library for over twenty five years and part of their needs,
if you will, is they have a hall that sometimes
the concert pianists will bring in their own piano. We
(42:35):
have to get the piano off the stage and into
storage at the Boston Public Library and get that in
place before that happens, and then again move it back.
Speaker 2 (42:46):
But when they should just bring guitarists in.
Speaker 4 (42:52):
When we were doing the McKim building, when they were
doing the McKim building over if you know the two
buildings that there's the Johnson Building which is the newer
section of McKim building, which is the older section of
the library. When we were when they were doing the renovation,
we had to take all of the material out of
(43:14):
the stacks in the basement and on some of the floors,
bring that over to the Childs Pound Armory, including Continental
Congress records and all types of material. But the one
thing that they put a police detail on was the
comic books because really first edition Superman, Batman and all
(43:38):
the comics. So a police officer rode in the truck
with us to go deliver those to the location. So
the Boston Public Library has many many things, and it's
a beautiful library. If you haven't been there, it is, Yeah,
it's it's worth going and seeing some of the things there.
George Washington on Dorchester Heights, so we moved the painting
(43:59):
of George Washington in the Washington Room. We had to
take it down, pack it up, move it over to
the Childstown Armory. Then we brought it back after they
did the renovations help hang it, hang it back up.
That's a fascinating piece of art. If you've never seen it.
Speaker 3 (44:16):
I'm not I'll try to see it all right. So
tell us a bit more. Who needs your services. You've
described a lot of different things, so clearly labs, universities,
what other types of businesses, uh, and then even even residential.
Speaker 4 (44:32):
Yeah, I mean there's a lot of different aspects that
we touch, if you will, with our moving services because
there's such a breadth of things that we do when
it comes to moving. So for example, I was with
doctor James Weiss today over at nest Faio. They have
a new new site that they're developing in Chilestown and
(44:54):
that's incubator space. So it's not the smallest incubator space,
but he's got some you know, brand new facility over
there that is beautiful. So if you're a scientist and
you need space with all the equipment and all of
the stuff already there, they can do that and we
just move over your freezers or your contents and your
(45:14):
computers and things like that. Then you've got the expanding
bio labs that are growing that need to get everything
over from one space to another, and they need us
to plug in their freezers to keep the content, keep
the contents inside the freezers. So we have a truck
with a generator, and the generator pouse electricity, and we
(45:38):
have a backup system that's built into the truck so
if we need to, we can grab that power and
keep the the items cold as we're transporting them from
one point to another.
Speaker 3 (45:51):
I don't know if it was that one or another move,
but I saw where there were some really close tolerances
and very low temperatures that you had to maintain. Pain
are certain things. One was like minus thirty or something
like that, fair minus minus ad, minus eighty minus ad.
Speaker 4 (46:09):
The typical freezers that you'll find in a lab is
minus at minus twenty and then four degrees celsius, which
is like thirty nine degrees fahrenheit.
Speaker 2 (46:19):
So they cannot lose power.
Speaker 4 (46:21):
They cannot lose power. They have to be powered. And
during them during that that move, you know there they're polities,
and we have data systems that monitor that if for
some reason, and because it is a piece of equipment,
they can fail. You know, they can feel even during
the move for some reason, you know they're they're they're
(46:43):
just some some of these freezers are, you know, twenty
twenty five years old. Yeah, it's not that they feel
because we're moving them. They just fail because they're twenty
five years old. So sometimes we have to have backups
to that as well. If we have something that old,
we usually recommend a backup in the truck already up
to temperature in case something happens like that.
Speaker 3 (47:06):
I wasn't as finicky about moving at twenty five now
that I'm over sixty.
Speaker 2 (47:10):
Yeah, I get it.
Speaker 3 (47:11):
So it maybe twenty five is sixty in freezer years, right,
all right, you're very active in your trade associations. You're
also you're actually at today the offices of Mass Biotech.
Speaker 2 (47:22):
Tell us about that affiliation. You're members of Mass A
member of Mass Biotech.
Speaker 4 (47:28):
Yes, here, I am at the Mass bio Hub and
they have you know, space available for those those that
are members that can use the space when they're in
the Kendle Square area. So that's where I am over
at Kendle Square. And the affiliation that you know, it
was something that was the progression of our business as
we understood the need to get our name out there
(47:51):
and to be part of the community of people that
we're working with so they know that we're vested in
the community as well. So we felt in this file
was the best place to be for us. So they
can see us as a forward thinking company, training, learning,
finding new things, understanding new things, and being part of
(48:12):
the the community in the Cambridge biotech area, Boston biotech area.
Speaker 3 (48:19):
And for those who don't know, Kendall Square is really
one of the key hubs for life science, biotech, et cetera.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
That's correct.
Speaker 3 (48:26):
So last question that went quickly, Uh, what is why
tell tell the people in the in the viewing and
listening audience is why they may want to reach out
to you and the best way to contact you. We
put in the scroll. Uh, there's an email address and
a couple of websites there.
Speaker 4 (48:41):
I mean you should, you should reach out to myself
or Jared or Jordan's and our companies because we care.
You know, we care about your company, We care about
your goods. And there are times when we are moving.
In addition to the equipment, we're moving the staff, we're
moving the people, the relocation package. We bundle it all together.
(49:02):
Being part of the Mayflower system, we can put that
all together. We just did a relocation recently from Maryland
to Massachusetts where we moved the lab and we moved
all the scientists and the research team that came along
with it. So we care. That's one of the reasons why.
And you have a trusted professional that's interested in making
(49:27):
sure that your move is going to go as smooth
as possible and that we're going to get you to
your final location without the hassles that you might find
with other companies. We can handle just about.
Speaker 2 (49:38):
Anything, outstanding. Thank you for your time. I really appreciate
you being here.
Speaker 4 (49:43):
Thanks Kevin, that really went by fast.
Speaker 2 (49:46):
It does, it really does. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (49:48):
I'll talk soon. Hang on just for a minute. And
for everybody else, thanks for listening and watching. This is
the show about business and business challenges. If you've got
concerns about the growth of your company, free to reach
out to me on LinkedIn or Facebook. You can find
me at Winning Business Radio one of my many email addresses,
Kevin at Winning Businessradio dot com. Our company is Winning Incorporated.
(50:11):
We're part of Sandler Training and we develop sales teams
at the high achievers and sales leaders into true coaches
and mentors. We're not right for everybody, but Hey, maybe
we should have a conversation. Thank you again to producer
and engineer one for another job well done. Be sure
to join us in two weeks on Monday, November fourth,
I'll be traveling next week. We'll have a repeat show
(50:34):
playing on the twenty eighth, but on the fourth my
guests will be Richard Blank, He's the CEO of Costa
Rica Call Center. Until then, this is Kevin helen In
you've been listening to Winning Business Radio with your host,
Kevin Helena. If you missed any part of this episode,
The podcast is available on Top four Podcasting and iHeartRadio.
(50:57):
For more information and questions, go to the Winning Business
Radio dot com or check us out on social media.
Tune in again next week and every Monday at four
pm Eastern Time to listen live to Winning Business Radio
on W four CY Radio W four cy dot com.
Until then, let's succeed where others have failed and win
(51:17):
in business with Kevin Halenan and Winning Business Radio
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