Two Years of Truck Buddy

I know, I know. For a blogger, I sure make a good mover…

Well, no more excuses. It was a busy summer. I could call it “The Summer of a Thousand Good Intentions.” Another equally accurate title might be “The Summer of a Thousand Moves.” I don’t remember if I mentioned it here before, (it’s been so long since I logged in I had to actually think about my login info), but by my rough estimates, I’ve done close to 800-1,000 moves since I started doing this thing.

Think about that. Remember the last time someone asked for your moving help? You didn’t really want to, but out of friendly obligation, or maybe because you owed your friend a favor, you did it anyway. Then, on moving day, you nearly twisted your spine out of place, and your forearms burned after lugging a dresser up the stairs, and you dropped an armoire on your foot. Now multiply that nearly one thousand times.

Lol. Okay, it wasn’t that bad for me. I actually enjoy the work for the most part. Moving myself for free is one of the worst forms of hell, but thankfully that doesn’t happen really often.

So what are these good intentions I was talking about? Let me review my pre-summer, pre-laid-off to-do list. Just a minute while I go wrap my sides nice and tight to avoid splitting them from laughter. Keep in mind that I put this list together around December 1st, 2008, roughly one week before I was laid-off from my job as a grantwriter.

Goal #1: By the end of February, finish “testing the Truck Buddy concept.” In other words, prove that it works. I had no real plan, mind you–just some fuzzy ideas about making money.

Goal #2: Recruit ten new Truck Buddies by the end of April from around the country. The idea was to have one in Chicago, one in San Francisco, one in Seattle, etc.

Goal #3, which actually goes with Goal #2: write the definitive MTB manual. Basically, the blueprint that TBs were to follow.

Goal #4: Retire from doing the actual moves by June.

Goal #5: Since I’m not very good at planning very far into the future, Goal #5 was rather vague. It was something like “Practice Today Show interview questions for my inevitable appearance to talk about the out-of-sight success of MyTruckBuddy.com.

Of course, things got a little nuts when I was laid off, and here we are, almost a year later, with a slightly different state of affairs. I am, however, still working on my Today Show talking points.

The highlights:

• I have a good volunteer workforce in place. I’ve been meaning to write about these guys and our adventures all summer, but, well, it’s rather difficult when you’re using your hands to heft mattresses.
• This is the beginning of the slow season, but I’m still booking moves as far out as November 28th. I don’t have a slot available until mid-October.
• One of the top searches that lead people to my site is “How to make money with my truck,” which shows me that the Truck Buddy network concept is still alive and well. (In fact, I just got an e-mail from a kid in San Francisco wanting to do this.)
• My website, while pretty crappy, design-wise, is becoming quite the sophisticated, automated time-saver and sales tool. Seriously — I discover a new feature every day in the GoodBarry system that I can implement. For example, when someone books a move, I can set up a series of automated e-mails that gives them moving tips, payment information, jokes, whatever.
• I’m about to begin writing the manual for Truck Buddies, as well as what I hope will be a hilarious Moving Tips guide. After doing this for two years, I think I have some good material.

Basically, it’s gotten to the point that I’m “coasting” as my wife put it. It’s a lot of work for “coasting,” but I’ve got something that resembles a stable, money-making system. I even have a Pakistani assistant! (More on that later, I PROMISE).

Sigh. I’ve been writing this post for about two hours between this and that, and now I have to show my wife how to put stuff on the online store. I’m so glad she’s up for that, because it’s one more thing I can take off the list.