Like classic car collectors and NASCAR drivers and fans, pumpers have high-octane fuel coursing through their veins. Your job might be focused on scouring out septic tanks, grease traps and industrial pits of all kinds, but your real passion is found on the other end of the suction hose: your trucks.
How do we know this is true? Pumper readers burn through the pages of classified truck ads every month to see what’s being bought and sold. You pore over photos of new rigs offered by industry truck builders in glossy full-page ads to keep up on service truck trends. You spend three days every year at the Water & Wastewater Equipment, Treatment & Transport (WWETT) Show examining the newest vacuum trucks from stem to stern.
I know you’re proud of your own unique service fleet. They are prominently featured on the front page of your websites and Facebook pages. You often refer to your trucks as rolling billboards for your professional business. You trick them out, keep them clean and detailed, and prepare them every morning as if you’ll drive them in the local Fourth of July parade.
Truck appearance means more to pumpers than it does to some work truck owners. Why do I say this? I live in Wisconsin, the Dairy State, where there are way more independent milk haulers than pumping professionals. And every milk truck looks exactly the same. These dairy haulers don’t spend a lot of time detailing their trucks. They don’t give any weight or consideration to additional chrome brightwork or vinyl graphics. To them, a truck is a truck is a truck. At least it seems that way to me.
TRUCK EVOLUTION
For pumpers, a truck is a lot more than a simple waste receptacle. It’s part of the mission statement for your business. When you order a truck, you think of it as a blank canvas on which to promote your professionalism and personality, to create a rolling billboard to reach your customers. You give great importance to paint schemes, to building a reputation for your business, to how you place tools and components to increase worker efficiency.
Over the past decade, I’ve seen the pumping community take a more thorough and sophisticated approach to speccing trucks and using their fleets as an important tool for branding a consumer-oriented business. The growth of our popular Classy Truck feature is evidence of this trend. For the past few years, we’ve seen a spike in submissions of Classy Truck photos, and, by and large, the look of the trucks is more refined than it was when I took the role as editor at this magazine.
We want to celebrate the evolution of the Classy Truck and provide more of the trucking content we know pumper gearheads crave. We want to do for work truck owners what glossy publications like Motor Trend do for muscle car enthusiasts … share concepts and ideas that make vacuum trucks even more functional and better looking.
To that end, I’m announcing a few new upcoming features for work truck fans:
More Classy Trucks for 2016
Over the last few years, we’ve had more work trucks lining up in the driveway of the Classy Truck garage. As more pumpers send in their photos, we’re going to release bonus Classy Trucks in upcoming issues. These submissions will qualify for our popular Classy Truck of the Year contest, vying for the opportunity to land on the cover of the magazine. The number of bonus trucks for 2016 depends on continued submissions from Pumper readers. I’d love to be able to double the Classy Truck corral for next year. How do you get involved? It’s simple. Shoot bumper-to-bumper photos of your new or refurbished truck (even large-sized smartphone photos will work) and send them to me along with a description of the truck to editor@pumper.com. Then I’ll call you with more questions as your truck is being considered.
Walk-around truck videos
If your truck is chosen to run in the magazine, we’ll ask you to grab your phone and make a walk-around video that we can post at our website, www.pumper.com. Just tap on the video function of your smartphone camera, point toward the truck and talk about your favorite features. Slowly make your way around the rig while describing what went into your decisions in choosing a pump, chrome accents, components and graphics. You don’t need to worry about editing the video. We’ll tell you how to upload it to our video experts and they’ll work their magic to make a video you’ll be proud to see at the website.
Welcome to Keeping It Classy
As a new twist on the Classy Truck, online editor Kim Peterson will catch up with owners of trucks that appeared in Pumper in the past and see how they’re keeping it classy. We’ll talk about the type of work the trucks handle, plans for new equipment, refreshes and updates, and learn what truck owners will do differently when they order their next vehicle. We know all of these trucks looked good when they were chosen for the Classy Truck feature, but it will be interesting to learn how they did keeping up with a pumper’s heavy workload.
Classy Truck slideshows
Everyone loves a website photo slideshow. You know the drill: “10 celebrities who own dogs that look just like them!” We’re going to bring that concept to the Pumper website … minus the celebrity nonsense. When you head over to the website this month, you’ll find two new Classy Truck photo slideshows: 9 years of Classy Truck Winners and Gorgeous Graphics. The first is a look-back at the annual contest winners going back to 2006, while the second is a collection of trucks with eye-catching tank art.
WHAT’S ON YOUR MIND?
I’m relying on pumpers to tell me what other new truck-related content you’d like to see in the magazine. We’re here to serve you, and we’re always up for talking trucks! Send me your comments, questions and requests and I promise to respond.
