Customer Q&A: Headwater Equipment

Today we’re talking to Mark Tollestrup, Sales Equipment Manager with Headwater Equipment based out of Lethbridge, Alberta.

Headwater rebuilds heavy duty machinery and then sell to hungry construction, oil and gas and forestry customers all over the world. Find out how they do it by reading more, or watch the video to learn how they discover the ins and outs of their customers’ financial portfolio with the help of CWB National Leasing.

Q: How did Headwater Equipment get its start?
A: Headwater was first a construction company owned and operated by Mike Stringer. He was a heavy-duty mechanic and serviced all his own equipment. He and his sons reached a certain point where they decided to start a dealership, so all the heavy equipment he used doing construction is the same equipment we deal in here today. We only sell equipment we would use ourselves.

Q: What makes Headwater Equipment unique?
A: There are lots of organizations where you can buy used equipment. The difference with Headwater is we rebuild equipment. We know a timeline of when a certain piece of equipment needs maintenance or needs to be rebuilt so we can get it ready to go back to out to work without skipping a beat. We try to stay ahead of the curve and make it easier on our customers that way. We also have 17 field service trucks that go out on the road to help our customers on-site all through Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. Not a lot of our competition offers that.

Q: Why sell used equipment?
A: Most of our equipment does have history. We try to buy it that way. Knowing the history, we’ll be able to see where the components are at and what needs to be done to bring it back up to code. If the engine needs to be swapped out, we'll swap that out. If the undercarriage is down, we'll replace the undercarriage. If it needs transmission work, whatever components need to be replaced, we will replace that. And once it’s rebuilt properly, it maintains its value. I mean, I’ve seen excavators come through with 38,000 hours on the meter and we’ve started the rebuild process at that point and have successfully sold them.

Q: How is business post ’08 recession?
A: The markets are ever-changing so there is a difference in the way we have to find equipment and the way we have to market equipment. They key is looking toward the global marketplace. North America has a lot of diverse equipment, considerably more than other parts of the world. So we find good equipment here for our overseas customers, rebuild it, put them into containers and ship them overseas. Our equipment reaches a lot of different areas of the world, all the way to South America and Africa.