Week 19 Winners
Rod Bourbonnais
The Lawn Salon
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Canada
Bobcat Unleashed Me
“In 1994, at the age of 19, I started a small lawn-maintenance and landscaping company called The Lawn Salon. I began primarily with lawn maintenance and other small odd jobs. Almost all of the work was accomplished with my 1.5-ton truck, one wheelbarrow, and a couple of shovels. Slowly, but surely, I began to take on jobs involving soil and sod installation, small patios, and so forth. I hired one or two guys to work with me and even took the big step of buying a couple of extra wheelbarrows! A few years went by and I acquired a second truck and two trailers. At this point, we still did everything manually, digging holes and then moving the dirt by wheelbarrow up ramps into the trucks and trailers. In 1998, I bought a hydraulic dump trailer, which made unloading much easier — and it had ramps!
“In 1999, I decided to lease a Bobcat® machine. My dealer, Winneco Equipment, informed me that if I decided to purchase the machine, a portion of the lease fees would be applied to the purchase. After three months of leasing the machine, I decided to buy it. I learned how to finance directly through Bobcat. The leash was being loosened one notch at a time.
“My 753 skid-steer loader was fantastic! It seemed to be capable of anything: loading the trucks, moving material, digging holes, loading tree trunks, moving engines, and pulling stumps were all easier. The possibilities seemed endless. Snow removal became a breeze. I was quite happy with my 753 and decided to get another machine similar in size and capacity. Bobcat suggested I test a brand-new 753 with cab enclosure and heat. The machine was delivered to our jobsite, along with a spare tire and a stylish leather jacket with a Bobcat logo embroidered on the front. It was the beginning of a great relationship.
“At this point, a lot of our business was focused on backyards and sidewalks, where the 753 was just too big. After looking at various backhoe attachments, I decided to get a 316 excavator. It took some getting used to, but this machine was perfect. This is when the leash really came off. The 316 almost eliminated hand-digging, and it came in handy for pulling stumps and other jobs. Its light weight almost eliminated turf damage, and retracting the tracks allowed us to get through practically any gate. The most memorable use for the 316 was when we had to drive through the interior hallway of a house to work on an enclosed exterior courtyard. Nobody else even wanted to attempt the job.
“I now think there is no stopping The Lawn Salon. Versatility is extremely important to us, as we now do all sorts of landscaping and other yard projects. One thing’s for sure: There’s no question in my mind that I wouldn’t be where I am, or who I am, without Bobcat.”
Donald Reed
Cave Jct., Ore.
Bobcat Unleashed Me
“We purchased our used Bobcat® M610 in May of 2002. The large bucket on the M610 is what we were looking at. We needed a machine to backfill around the foundation of our new house. After draining 15 gallons of water out of the hydraulic system, replacing all of the clutch pressure plates and bearings, installing new tires, and changing 20 gallons of 30-weight oil, we put the machine to work.
"Once we backfilled around the foundation of our new house, we decided to keep the machine around for a while longer and use it to prepare the ground for a garage foundation. Next, we used it to lift the steel rafters into place on the garage. Realizing that the 1-yard bucket could hold a lot of yard debris, we started using the M610 for yard cleanup. Five acres of forest generates a lot of debris, and this workhorse made short order of the work at hand.
“We have found several ways to use what we have around not only our property, but around the whole neighborhood. I have used the bucket to knock lower branches off the trees near our house; this is to help prevent a forest fire from going from the ground up into the tops of the trees. We have used the M610’s 1,000-pound lift capacity to pick up engine blocks and place them into a truck to be hauled off. The maneuverability of our M610 allows us to go into places we could never get with a pickup truck.
“Our Bobcat machine is well-known around the neighborhood. I use it to fill the potholes in our gravel roads two or three times a year. I regularly use it to scrape out safe areas for our neighbors to have burn piles. The M610 is something our neighbors like seeing running around, and I’m sure they’d miss it as much as we would if it ever broke down beyond repair. We weren’t planning on keeping our Bobcat machine longer than a year when we first got it. Now we can’t see getting rid of it. Even as old, worn-out and improperly maintained at it was when we purchased it, the TLC we provide has allowed us to keep our M610 running and paying for itself.”
Sheila Dunning
Dunning Construction Inc
Trinity, N.C.
Bobcat Unleashed Me
“It is sometimes difficult for women to understand why men need expensive tools and equipment. I assumed that our Bobcat® machine would spend a large amount of time parked in the shed and the money could be better spent elsewhere. When circumstances changed and I started helping my husband Garry with his general contracting business three years ago, I came to understand his love affair with his Bobcat machine. There is no way to accomplish all the work he does without our Bobcat machine and attachments.
“I started photo albums of the houses my husband builds — and our Bobcat machine is usually at center stage. We purchased one overgrown, wooded lot that could not have been cleared without our Bobcat machine, and we used it to help build a house. In 2006, we purchased a lot that formerly had a house with a basement and lots of trees in the front yard. My husband dug a maple stump out the ground that was bigger than our Bobcat machine! He graded and moved a large amount of dirt to make the lot buildable. We accomplished all of this since August of 2007 with a man, a woman, a Bobcat machine, and attachments!
“We even built columns for the entrance of a new home. Our Bobcat machine delivered and moved the pallets of block and rock. We demolished our old home — a building of about 1,100 square feet. My husband pulled the house down, along with three chimneys. We were shocked when we realized the whole process only took about two or three hours! I hand-picked lumber and made piles of debris to be loaded onto the truck with our Bobcat machine’s forks. Garry graded the lot and moved the remaining block, rock, and brick debris. He dug a hole for his dad, a plumber, to install the yard hydrant.
“The Bobcat machine and hoe attachment dug our foundation and moved our block and brick around the yard. Since I was the laborer for the foundation, my husband moved the mortar with our Bobcat machine instead of a wheelbarrow. Our Bobcat machine also moved gravel around our foundation drainage ditch, backfilled the drainage ditch with dirt, unloaded two pallets of rock for our foundation, and moved part of the old house’s front porch. We used the Bobcat machine to lift the trusses on top of our house walls. We also used the Bobcat machine to lift the sheeting onto the roof. We graded an area to prepare the concrete slab for a new garage.
“Finally, we purchased 56 boxes of hardwood flooring from Home Depot. Our truck was completely full, but we knew we could depend on our Bobcat machine to unload it and save lots and lots of work — and my back! There is no way that we could accomplish what we did without our Bobcat machine. I am in love, just as much as my husband is — maybe more. Now I understand!”
Bill Long Turkey
Lower Brule, S.D.
Bobcat Unleashed Me
“I took over a small cattle ranch from my grandfather when he died in 1995. I was 20 years old. All I had to work with was his old John Deere 4430 tractor. I replaced that with a Case IH unit in 1998. I kept doing things the hard way for three more years until I could finally purchase a Bobcat® 773 skid-steer loader in 2001. I’m located on a South Dakota Indian reservation, where our pasture boundary fences are old and crumbling. We’ve repaired and replaced fence our whole lives, never keeping up with the situation.
“I added a Model 15 hydraulic posthole auger in 2002, which has streamlined the building of new fence. We can put in miles of fence in the time we used to put in yards. I can build stacks of hay in 15 minutes with my 773, half the time it took with my tractor. When people see me and my Bobcat 773 fencing, stacking hay, and cleaning barns, they always say, ‘Man, you can work fast — where did you get that machine?’ I tell them ‘Cook Implement in Chamberlain, S.D.’
“I used to work summers as a firefighter to make ends meet, before I added a backhoe attachment in 2003. I now do custom work with my Bobcat machine to bring in the extra income I need. I can earn as much doing three or four jobs as I used to make in three months of firefighting. I have been able to improve the landscape at my ranch’s headquarters by hauling gravel and dirt and filling in holes. When I tore down old buildings to construct a new barn and shop, I was able to do the demolition myself and haul away the debris. During construction, I was able to prep the sites for the building contractors. The money I saved doing work myself has more than paid for my 773.
“With the mobility of my Bobcat machine and attachments that are easy to change, I can go from one job to the next in the blink of an eye. The jobs that I can do with my 773 are endless. It makes me wonder how I ever got along without it. It’s like having another me with hydraulics! My grandfather would be proud of how I kept his ranch running, making a success using technology he never dreamed of.”
Jacques Gauthier
Rossport, Ontario
Canada
Bobcat Unleashed Me
“I have been employed in the mining business for over 25 years. My first job was at a silver mine in northern British Columbia in the early 1980s. We were all required to attend Bobcat Boot Camp to learn the operating and safety aspects of Bobcat machinery. That was the first time I operated a Bobcat® machine. Back then, the basements of the mill would flood out with muck. High-pressure hoses could not keep up with spill cleanup. With a Bobcat machine, we could remove the solids in record time and hose up the remaining muck with ease.
“My next job was at a zinc and copper mine in northern Ontario. During the start-up of the mine, we spent the majority of our 12-hour shifts with a convoy of wheelbarrows and a few strong men, who filled the wheelbarrows with rejects that the mine’s ball mill spit out. We filled the wheelbarrows and pushed them down a ramp, through the basement of the mill, out the bay door, and returned just in time to have our wheelbarrows filled up again. There were six wheelbarrows and six employees. The day they delivered a Bobcat machine through the bay door of the maintenance shop changed our lives forever. One person remained on the job to remove rejects and the rest returned to their jobs.
“I am presently working at a fly-in/fly-out gold mine in northern Ontario. We use a Bobcat machine there for a vast number of jobs. What impresses me the most is that many different operators use the Bobcat machine, but we still have only minimal downtime and repairs. That machine is like the Energizer Bunny; it keeps going and going and going!
“After hearing about my experiences with Bobcat machines at three different mines, my wife went and bought me a 2004 Bobcat S130G skid-steer loader. What an investment that was! We live on an island off the north shore of Lake Superior in Ontario. The island has very rugged terrain, and I have spent days removing rocks from our property. I dug up the rocks. The ones that were too big to move manually I reduced by pounding chisels into them until they split. Most of the rocks were put into baskets (12 feet by 4 feet by 4 feet) to create a retaining wall for our new road to the lake. I did this for years. Each spring brought a new crop of rocks, pushed up by the winter frost.
“Since my wife purchased the Bobcat machine, I have not stopped smiling. I’ve done more landscaping in the last two months than all the five years before put together. Filling the baskets is a breeze, and I don’t need to chisel rocks anymore. Goodbye sore back and stiff shoulders! My Bobcat machine helps me multitask and it has already paid for itself. I can easily go from removing snow, to landscaping, to moving materials around the property. Your slogan — ‘One tough animal’ — is an understatement.”
