News

Stop That, It’s Illegal

It’s not the fine, it’s the liability.

I was at a DOT lecture at the NPSA conference. The point of the lecture was DOT enforcement of moving loaded containers. The lecturer specifically mentioned refrigerated containers, household goods, and office containers as violations.

Office containers are loaded containers, and have to comply with FCMA rules.

If there is anything in the container at all, the four corners have to be on the trailer and the container has to be locked through either the upper or lower corner castings in such a way as to keep the container from moving more than 1″ in any direction. They specifically said the reason you can’t use chains on the lower corner castings is because the container can lift 1″. Lower corner castings have to have a lock down as well as forward and sideways. 

It was very clear and elicited a lot of boos from the audience. Primarily because, how do you in a practical manner chain through the upper corner castings? Have to carry around a ladder or have a trailer with slide-in pins. 

At the 2019 Ohio Freight Conference in Cincinnati, after a lecture on Intermodal freight, I specifically asked the ODOT and the federal DOT lecturers about the same subject. They both referred me to the manual and both said the same thing. 

It only takes one.

I don’t think most state troopers know the rules well enough to stop an office container. But it only takes one. Then, everyone at the station knows. That’s what one of our new customers found—once they got stopped, they got stopped every time they had an office container. We were able to get them a trailer in 30 days, but that was 30 days they didn’t move office containers.

What happens when there’s an accident?

Then there is the whole scary liability that if there is an accident and the load was an office container hanging off the back of the trailer, it is illegal, you know it is illegal, but are doing it anyway because you haven’t gotten caught in the past. You are knowingly violating FCMA rules, will your insurance company cover you? If they do, will they continue to carry you?

Take away the worry. Move loaded containers legally and safely.

The corner locks in every QuickLoadz make it easy to legally lock any loaded container to a bed.

- Sean

They Bought A Trailer After Being Told It Could Move Loaded Containers

I was talking to a new customer who said that they were moving an office container with a tow trailer. They had two feet hanging off the back, something they had done dozens of times before, and that they thought was perfectly legal.

It’s not.

They were almost 300 miles from home when they were pulled over because the end of the container was hanging off the back of the trailer by two feet. The company that sold them the trailer assured them that it was legal. An $11,000 fine, an out of service, a tow, a crane, and a flatbed later, and they were convinced that it was not legal. All told, they thought they had around $13,500 in costs, plus they can’t move their office containers without risking it again.

This container is not fully on the trailer nor is it secured through the corner castings. This is only legal if the container is completely empty.

It is only legal if the container is completely empty.

Anything in the container, and certainly an office trailer or other converted container, is not considered empty. At a conference a DOT official explained it like this:

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“If the container is empty, and by that I mean a completely empty standard container, then the container is the load. If, however, there is anything at all in the container—and this could be a carpet—the contents of the container are the load, and therefore the container has to be completely on the trailer, and secured through the corner castings.”

Here is a summary of the regulation from Securing Loaded Intermodal Containers on Non-Chassis Vehicles:

Section 3.6.3:

“All lower corners rest upon the vehicle,”

Like QuickLoadz does.

“Either chains, wire ropes, or integral devices that are fixed to all lower corners,”

Like the hydraulic corner pin locks that activate instantly by the push of a button on every QuickLoadz.

“Or crossed chains that are fixed to all upper corners,”

That sounds hard, bring a ladder.

Why can most people only move empties?

Because most people can’t comply with these regulations. Let’s look at how a simple trailer loads containers:

The winch takes up space at the front of the bed, so the container doesn’t load all the way. There’s a few feet of container hanging off the back. This container doesn’t meet the requirement that all four corners must be on the bed.

This is a properly loaded container. All four corners are on the bed and the chains are securing the container to the bed. It’s a really great way to move loaded containers if you want your employees to spend an hour in the sun, wind, rain, or snow manually winching and chaining up a container. Not to mention, with the container chained up like that, you can’t open the doors and unload it at a loading dock like you can with QuickLoadz.

QuickLoadz makes it safe and easy to be legal.

QuickLoadz dual chain drive chains pull the container all of the way onto the trailer and then lock it on with the pins through the four corner castings. The dual drive chains then push the container off of the trailer so no part of the container ever needs to hang off of the back of the trailer. This makes moving not only empty containers fast, safe, and easy, but allows you to move loaded sea shipping containers legally.

A QuickLoadz trailer with a container locked in on the bed.

With this ability to move loaded containers you open up an entirely new business line. A lot of companies have tow trailers to move empties, but with QuickLoadz, you can move loaded containers, and charge accordingly. The only other options are cranes at both end—pretty expensive and difficult to coordinate.

In summary:

  1. With QuickLoadz you take a 20 minute long, difficult, dangerous job involving straps, chains, and lots of dragging things around and turn it into 3 minutes of pushing buttons on your cell phone.
  2. With QuickLoadz you don’t run the risk of a huge fine for illegally moving a container with part of it hanging off of the back of the trailer.
  3. With QuickLoadz you open up an entirely new, lucrative line of business in moving loaded containers. Shoot, maybe when one of your competitors gets hit for moving office containers illegally, you can offer them your services.
Apply here
- Sean

QuickLoadz Hops Across The Pond

JobsOhio and London Stock Exchange have combined to bring world class training to help companies such as QuickLoadz prepare for the next steps in moving into international markets. For QuickLoadz, management training in the ELITE program was an intense immersion into the world of big business.

Sunday the 27th of October in London the management of QuickLoadz was very happy to be graduating in the very first US cohort of the London Stock Exchange Groups ELITE program. ELITE is London Stock Exchange Group’s international business support and capital raising program for ambitious and fast growing companies.

First group of Ohio companies join ELITE USA | LSEG

QuickLoadz receives constant inquires about bringing our automated container moving trailers to Europe. We are looking forward to working with the London Stock Exchange Group’s vast network to find partners to spread QuickLoadz. Sure that will be nice, but along with our other cohort companies, we get to ring open the London Stock Exchange which will be fun.

- Sean

QuickLoadz Expanding Production in Athens County

Quick Loadz Container System (QuickLoadz), a rapidly growing manufacturer of patented truck beds and trailers that automatically load and unload shipping containers, announced today its expansion into the Bill Theisen Industrial Park in Athens County.

The announcement was made in London as QuickLoadz celebrated its graduation from the London Stock Exchange Group’s ELITE Program, a program in partnership with JobsOhio. Designed to provide high-growth potential companies with intensive education, business support, and direct contact with the international financial and advisory community, QuickLoadz was one of ten companies from southeastern Ohio to complete the program.

“The ELITE program is helping us support important growth opportunities in Ohio, and the expansion of QuickLoadz today is the perfect example of how this partnership can help propel new job creation across the state,” said Lt. Governor Jon Husted. “I’m confident that JobsOhio’s strategic investment in these Southeast Ohio companies will continue to support new growth in the region.”

QuickLoadz plans to add 40 new jobs and grow to 52 employees over the next three years as it expands its production capacity and grows sales of their unique shipping system.

“QuickLoadz is a great example of how innovative companies can establish a business in southeast Ohio and continue to thrive and grow,” said Dana Saucier, JobsOhio Vice President and Head of Economic Development. “This investment demonstrates the confidence QuickLoadz has in Athens County’s talent, and brings new opportunity to a vacant facility there.”

Company owner Sean Jones founded the business in 2013, after inventing a microcomputer-controlled system that allows operators to complete the container moving process from a smart phone.

“QuickLoadz products are unique, patented and in high demand. The increased production capacity will allow the company to grow quickly, creating high-wage, high-skilled jobs in southeastern Ohio,” said Jones.

The QuickLoadz system allows drivers to back their truck up to a container using a rearview camera viewed on their phone, then push a button on the phone that lowers the trailer to ground level. A lift goes under the container to pick it up, and the trailer uses built-in hooks, chains and rollers to grab the container and move it smoothly onto the truck bed. The result is a transfer that is quicker and safer.

Jones was originally in the mobile storage business and daily experienced the need for a more efficient way to move shipping containers. He applied his engineering, business and storage backgrounds to the problem and QuickLoadz was born.

It was not long before the demand for the product exceeded the company’s ability to keep up with orders. Major customers, including moving and shipping companies and government agencies, wanted more units than QuickLoadz could provide.

The move from a small building in Nelsonville to the 47,000 square foot building in the industrial park will enable QuickLoadz to take more orders, reduce delivery times, and increase sales. That, in turn, will result in new jobs for skilled, well-paid workers to fabricate and assemble the trailers and truck beds and manage the growing company.

QuickLoadz is renovating and moving into a building that has been vacant since 2014 and had fallen into disrepair. The property has housed several different businesses over the years and was originally the location of Columbus & Southern Power’s Poston Power Plant.

“QuickLoadz has been a familiar face in the thriving Athens entrepreneurial scene,” commented Sara Marrs-Maxfield, Executive Director of Athens County EDC. “We are very excited that the company will stay in the county as they mature and continue to be successful. This is a great example of growing your own, and we are thankful that JobsOhio and APEG recognize the value of supporting emerging companies that already exist in the region.”

The company will invest approximately $1.2 million to renovate the building and to get it ready for increased production. JobsOhio and the Appalachian Partnership for Economic Growth (APEG) assisted the company in obtaining a $300,000 JobsOhio Revitalization Grant to renovate the property. The program is designed to encourage redevelopment of underutilized properties and support companies that are creating new jobs and investing capital in fixed assets.

“We are very pleased we could support a smaller growing company that is doing world class business from right here in southeastern Ohio,” commented APEG President Mike Jacoby. “QuickLoadz is a leading example of a local company combining innovation with manufacturing expertise to grow, create jobs and positively impact our economy.”

Appalachian Growth Capital (AGC), a new federally designated Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI), provided financial advisory and analysis services to QuickLoadz during their planning phase. AGC also linked the company to secondary lenders, one of which ultimately provided financing for the expansion project.

“QuickLoadz is creating jobs and making excellent products, and we are pleased to be able to support their growth,” said AGC Executive Vice President Brad Blair.

- Sean

When Phones Had Cords and Smoking Was Good For You

Why are you using a trailer with tech from when phones had cords and smoking was good for you?

There are self driving trucks, but the truck doesn’t carry the freight, the trailer does. And trailers haven’t really changed in 50 years.

Until now.

QuickLoadz is computer controlled and Wi-Fi enabled.

So any driver can operate the trailer from their cellphone. That means in 3 minutes, a driver can load or unload a full sea shipping container without ever leaving their seat in the truck cab.

Do what no one else can do and get paid accordingly.

QuickLoadz is an automatic container mover, but it is also an equipment mover, flatbed trailer and a trailer that can unload itself. All in one.

Cut the cord. Join the 22nd century. Buy a QuickLoadz.

- Sean

Going, Going, Gone

QuickLoadz bought a fleet of used Penske box trucks to turn into QuickLoadz Super Bed trucks. The idea was that if we put a brand new QuickLoadz on a good used truck, we can cut the price in half and get more people safely moving loaded containers.

We sold them all in a week.

I guess it was a good idea.

I had wanted some of them for the OSU Farm Science Review last week as a show special. So, I bought another batch. A bit more mix in models, and of course, Penske raised the price on me. Nothing like success. But it is still a really good deal which I am opening up to everyone.

A fleet of Penske box trucks.

That means I can put brand new 2020 20k Super Beds on these trucks and offer them to you for a ridiculously low price of $75,000. All of these Super Beds will be wet coat painted black. Some trucks are white, some are yellow, some are Hino, some are International, some are Freightliner.

We have the only system designed specifically to move containers.

A QuickLoadz 20k Super Bed with a 20' shipping container loaded. The container has the QuickLoadz logo painted on the side.

QuickLoadz has automatic hydraulic locks, a built-in rearview camera, and remote control that works on the driver’s smartphone; the whole system is so automated you really don’t have to get out of the truck—all standard.

A QuickLoadz 20k Super Bed with the bed at a high angle with a shipping container loaded. The container is locked in and not going anywhere.

Of course it can be used like a tow truck, move equipment, and be a flat bed. The bed itself slides out like a rollback tow truck to give a low loading angle when you need it. One of my favorite features of the truck version is the 50° tilt angle. The tilt not only gives you a dump truck, but it allows you to get really close to a container and still grab it when there is not much room.

20k Super Bed

Move LIGHTLY LOADED 20′ containers with a QuickLoadz bed that mounts onto your existing truck.

  • Deck Length: 20′
  • Overall Length: 22′ 6″
  • GVWR: 20,000 lb
  • Curb Weight: 8,500 lb
  • Payload Capacity: 11,500 lb

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- Sean

QuickLoadz at the OSU Farm Science Review

QuickLoadz is attending The Ohio State University’s Farm Science Review 2019 in Columbus, Ohio. The show starts today, Tuesday September 17th, and runs through Thursday September 19th.

QuickLoadz will be in Exhibit Area 74 featuring the 20k Super Bed and 60k Super High 40 models.

  • The 20k Super Bed offers great versatility with its 50° tilting bed for dumping container contents like a dump truck, optional tow package for moving tractors and equipment, and self-unloading flatbed.
  • The 60k Super High 40 can move a fully loaded 40′ container full of grain, corn, wheat, and other crops, or two 20′ containers with the optional Dual 20′ Container Package.
  • The standard shipping container provides a low cost, secure, safe way to store your crop for long periods of time—every shipping container is an air-tight, water-tight, bug and rodent-tight steel safe. Specialty containers can dry crops inside the container.

QuickLoadz for Agriculture

At harvest:

Time is money, and the one thing farmers don’t have a lot of. Minutes count.

Save time and money.

Move to QuickLoadz with sea shipping containers for harvest.

  1. Using a QuickLoadz trailer, drop cheap $1,000 wind and water tight containers field-side whenever convenient. A day, a week, or a month ahead of time.
  2. Unload the crop straight from harvestor to the containers. Close the doors. Containers are cheap; water, rodent, and insect resistant; giant steel vaults.
  3. If you need more storage, buy another container—cheap, practically indestructible, and you spread out your risk to many steel boxes.
  4. When convenient, using your QuickLoadz, pick up loaded containers from the fieldside. Your schedule, not the grain container’s, not the weather’s.

No waiting on grain trailers.

No worrying about it raining on your grain trailers. No silos.

Plus: Some QuickLoadz customers are drying their crops in containers they modified. Some QuickLoadz customers are moving their crops straight from field side to rail.

But QuickLoadz has so much more to offer.

Dual 20′ Container Locking Pins

An automated container mover.

Three minutes. Never leave the seat in the truck. You see all those containers everywhere. From the back of a Walmart to a job site. Every single container needs moved. With a QuickLoadz, you have the only automatic system to move them.

With QuickLoadz, you have the only automatic system to move loaded containers. Fully freight compatible, loading dock accessible. What to do in your down time? Make money doing what no one else can.

A flatbed.

But not a regular flatbed, QuickLoadz is a flatbed that can unload itself.

An equipment mover.

QuickLoadz is an equipment mover. With a 38 HP EFI engine behind it and 30,000 pounds of pulling force, those drive chains will pull just about anything up on that bed.

A dump truck.

The truck version of QuickLoadz is not only a rollback tow truck, it is a dump truck. Top that.

Get ahead of the game. Buy a QuickLoadz.

- Sean

With QuickLoadz, Wait Times Go From 3 Hours To 3 Minutes

We estimated that detention is associated with reductions in annual earnings of $1.1 billion to $1.3 billion for for-hire commercial motor vehicle drivers in the truckload sector.

The Department of Transportation, 2018. Link.

DAT research revealed that 63 percent of drivers spend more than three hours waiting for their trucks to be loaded or unloaded on average, often leading to the missing subsequent loads as a result.

DAT, 2016. Link.

Save a billion dollars. Buy a QuickLoadz.

Loading dock wait times are just part of the savings, probably the smallest part.

QuickLoadz builds the only trailer in the world that can, all by itself, load and unload full sea shipping containers without the driver ever leaving their seat in the truck cab in three minutes. Entire 60,000 lb. loads can be picked up and delivered. No waiting on loading docks. With the container and its merchandise sitting on the ground, loading docks aren’t needed.

Turn 3+ hours wait into 3 minutes. Eliminate loading docks, eliminate accidents.

QuickLoadz. Safe, fast, simple, cheap, versatile.

A QuickLoadz trailer at an angle with a shipping container loaded.
- Sean

Another Hurricane

Another hurricane, thousands of containers and trucks rolling into Florida. All of those supplies, all of those trucks waiting. If only there was a freight company with QuickLoadz. Every emergency that company would save FEMA millions. Supplies at ground level where they are needed already in a mini warehouse.

With QuickLoadz, full sea shipping containers can be picked up and dropped off in 3 minutes without any external equipment.

This means that for the first time ever, containers can be cheap portable warehouses. Containers are wind and water tight, so 90% of the world’s freight travels in them.

Portable, cheap, dynamic warehouses are handy for anyone—but especially in emergency situations.

Fleets of trucks with relief supplies get sent into disaster zones. Fleets of trucks, drivers, and relief supplies sit idling waiting to be unloaded.

Line of FEMA trucks backed up on the road.

But where you do unload in the middle of a disaster? With what? Everything is 4′ off the ground in truck beds and in pallets. This picture from the Hurricane Maria disaster shows containers full of supplies sitting on chassis, no way to distribute, nowhere to unload.

With QuickLoadz, containers become the ground level portable warehouse.

People unloading hurricane relief supplies from a shipping container on the ground.

Logistics become simple, fast, and cheap.

Drop the container full of supplies where you need it, when you need it. Driver, truck, and trailer leave in 3 minutes.

  • Load the containers ahead of time, containers don’t care about rain. The containers are the warehouse. Safe, flexible, secure warehouse, wherever you need it.
  • Using QuickLoadz, pick up the loaded containers from ground level with no other equipment needed.
  • Using QuickLoadz, drop the loaded containers at ground level, no need to unload, the container keeps the supplies dry, safe, and secure.
  • No fleets of trailers and trucks that have to be loaded and unloaded. Where do you unload? The supplies are 4′ off the ground stuck in a dry freight van. Not with QuickLoadz and containers. Drop containers loaded with supplies at ground level, leave, bring back more.

Our best-seller for freight, the 60k Super High 40.

- Sean

How To Move A $250,000 Container Full Of Delicate Equipment?

With a QuickLoadz of course. One of our customers builds aircraft landing systems into 20′ sea shipping containers. As you can imagine, they are expensive and delicate.

Our LiftWedges pick up one side of the container 6″, then the Dual Drive Chains pull the truck under the container. No dragging the container or the back of the truck or trailer under the container. No dragging the container or the back of the truck on the gravel or asphalt. With a push of the button the container is locked on and ready to go. No chains, no straps, no winches, no cranes. Fast, safe, easy, cheap.

If QuickLoadz can move a containerized aircraft landing system, I think we can move anything you need.

See how it works:

- Sean