Talkin' Tires: Episode 4 | Jessie Wickel | Wickel Tire Pros

In this episode of Talkin' Tires, Craig Hunter of Tire Reclaim is joined by Jessie Wickel of Wickel Tire Pros to discuss starting a local tire business from a family farm and the ups and downs that come with it. Produced by Recycled Media.

Episode Transcript

(00:03):
Welcome to Talking Tires, the podcastthe delves deep into the world of tires.
Join us as we explore everything fromthe science behind the manufacturing to the
latest innovations in the tire recycling.Our aim is to provide you with a
comprehensive understanding of tires, including howthey work, how to maintain them,
and how to dispose of them responsively. Whether you're a season mechanic, curious

(00:26):
car enthusiast, or an avid recycler, Talking Tires is the perfect podcast for
anyone who wants to learn about theessential component of the modern vehicle and heavy
equipment. So buckle up and joinus for an informative and engaging journey in
the world of tires. All right, welcome back to another episode of Talking
Tires. I'm Craig Hunter, yourhost from Tire Reclaim, and I brought

(00:50):
with me today a special gentleman,Jesse Wickle. He is the owner and
operator of Wickle Tire Pros out ofBurley, Idaho and now to Rome,
Idaho. But I was just tellingJesse getting settled in here, that we've
had a manufacturer owner of tires onthe show. We've had from rubber Uh

(01:11):
manufacturers for crom Rubber Facilities on theshow, and now we get to have
a up and coming tire men oran operator to selling tires retail. I
heard agg is really big, soI say I heard because I've heard his
story from others around the community.And that's really why we wanted to have

(01:33):
Jesse here was to talk about WhippleTires and the story. I know there's
a farm involved. You have afamily farm, if I'm not mistaken.
So if that's if that's uh,what we're gonna talk about next would be
the family farm. Then I'll letyou take over and tell us how you
kind of got started in the tirebusiness to begin with. So now probably

(01:53):
two thousand fifteen, two thousand andsixteen, we started looking for other businesses
to diversify into, and as afarmer, we use a lot of tires,
so the tire deal kind of cameup, and one of my friends
mentioned there was some action on somelocal tire stores possibly getting ready to sell,
so we started talking to some ofthem and eventually ended up buying Bowers

(02:15):
Tiring and Wheel out down the road, and that's how we got started.
They were just a little retail storethat did light truck, passenger, oil
changes, break stuff like that.Didn't have much, didn't have any AGG
involved in that business. And withinprobably six months, we bought a couple
of service trucks and started into theAGG end of it, and then it

(02:38):
just continually grew from there. Soso I'm guessing word of mouth was probably
big right then, because you hada name in the Agg community. Would
you say that you've just built ontothat retail that was there with the AGG
and kind of bolstered the whole thingaltogether. I noticed we're in a big
new building. Yeah, this wasn'tpart of that purchase. I've zoom.

(03:00):
No, it wasn't part of thepurchase or the plan. Originally original plan
was a tire store. Wuld runitself and I'd still be farming. But
we grew fast enough and got bigenough we needed a bigger location. So
we bought this old grocery store andremodeled it and added onto it and turned
it into a tire store. Andthis was a grocery store. Yeah,
this was Stoke. Oh okay,I did not know that. I met

(03:22):
Carson. Probably knew that being fromthe area, but yeah, we didn't.
I didn't I wasn't aware of that. Awesome. So the service trucks
seemed to be a big part ofthe business too. You've got quite a
few of those moving around. Yeah, we've got several i don't know,
thirty five fromwhere in there. Yeah, service trucks and that. Wherever the

(03:44):
farmers are, we have to goto them. So, so where are
you getting this the manpower? I'veheard tell that there's a lot of experience
in your company for being a newcompany. I've heard there's a lot of
twenty yeah, twenty five year vetsin your company. Where'd you find them?
How'd you get Well, the localcompetitor was a locally owned company sold

(04:05):
out to corporate change pay structure fortheir employees when they bought it. Employees
didn't like that, so they camedown here and asked me if i'd hire
them and buy trucks, and andso we bought every truck we could find
and rebuild it at our farm andactually build a bunch of our own trucks,
and and hired everybody that wanted tomove down here. So these rap

(04:27):
trucks rolling around here, you've builta lot of those. It's not order
them with everything on them or we'rebuilding, we're starting. Uh, it's
pretty tough to go buy new trucks. So yeah, we found trucks and
beds and booms and and just buildthem ourselves. And so I noticed the
tire Pros with the wickle there.So that's a franchise, is it not?

(04:47):
Because I see Rogers Tire Pros andcalled, well, yeah, I've
seen other tire Pros around ido.Yeah, so how did you find them?
And where did that? Our mainsupplier is American Tire our Distributors and
so they own tire Pros. Soit's a it's a franchise for independently owned
tire stores that can belong to somethingbigger, offer a better warranty, offered

(05:12):
other locations for their customers when they'retraveling or have kids that go to college
somewhere else or whatever in the case, right, you're a national account that
maybe you need to get to otherareas. Is that something too? Yeah?
Awesome? So then what would yousay is I don't know some of
your biggest successes thus far? Hasit been bringing on that agg business?

(05:33):
Okay, definitely, it's it's beena learning experience from the get go,
because not only did we need thetrucks. We needed inventory, and the
American tire distributors isn't big an egg, so they have some but not a
lot. So we've had to branchout and figure out ways to supply the
AGG tires and actually became direct withTighten good Year AGG about a year ago.

(05:58):
Yeah, and so we started ourwholesale co Pennie, so we can
sell to other tire stores and thathelps us have the inventory we need here
to take care of our farmers whenthey need it. So that's at d's
working with you on that. No, that's we're direct with ourselves with Okay,
Sighting good Year so awesome. Yeah. So early on you mentioned that

(06:19):
you wanted to diversify, so wasthat your driving force for YE Tire Pros.
Yeah, that was pretty well ourYeah, and we weren't real picky
on what we were getting. Youknow, tires wasn't the first on our
list, but it just fit.Yeah, just farming good one year and

(06:40):
bad for ten so yeah, wellmaybe something else will diversify and come in
and help us out to those otherten years and right, and so that
that was kind of the point todiversifying and you and you already you look
at your tire bill probably right,so you tires spend a lot. You're
not gonna get in the oil business. Yeah, right, exactly, you
start to look in a different thing. We're not going to start machining our

(07:00):
own parts, yeah, but wemight be able to change our own tires.
Yeah. I like that mentality.What is is there anything else that
you did there diversification wise in thatsame time frame or no? Is that
pretty much you just Yeah, intwenty twelve we sold we had a pretty
good sized farm out north, andwe sold that the opportunity was there,

(07:23):
and then we went just had ourfarm in Decklow, and so from that
point forward, we're pretty well lookingfor the next thing, whether it be
more ground over there or just somethingelse. And this is what we've kind
of fell into so well. Andit seems really great for the entrepreneur type
in my mind, because I noticed, you know, as you're building your

(07:44):
business and marketing, and I knowyou're saying word of mouth is probably a
lot of your marketing. You've alwaystold me that, but yeah, you're
also expanding your footprint. I noticedfor storage, you're over here kind of
by the river. Yeah, you'vegot a big storage facility there, storage
across the street right? Are youon this whole entire block? Here?
Is this your building here? Ye? More storage right now? Yeah.

(08:09):
I was like, I've wondered ifthat would ever, you know, be
part of the business or But youhave this working as a store, so
I guess maybe just knock it downand valuable to you as flat dirt right
now? Probably wouldn't it. Yeah, but it's pretty nice to have our
inventory just right across the parking lot, right, rather than having to go
across the street every time we gotto get truck tires or whatever, you

(08:30):
know. And yeah, it takesa lot of room to store tires,
which there's been a learning experience forsure. Yeah, having room around you
is vital. We're learning that aswell, and entire reclaimed you know,
getting into recycling and tires. We'renoticing there's a lot of more equipment to
park here or there. So II understand the footprint and the challenges that

(08:52):
come with that. Yeah, howabout your community? You obviously you have
a lot of people employed here.That's family, that's little kids, you
know, little mouths you're feeding.Yeah, I know it's stressful too,
right, You have a lot offamilies to think about. But are there
some community things you're excited about,or that you got a softball team or

(09:13):
anything like that. Our Jerome storehas a has a softball team that a
bunch of them belonged to. We'venever done that here in Burley. We
try to participate in the four hauctions at the fairs. I think that's
a good, good program for thekids that want to do something, maybe
learn how to work before they getthere, you know, right, and
then they see the money on theend, you know, mom makes them

(09:33):
spend it on college. But still, yeah, they see that at the
end and go, Okay, Ican see this and maybe I do want
to do something. Right, youput in work, you get something at
the end, exactly. Yeah.Nice, Plus the rest of us get
some nice beef. That's right.Yeah, right, Well how about you
mentioned Tim and Chris. Are thereother guys in the in the shop here

(09:54):
that you wanted to single out assome guys? We've got jam and I
know you could list them all.Yeah, yeah, they're all very vital,
I feel like, you know.And we've got Shane and Tyson and
Quade, Keeno, Kevin and probablybrock on the service trucks. You know,
we got great totally down in Jerome, and yeah, all our service
truck right guys are amazing, ourcountercrew hearing Burley's amazing, Jamie Moon and

(10:20):
Josh Felt ows Er, Josh Farrell, Candy, I'm gonna get you in
trouble for anybody, forget putting himon the spot. Yeah, but and
also obviously all of our boss athome. I'm sure you have a lovely
wife. Yeah, she's wondering whereyou're at all the time. And yeah,
she's probably gonna be jealous of mebecause I got you to talk so

(10:41):
much. That's right. I gethome and I don't want to talk.
Yeah, yeah, she's gonna belike you talked all the time for him.
Yeah yeah, Yeah. My wife'sbeen great. She's questioned my decision
for five years, but she's she'sstayed there and supported me so well.
Like I think you said in thebeginning, the tires was supposed to be
something that you got going and thenthis is gonna be better, our lives
gonna get better. And she's like, wait a minute, you're never home.

(11:05):
What's what's the deal. This isn'tgetting better? Right? Yeah,
well it'll come right, yeah,yeah, yeah, more than you think
it's gonna be when you do it, you know, yeah, if you
don't put the work in, nothingcomes out so right. So we talked
about successes. Was there any anychallenges in this time that building this out
that you had to learn from it? I had a guy buck Hill,

(11:26):
if you could go back and listento one of our podcasts, the owner
of set Code Tires. They makesolid tires. One thing he talks about
that I loved was even you know, most innovators, when you're doing something
different or you're gonna have some failures. And he talked about because they were
all pilots and they would go backlike a like a wreck on like a

(11:46):
plane crash, and say, Okay, what'd we do right? What'd we
do wrong? Leading up to that? You know, when we made the
decision and how we acted, youknow. So I'm sure you've gone over
some things, decisions you've made andyou'll do it different. Can you talk
about any of these maybe helps someof the listeners. And oh, a
lot of it's been product based.You know what products we bring in and

(12:07):
you try to get the best productyou can for the best value, so
you can pass that on to yourcustomers, you know. And we've found
that some of it is really justcheap junk. And so we've we've learned
that some of the ways that everybodythat's came to work here has always done
things as far as putting tires togetherand doing things it maybe there's a million

(12:30):
ways of skin a cat, youknow, and we've found the kind of
the right way to do it,and that's how we try to do it
every time. That way we canstand behind our work. Yeah, we've
we've learned, and you really you'reup against some some big powers. Yeah.
Yeah, and that's tired. Youknow. It'd be I tell the
guy the other day, it'd belike going to opening a business or a
pizza shop at Chicago. Yeah.I mean, you get into the tire

(12:54):
business, you better be ready tofight. Yeah. And they got major
buyer powering. We're talking like Walmartbuying, which is also a competitor of
you yea, Walmart's Costco because arelike some of the biggest names on the
planet are your competitors. So I'msure buying practices has been a big part
of that. But then customer service, I'm gone so that smiling face and

(13:15):
yeah, just town. Yeah,we want we try to treat everybody how
we'd want to be treated, andand and for our egg customers, it's
all about getting there. You know. They you have a one tractor go
down in a potato operation. You'reshutting down thirty guys. That's costing that
guy a lot of money over onetire. We gotta get there and get
it fixed and get him going.That's that's our goal. That's all.

(13:37):
We have so many service trucks andand so much inventories to try to take
care of that kind of stuff.You got dairy, you got sugar,
beech, you got potatoes, yougot corn, you got everything around you,
and all those are vital what somebodywould call what they try to label
us efficient, no, or you'reneeded in your position. During COVID they

(13:58):
told us, oh yeah, yeah, what did they call us? None?
Help us out? What was itwhen? When during COVID if essential
essential? Yeah, yeah, Soyou're out there changing tires a lot of
times. I think when you're youknow, you look at the guy on
the side of the freeway, rightand he's broke down. First of all,
the driver's trying to get home.You know, he wants to see
his wife and kids. He's gota load of who knows what might be

(14:22):
vital you know, to somebody somewhere. And then now your guys out there
standing eighty min hour traffic trying toget him back, running down the road.
And to me, that's extremely vital. Yeah, you know, yeah,
essential if you will. Yeah.So, I don't know. I
guess how did COVID treat you guys? I seem to bring it up every
time, but it was a bigpart of business. Did did you see

(14:45):
a big influx in semi and sloweddown on passenger or vice versa the first
two weeks. I think we're thehardest for us. I mean, we
just went to almost nothing. Nobodywas coming in the shop, nobody was
getting anything done. We were doingthis remall right, right then this one
it was at night. It's juststopped. All the business just stopped,

(15:13):
and we didn't know whether it wascoming back. We have to remind ourselves
at that time. I reached forit to go cup for my drink the
other day and thought, you know, I thought it to go lid was
gonna kill me. Yeah, afew years ago they told me I'd better
be gloved up and maxed up tojust to touch something that other people might
have touched. Yeah, but youknow, we forget those little nuances.
But yeah, they were real atthe time. And you're looking around.

(15:35):
You got this shop, you know, So how'd that go? I mean,
obviously we figured out, you know, here's what we gotta do.
We got it. We got amask up when we're getting into customers vehicles
and and maybe go pick their carup at their house so they don't have
to come out in this and takeit back to them. And and that's
you know, our Lupe base stilldoes that, goes picks up cars,
and so that's something that stuck.Yeah, it's stuck. Yeah. The

(15:56):
text to pay became huge right then, so we had to switch credit card
companies too. Uh so we couldprocess and just text them and have to
walk into the showroom to pay alot of things like that. The egg
community, I think everybody just saidwe gotta go. We don't have a
choice, and so that side toget much more essential than that. Yeah,

(16:18):
that side we just went and figuredfigured hopefully nobody shows up and shuts
us down because we feel like we'reessential. So we're going, so yeah,
and nobody ever showed up so well, abulances have tires and yeah,
these cars have tires. Yeah,you probably could have worked your way through
that one. Yeah. Yeah.So I don't know. COVID was a
big impact on all businesses, butI think we've pushed through it now.

(16:40):
Hopefully we won't see anything come upin the future, but it sounds like
a few good things shake shook outof it, you know. And so
all right, well, what's what'snext on the list for you guys?
Do you have any more stores comingup, any future plans or know how
any plans yet? But I can'tsay that I've ever planned anything. I

(17:00):
get that. Well, I Iappreciate you coming on. It's it's been
fun learning a little bit, andhere straight from the horse's mouth rather than
uh than other people talking about whyyou got into it. So yeah,
I was glad to hear about it. And I hope everything's going good with
your tire collection and recycling, andwe're excited to bring a lot of new

(17:22):
things for that and to be youknow, shameless plug with our tired reclaiming
picking up tires for you. I'venoticed there's quite a bit of room back
here in the back in the area. So it looks like we're getting you
cleaned out pretty good and keeping uppretty good. It is better. Well,
I'm glad to hear that. Sowe got that on camera, and
uh, I do appreciate your timeand thank you. Have a good rest

(17:45):
of you day a