Tow Professional Podcast
Tow Professional Podcast
No More Post‑it Notes, No More Payphones: Your Dispatcher Will Thank You
Proof beats promises—especially when an adjuster is deciding whether to pay your bill. We sat down with industry veterans Shelly Hawkins and Dennis McGowan to explore how modern towing operations turn documentation, telematics, and smarter software into real margin, safer scenes, and faster approvals. From factory-ready cameras and scene lighting to driver apps that capture four-corner photos and timestamps, we break down how to connect the truck, the operator, and the back office so the job record tells the full story.
We dig into the industry’s next chapter: consolidation driven not just by ownership, but by unified workflows. Shelly shares the operator’s view from accessories to software, while Dennis brings the builder’s lens on product strategy, showing how tow management systems now handle live dispatch, media capture, invoicing, lien letters, and impound-to-auction timelines. The result is fewer wrong trucks dispatched, less backtracking, and higher jobs-per-shift without adding headcount. We also get practical about AI—using large language models for consistent call intake, drafting recovery narratives, and decision support that suggests the right driver based on proximity, equipment, shift timing, and customer history. AI doesn’t replace people; it removes repetitive friction so teams can focus on safety, judgment, and service.
If your business runs on slim margins, the cost of not adopting these tools is higher than the software itself—lost time, missed jobs, and claims you can’t defend. We close with the launch of the Tow Trend Podcast, where Shelly and Dennis take on future-focused topics across trucks, accessories, software, training, safety, and legislation, featuring operators from first trucks to large fleets. Subscribe, share with your team, and tell us what technology changed your shop most. Your feedback shapes the next episode—rate and review to help more towers find the show.
Welcome, one and all. You are listening to Tow Professional On the Go Podcast. Remember, this is your podcast for the pros that have a need to know, that are on the go. It's truly the voice of the towing and recovery industry. And uh today, listeners, I tell you, this is going to be a great one. Uh, we actually have Shelley Hawkins, Director of Marketing Engagement of Atora on today, and Dennis McGowan on today. And let me tell you, if you want to know about software, how it can impact your business, um, what you can do uh to be proactive in the market uh with your technology and your software, this is the episode you're gonna want to listen to. So uh this will be a great one today. So welcome, Shelly, and welcome Dennis to Toe Professional Podcast today.
SPEAKER_03:Thank you, Darren.
SPEAKER_06:Thank you very much for having us.
SPEAKER_01:We appreciate it.
SPEAKER_06:You're welcome. You're welcome. Well, let's start off uh with just uh both of you uh just telling a little bit about yourself. Shelly, you want to tell a little bit about yourself, and then we'll move to Dennis before a question.
SPEAKER_03:Dennis, thank you so much for having us. First of all, we appreciate it. Uh, looking forward to the conversation today. No doubt it's gonna be super exciting. Um, my name is Shelly Hawkins. I am the director of market engagement here at Atura, and I got my start in the towing industry in 2008, working for a company called AW Direct, the nation's largest seller of accessories that started up in Berlin, Connecticut, New Berlin, Connecticut, um, with the Thibodeo brothers that started that company. And they decided to go on to their next venture and sold AW Direct, then to Granger. Granger sold it to Aaron's, and I was a part of all of those changing of the hands, learning lots of lessons in the process for sure, but also gaining knowledge of understanding the rigging, understanding the tow trucks, and also understanding what our towers go through on a daily basis and having empathy for them 24-7, but also having to do math on the fly. You know, do I have a truck where the weight matches the weight of this recovery that I'm gonna do? And I just fell in love with the industry. And then in 2016, I went to work for Paul and David Roddinghouse of Zips Truck Equipment. And about two years later, um, I helped them set up a lot of vendors that AW Direct was selling for. We made the decision to then have Zips by AW Direct, and that was also really fun. Um, a few years after that, I got a call from Corey Brundage of Honk Technologies asking me to consider being a product manager for Honk Technologies, helping architect the technology that is facing the towers because of my past experience understanding and communicating with towers. And then the same conversation came around from Traxero in 2000, let's see, 2000, late 2021. So when I started here at Traxero, um, and then of course the merger with the Torah, the same company, same family of software. And so I really have my hands in almost every part of the business, helping our employees understand our towing industry, connecting all the folks that need connecting to make our software better, to unify the towing life cycle, and to pass on the knowledge that I have gained since the beginning in 2008. Did you know all that, Darren?
SPEAKER_06:No, I didn't. You just blew me away, Sally. You've been from uh through A to Z of the industry, really, from knowing the front side, how it works, the backside, the software, everything. And uh yeah, that blows me away. All fantastic companies and all ones I've I've worked with uh since day one coming into the market. And AW Direct uh brought me right in and and came into tow professional work with us, so as well, zips and and haunks in the past and Trax Arrow. So all fantastic companies. And wow, what a resume, if I can say the least.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, I I can start name-dropping. I'm sure you know my very, very good friend, Mr. Adam Bauer, over at Zips. You work with him. Adam is fantastic as is his wife. But yeah, uh, I found this industry to be my passion. We are problem solvers. Um, sometimes I think I have a little mini motor club over here because I had a tower call me from the Ohio Tow show last week who had lost a fork receiver. I said, You lost the fork? He goes, No, I was a fork receiver. Well, what's the serial number? What's the make and model on the record? You know, let me connect you with a tower over here that has a receiver that he's gonna let you borrow to finish your tow back to Missouri or wherever you're headed to. But we are in an industry that is highly connected, and we are simply people that in turn help other people.
SPEAKER_06:Man, I love it. I love it. Now your turn, Dennis.
SPEAKER_01:Top that it's hard, hard to top that one. Hard act to follow there with Shelly. Um uh Dennis McGowan, I am a third-generation tower. Uh, my grandfather worked for the city of New York and was a bus repair mechanic and uh was a tower when the buses broke down uh back in the day with the the old well-built equipment and early on. Um I grew up in the passenger seat of a tow truck. My dad worked for uh a few different towing companies around New York City in the metro area there, um being part of uh all the different uh highway programs and the quick clearance programs that we had going on in the city. I grew up in literally in the passenger seat of a truck. Uh there are some great photos of me at you know less than a year old uh riding around with dad in his uh old yellow chase trucks as they used to run in New York City. Everybody ran uh you know little single-wheel pickup trucks and everything else like that. And uh started working in the business myself uh in the early 2000s, uh, worked for some local body shops, and then I moved over to a company known as Mike's Heavy Duty Towing in Brooklyn, New York. Uh grew up with those guys and spent uh the better part of a decade working with them, uh, helping to grow their business as they took on those highway contracts. Uh and at our largest, we had you know 120, 130 pieces of equipment on the road, um, you know, fully staffed drivers, light, medium, heavy, land all. And I was uh the you know, started out as the overnight dispatcher at you know 17 or 18 years old, and you know, filling in where people were needed, jumping in trucks as as needed, you know, here's the keys, go figure it out as uh as we all came up uh the hard way in this business. Uh so for that I'm I've become uh an advocate for training and and for certification and things of that nature because I don't ever want uh people to go through some of the experiences that that we did early on. Uh, but I've I've worked for several towing companies uh in New York and Los Angeles over uh my career. Uh my last stint in an actual towing company was uh 2019, 18, 19. I was working for Falcon Towing, one of the largest AAA providers in Southern California. Uh we had uh 50 trucks on the road, light duty, battery, uh, the full service, uh, and they had a full service shop as well. Learned a lot about the ins and outs of what actually goes into the process of being a AAA vendor and and the focus on customer service and everything that goes along with that, uh, as opposed to just being you know in the towing business. Uh that it really is a whole different model, right? And uh from there, I also wound up at Hunk Technologies as uh started out as an uh area rep for the New York City metro area and the surrounding area. Uh spent a tremendous amount of time building some incredible products with some incredible people over there, uh refining our driver app to make it as you know usable and customer-facing as possible for our towers, and being the voice of the tower in the room when we were building software and building tools for towers to use and uh building products and designing websites and interfaces for them to use for them to log in and get paid and ensure that they uploaded the right information, all the paperwork that we needed to follow up on deliveries and uh secondary tows and insurance paperwork and all that stuff that goes into it. And then uh my good friend Shelly Hawkins pulled me to the side at the Las Vegas tow show last year and said, I want you, I want to introduce you to uh a very intelligent, brilliant human being, Mr. Michael Winton, our current CEO over at Atura. And uh I recently joined the Atura team uh to come on as our principal product strategist, and again, to continue to uh increase that vision, increase the voice of the tower in the room alongside Shelly and and in the products that we build, and to figure out how we strategize to bring this massive suite of different products together in an overall vision that will benefit the towing industry.
SPEAKER_06:Man, that is fantastic. And and you know, and nothing like two key people that have worked hand in hand with the tow professionals in the industry and you that right there alongside them on a daily basis to know what's needed uh so badly in the market. So that's fantastic. Well, my my first question, I know my listeners are waiting to know this one is right now, how do how do you both envision the the towing industry evolving and what sort of roadblocks or even opportunities are there for tow professionals?
SPEAKER_01:Well, the industry is absolutely moving into a new future, right? We are seeing um private equity-backed large conglomerates start to uh acquire some larger towing companies and even some smaller ones. We're definitely seeing some industry consolidation.
SPEAKER_03:It's not the first time we've seen consolidation across this industry, but it's the first time and consolidation is no, you know, no stranger to the United States and of course the world. We all remember the day when there were 30,000 different banks. There were how many tens of thousands different cell phone companies, and now we have five.
SPEAKER_01:And yeah, this is the first time that consolidation is happening being backed by technology. Um, you know, we we can talk about the things that happened, you know, uh years ago and and you know, back in the days, back in the day, though, right? Where we're in this new world where uh offices are more connected to each other. Um you've got tools where your your dispatchers and your call takers and your towers are all able to communicate simultaneously across different platforms, across different tools, across cities, states, and frankly, all across the country, right? So we're more connected than ever. And that's really bringing this consolidation piece and really the future of the industry together is is is how do we see these pieces of technology advancing the industry as a whole? I love it. I love it.
SPEAKER_03:I think about that, and a lot a lot of folks out there want to grow their business. They they want uh a bigger business, they want commercial accounts, they want to advance their company. And like Dennis said, now we have the tools, not just the technology, but the tow trucks are smarter. They have smarter technology to operate safer. They give us all these tools in our toolbox to scale the business and to create communication efficiencies. Who remembers back in the day? I think Dennis, you introduced this to me, where the tower carried a roll of quarters in the truck to call the payphone, to call the dispatcher, to call the office, instead of driving all the way back and wasting that gas, are there any more calls for me to go on?
unknown:Listen.
SPEAKER_01:All the quarters and a pager.
SPEAKER_03:Quarter and a pager, the blackberries and all the and the bag phones and all the evolution. Um, but we are going to be as smart as our communication is. And the better the communication between the multi-layers of complexity in the towing industry, the better the business is going to be. And I've never been alive in an era where we have an amazing source of tools for the toolbox, for the software that they're using to communicate better for the tow truck, for all the advancements happening to the tow truck and in the accessories. And so it's just, it's just a fascinating time to be a part of and very exciting.
SPEAKER_06:I agree 100%. I think there's more tools than ever for our tow professionals to use. It's just them stepping out there and embracing those and moving with that technology because it'll simply help them grow. Um, well, my my next question is this what specific types of techno technological advances are you seeing right now in the market?
SPEAKER_03:Hydraulics. I'm joking. That was a joke. I mean, think about it. Like, I love to take it all the way back to hydraulics. I mean, there are people that are going to listen to this that have run a wrecker pre-hydraulics. They're still around. I promise you. So it starts with the hide the hydraulics being incorporated into the tow truck. We talk about synthetic wire rope on winches. We talk about the round sling being used first in manufacturing facilities. And now the towing industry, show me a heavy, show me a show me a tow truck that it's not going to have a rim sling, a round sling, something synthetic. So we not only advance in technology on the physical part side of that tow truck and accessory, but we also advance on the software side. I'm going to turn this over to Dennis to kind of talk about the evolution of the software side because you have used two of our platforms, Dennis, in your past history.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, uh early on in my career, we were customers of Tracker. Tracker's been around a very long time. It's part of our suite of products right now. And uh that was a very simple product at the time, right? It was something that you had to have installed on your computer. There was no web-based hookup. You weren't able to access it from your phone, you weren't able to pull up a laptop and jump in anywhere else. But it was a tool that was able to track your jobs. You were able to see what jobs your towers were on at any given point. You were able to look in and do your invoicing through there, uh, print out invoices, stuff them in an envelope, mail them out. And, you know, we've moved on from you know some of the early versions of that. And now we have the ability with some of these uh tow management systems where you can actually communicate with your drivers in real time. You can send them job information, they can upload photos back into that portal now, so you can save those photos, uh, and that's for a multitude of reasons. That's you know, let's let's look at the recovery scene. If we have to do recovery invoices, we we need photos and video capture. Uh, we've got protection from damage claims, right? We took our our four-corner pictures to make sure that the vehicle's not damaged or or prior damage was documented. We've got it all connected to that file and it's all simultaneous and stored in one place, right? You can send that back to your system. You can save that there, you can send that off to an insurance company. You can do your invoicing, your invoice tracking, uh, your reconciliation of your bills. And this, these are all just the basics that come with these uh technologies that exist today. You know, you've got additional add-on pieces like fleet tracking, you can see where your trucks are, and that comes with all sorts of onboard telematics potential, right? You've got your external-facing cameras on the truck looking out at the recovery scene or the road ahead. Again, things to prevent you from damage claims, accident claims, things of that nature. You've got your in your inward-facing cameras, right? See what your drivers are doing, protect your drivers from claims of inappropriate behavior in the truck or anything else like that. Again, insurance companies are all looking for this kind of data these days. They they want they want this information. You've got your onboard telematics to look at hard breaking and hard stopping and tight and hard turning and all these things that can help you uh as a business owner protect your business from your operators, protect it from fraudulent claims. All these different pieces exist today, and how do they all tie in together so that we can retain all this information and put it back together? And and again, like being able to send that file off to the insurance company and say, here, here, here's the photos and telematics of all the 15 trucks I had on scene to do this recovery. You know, we were out there for 18 hours and we had 15 people working, we had to bring in additional labor and a skid steer and a roll-off container, and and here's the documentation of all that, here's the tracking of all of that, and here is everything. So when that bill gets to that insurance adjuster and he goes, Oh wow, I guess I'm just gonna have to pay this bill because all the documentation's there.
SPEAKER_03:So Dennis just laid out a lot of complexity. And I'm going to do what I like to call break it down Barney style. Okay. Do you know what that like the purple dinosaur? Let's break this down, Barney style. Darren. Darren, have you ever been in communication with a person, no matter who it is, and you're face to face with them, and you tell them something only for the next day for that person to say, that is not what you told me.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_03:Every human being listening to this has had that happen.
SPEAKER_01:Also, what about pretty sure I said that to you this weekend, Shelley?
SPEAKER_03:Every day. Also, you're thinking about something so hard, you're thinking about something. I I have to remember, I have to remember, I have to remember that you convince yourself that I did tell you. And you come back and say, Why didn't you do this? You never told me that. Yes, I did tell you that when you've convinced yourself that you told me because you thought about it so much. And so these softwares, you know, when I've texted you a message, that's clear. I have proof you received it. That is that is what can make these businesses scalable, is just the bare bones basics of the original source of the job and what needs to get done. And it's just astounding.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, it's I I think that the record keep me. You you see the the companies that will say, well, I don't know about the cost of the software and so on. Well, the cost of not having the software is overwhelming. Uh, if you're not able to track your truck, see what your drivers are doing, see their what they're doing on a daily basis. I think it can be more costly 10 times over to your business than not having something dedicated to watching every part of that business for you.
SPEAKER_03:And towers send a wrong tow truck. How many times do towers send the wrong tow truck or not enough equipment? They have to backtrack. They lose time, they lose money. And the more thorough our communicators can be about communicating that message, the better the efficiency is, the more money they're going to save, the more money they're going to get because they can go to more jobs faster, quicker, safer. Love it.
SPEAKER_06:I love it. I love it. Well, let me ask you this before we we take a commercial break, what's next for truck technology uh and back office operation technology?
SPEAKER_01:Shelly, I'll let you start with the uh the truck technology since you are the uh truck and equipment expert here. I just drove them. I love it.
SPEAKER_03:No, it as far as the top three brands out there, Miller Industries, um, Jordan, and also NRC, we have a lot of other, we have a lot of other brands that we very much know, Detour at Record. I'm not even gonna pretend to name them all that we see at all the trade shows. They're all very important. They all offer brand new technologies. To give you a specific on what's next, I don't know that I can, but what I can tell you is this it's only going to be as good as the communication with the towing audience. So, you guys listening to this, when you want to see innovations in your tow truck, and you are all serial idea generators, communicate to your rep that you buy the tow trucks from, hey, this would be a great idea, and I think it would be an amazing idea across the nation. And let me tell you why. Communicate that conversation to your rep for the tow truck, to the person that you know at your software, to every single vendor that you interact with. We are only going to be as good as the ideas that you give us. But perhaps there is gonna be some really cool stuff that we see at Baltimore this year that I just can't talk about.
SPEAKER_01:Sorry, whoa, we might have to edit that out. We can't talk about that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:No, communicate. That's I think that's one of the big themes here, is what I'm hearing.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Shelly and I, you uh Shelly, you and I had a uh great conversation this weekend uh at the Ohio Tow Show with uh some towers who are talking about uh or talking to their distributors about getting cameras mounted on the trucks from the factory, right? Having those onboard telematics involved early on, right? And and so that's what we're we're starting to see again, all this telemetry, all this camera data, all this external information that you can gather from the truck and from the scene, frankly, when you get on scene at a recovery site or at a uh uh you know, even at a standard breakdown, right? So being able to see that information and being able to have a place to store that and and being able to access it relatively easily is I I think some of the most important things we're seeing on the truck side. Um and in the back office, we are seeing uh, again, uh not to continue to talk about consolidation specifically, but that efficiency that comes along with those types of businesses, right? People want to get really, really efficient, especially in an industry that has such small margins, right? We know this this is not an industry that's making 15, 20, 30 percent margins, right? We know the average towing business runs six, seven, eight percent margins, right? So when we when we were running on that limit of a margin, we have to be as efficient as possible. So these tools, again, that GPS management software that we talk about, being able to track your trucks, being able to see where your trucks are and send the closest right truck to that call is becoming more and more efficient. We saw this uh, you know, in the early 2000s, late late 2000s during the recession. We saw successful towing companies that were adopting new technologies was the ones that weathered the storm and made it through the other side.
SPEAKER_03:100%. And you're going to see the entire life cycle start to finish unified from the time the job comes into the towing company to the tower performing it, to perhaps the car getting impounded, to then going into, let's say, an auction. You know, you're going to see the unification of this entire cycle on a beautiful software that will be all connected. And not to go into too much complexity, but you know, when you impound, you have to send out the letter to the lien holder and to the last registered owner. And then you've got to like figure out am I 45 days out, you know, all these different complexities. And this software is just going to do so much for you that you can run the business, make more money, and scale the business. And I really want to emphasize scaling the business should you want to grow the business.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, I think you're dead on it, Shelley, because time is is money, and the more you can handle, the more you can understand and move forward with the business with that technology. Yes, the more you can scale. Um that's awesome.
SPEAKER_03:No more post-it notes, no more rolls of quarters. Okay, let's go.
SPEAKER_06:That's right. That's right. Away with the post-it notes and rolls of quarters. Well, listeners, we're going to take a quick commercial break to hear from our sponsors. Do me a favor, hang in there. We'll be right back with Shelly Hawkins and Dennis McGowan with more great information from these industry experts. Hang in there, we'll be right back.
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SPEAKER_06:Again, this is Tow Professional Podcast on the go. This is your podcast for the pros that have a need to know and are on the go. And it's truly the voice of the towing and recovery industry. Today we're again here with Shelly Hawkins and Dennis McGowan of Atura. And uh man, they are laying out the new technology in the industry and why it is so important uh for you to do your research and to look into a quality company when you are choosing your software. So uh now that we're back, uh let's move in. And uh this is this is one again, uh I'm I I really wanted to ask our listeners to want to know about uh because AI is talked about everywhere. So uh tell me, where do y'all where you said here goes my southern accent, you hear it? Where do y'all um see AI fitting into the towing and recovery industry? And how are we towing and recovery businesses making use of it of AI now and responding to it?
SPEAKER_03:Uh I'm gonna respond to it. I want Dennis, of course, to respond to it. But Darren, I am just curious. I am a young lady from the mountains, the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia, deep in deep in the mountains. I was born and raised in Cramtree Holler on the Stanley Branch side. And so when I go back home, I visit Mom and M, you know, and all that. So where is your southern accent from? I'm not familiar.
SPEAKER_06:Uh Birmingham, Alabama.
SPEAKER_03:Birmingham, Alabama, home of wheel wrecker and hearse towing and a bunch of other towers. Love love those guys for days. And I was like, where is Darren's accent from? I am not familiar.
SPEAKER_06:Yep, we're uh uh single wide and F5 capital of the world down here in Birmingham.
SPEAKER_03:We're proud of Single Wide.
SPEAKER_06:Yes.
SPEAKER_03:I love that. That's um before we launch into the conversation about AI, I want to put it out there for the folks listening. We are always concerned and potentially fearful of the things that we don't understand. Do you remember the first time that you looked at a round sling and said, You mean to tell me that this can pick up 20,000 pounds? I don't think so, and I'm not gonna trust it. Or the first time you saw a rim sling that was about as big a round as your pinky finger, and you're like, You mean to tell me I'm gonna put this through the rim of a tire and pull this thing out and it's not gonna break. What does that even mean? We are fearful of things that we don't understand and we've never used. And AI is here. AI is not going anywhere, and you are either on the bus or you're not on the bus. I remember my good friend Shannon Yates talking to me at Honk Technologies, and Shannon said, Shelley, I want to be a part of the technology at Honk because that location-driven tow truck technology is here to stay, and it's going to be moving forward with a lot of other different national entities for sources of jobs. And he made the statement, I'll never forget, Shannon Yates said, if you do not adapt, you will die. Your business will die. AI is here. And, you know, friends, if you have questions about AI, reach out to us. I'm going to turn it over to Dennis because he certainly is very much on the forefront of AI, and I'm very impressed with what he's been able to build out so far.
unknown:Awesome.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, there's there are so many uses for AI across uh telling businesses across the industry, right? Um, there are things that are being developed right now by several different operations. Uh we were using large language models, which is just essentially uh it's a voice tool, right? And it's it's a model that they call a model, is what what what the the uh the enterprise is, like your chat GPT or your Google Gemini. That's that's the model, right? And so we have these large language models, which are essentially a database that can communicate with you and have a conversation with you. That's that's what the formation and the foundation of an AI tool is, what we see in practice use today. So what we're seeing a lot of those models being used for today is is telephone technology. We know how hard it is to hire a dispatcher and train a dispatcher on the myriad of different things that come across their desk over the course of the day. You can get a phone call for the same vehicle being picked up from the same house, going to the same repair shop three days in a row, and end up with three completely different scenarios. And that's just what this industry is, right? And so it is. So complicated to train a dispatcher and have a dispatcher and a call taker available with all the right information, gather the right information. Well, I need uh uh this account gets a purchase order. This uh, this account I need to get a work order from. This account is passed due. They're on they need to get a credit card before they can uh get service, right? So all these different things you need to train a dispatcher, and you know, every time you need a new dispatcher, every time you expand, or you know, you move into a new city, or that dispatcher you know leaves and goes somewhere else, you have to train somebody new. Well, what if I could put a large language model in your office that has all of those requirements, is able to understand all of those complexities because you're teaching to that model the first time, and you're able to score that model's responses and be able to see how it interacts with customers, and it's able to capture all that information from you, right? We don't need to go out and hire 16 new dispatchers when we open up a new uh a new location, right? We can get away with three because we've got this incredible model that's going to be able to capture all this information, and then we just need to call and follow up and verify details and and you know maybe secure payment or things like that. That's one of the big uses we're seeing today. Uh, we're seeing invoicing tools being used. We're seeing uh Shelly's got a great friend in the industry who uses AI to build recovery narratives.
SPEAKER_03:Wade Fickert, uh, a fantastic individual, she will be at the Tennessee Toe Show along with Baltimore. You guys can stop by. And she's hosting a class at the Tennessee Toe Show. Her company is called Toe Boss, and she's fantastic. She's built out an AI product that can help write the narrative in a very compelling way. So when we think about AI, don't just think about AI replacing humans. Don't think of it that way. I think a lot of us have this preconceived notion it's replacing humans, and we want that human connection and we want that human relationship. And yes, that is never going to go away in the towing industry because we are a high-touch industry. We are, like I said earlier, people that in turn help other people. This AI is bringing you efficiencies to help you write the narrative, like Dennis said, to help you invoice things. Think about your day-to-day business operations where you don't necessarily need human touch, but just to do this back office paperwork that is just so tedious.
SPEAKER_01:And Shell, you mentioned scale a few times. And again, it being able to scale more efficiently, being able to just scale faster because you have these tools in place and you and again, not to replace people, but to be able to add pos add to positions and be able to make people more efficient, right? Again, what if I were able to sit down with your dispatcher and uh I was I was able to show your dispatcher a screen and say, hey, look, you've got 15 trucks out there, right? You you're running 15 trucks, light, medium, heavy, they're all over town. This one's up north, this guy's down south, this guy gets off of work in two hours, and the and so we have a job in front of us, right? What if I was able to sit down and say, okay, well, dispatcher, here's a screen of of all of your 15 drivers. We think, or our artificial intelligence, based on the data that we've taught it, based on the information that we've taught it and and and the things we want it to look for, we're able to say, okay, well, the we think these three are the best drivers for this call. We've got Shelly is 15 minutes from the call in the proper truck, and she doesn't get off of work for four more hours. We've got Jimmy is about 20 minutes away. He does get off of work in an hour, but this should only take him 40 minutes to complete this job, so we shouldn't have to cover any overtime or things like that. And then as a third option, we've got Johnny, who is an hour away, but Johnny's worked for this customer seven times in the past week, and he knows this customer and this operation really well. So maybe we hold this job for Johnny if it's a non-priority, right? And so we're able to put that in front of your dispatcher and just inform their decision better using the rules and using the tools that you've built essentially in your business yourself. And how do we make that dispatcher more efficient, more intelligent?
SPEAKER_03:So we have a lot of early adopters uh out there that are embracing AI, that are creating their own GPTs. I'm not an expert about that, but I understand it a little bit. And they are moving forward. And I think the other segment is gonna be people that sit back, you know, lace their fingers behind their head, prop their feet up, kind of see how this goes, you know, because they all have friends. Some are using it, some are not using it, and you're gonna have the earlier adopters to embrace it quickly. Then the segment of folks that say, you know what, I know I'm gonna get feedback, you know. Um and that's kind of how his how it is historically, not just with not just with software, but like, you know, going back to synthetics in our industry, just to use that as an example. So there's going to be all different segments of people. Um, AI is something very exciting, and I love seeing the towing industry use it creatively to scale the business and create efficiencies.
SPEAKER_06:And that's I I love the way you both explained that. And I can tell you it it makes a lot of sense for for us not to be fearful of it. It's something that's going to be here, it's not going anywhere. Uh, and like you said, the the people that will choose to use it first out the gate, a lot of those will uh get a an advantage in the industry for having that and being able to scale their business with it. And then, like you said, there will be others that will come along and uh there's always a Burger King that will take that spot after the prime spot was taken by McDonald's. So uh you can choose to either be the McDonald's or the Burger King. But I I hear what you're saying. After all, we're all gonna have to brace it at some point, and it can only help better the business use the correct way.
SPEAKER_03:Um we cannot be afraid of failure when it comes to using the software. Of course, of course, we are not going to accept failure on the roadside. We want to ensure safety is the priority. But when these new tools come out, especially on the software side, be of all things curious. Ask the questions, get inside a forum, make a Facebook group for people to give feedback to say this is working. You should jump on board and try it.
SPEAKER_01:Or just call Shelly, she'll she'll walk you through the whole process. It's fine.
SPEAKER_03:No funny. I love it.
SPEAKER_01:It's the second time I've a podcast this week. I've told somebody to just call Shelly if you have a problem. Just call her anytime, 24-7. Day or night.
SPEAKER_06:I'm sure Renee will be thrilled for that.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_06:What will be the uh the focus of the new show?
SPEAKER_03:The new podcast.
SPEAKER_06:Yes, the new podcast.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so this is uh Shelly and I uh reuniting again for uh a new podcast called the Tow Trend Podcast. Uh, and we're gonna be having some great conversations about the future of technology in the industry. We are gonna sit here and we are gonna laugh and we're gonna joke and we're gonna make fun of each other and uh hopefully entertain. Uh, but we're gonna talk about what the future of the industry looks like, what technology is coming down the pipeline, what uh you know, what things we're seeing in uh, you know, like the conversation we just had. What's coming next in the trucks, what's coming next in the equipment, what's coming next in in uh accessories, what's coming next in the back office in our towing management software, uh, what are we seeing? What trends are we seeing across the industry, and you know, how can we make it a better place? We're hopefully gonna have some great conversations with some great people as well. Uh again, all future facing. What is the future of the industry? What does the industry look like a year from now, five years from now, 10 years from now, and after we're long gone, what does this industry look like?
SPEAKER_03:All topics are going to be on the table from legislation, which is something that's in the forefront of all of our towers. Um, what that means for the towing industry, safety initiatives, training initiatives, of course, software, because we are, of all things, a software company. And we're going to talk to some really, really amazing folks in the towing industry. Some that have two tow trucks, some that have 30 tow trucks, some that just bought their first tow truck. Um we are super excited to just put the content out there to share the best practices and efficiencies that our folks that we know are using today.
SPEAKER_06:That's it's fantastic, you know, and it's it's something when you talk about technology, Shelly. Years ago, I wouldn't even thought about a podcast myself. And, you know, DJ Harrington prodded me a little bit and said, Darren, you need to do it. It's uh it's the way things are going. It's a great way to reach people. And it's been phenomenal. Now with over 21,000 plus listeners, um, it's blown us away how much it can speak to the industry. And I certainly know that's what you and and Dennis are going to do is speak directly uh to those men and women that are out there in the tow trucks, that are doing the work, that want to listen in and want to further their education in the market and be um there in the know and know what's going on. So I um uh I congratulate you for for moving forward with that and um very inspired to uh to listen to it in the future as well. That's fantastic. Well, let's do this. Let's take another quick commercial for our sponsors, and when we come back, listeners, we're gonna have more information. We'll wrap up this episode uh again with Shelly Hawkins and Dennis McGowan of Atora. We'll be back in just a minute, so hang in there.
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SPEAKER_06:Well, welcome back, listeners. You have been listening to Toe Professional On the Go Podcast. Every week we do our best to bring you great guests, uh, just like Shelly Hawkins and Dennis McGowan of Atora. Make sure you download and listen. We're available on Spotify, iTunes, Pandora, Stitcher, iHeartMedia, Amazon, or wherever you get your podcast. We're always looking to bring you great guests and the latest industry information for your company. So when we left, we were talking about um the new show, the new podcast you and Dennis are going to be working on. So some of our listeners may be aware that Shelly and Dennis previously did a podcast called Get Hooked. So, how will the Tow Trans podcast compare to your previous content?
SPEAKER_01:So I think first and foremost, we have more freedom than we've ever had before to talk to who we want and talk how we want. Um, this is obviously a podcast produced by the fine people over at ATORA and it is sponsored by the fine people over at ATOR, but this is Shelly and I's podcast, and we have been given the green light to go ahead and have whatever conversations we want with who we want. So we're gonna be open and we're gonna be free and we're gonna keep it real, and we are gonna talk about the real problems that are facing the industry today, right? We're gonna talk about what the issues are, like Shelly mentioned earlier, legislation, things coming down the pipeline on that side of the world. We are gonna talk about the problems going on across the industry when it comes to insurance costs. We're gonna talk about things like uh, you know, managing your business. We are gonna talk about managing and potentially even giving up customers, right? That's a great conversation we had already too. How to say goodbye to a customer that may not be working for you. We're just we're gonna have the freedom and the ability to go wherever we want and take this wherever the industry leads us, right? We love this industry, we're both from this industry, as we've already talked about here. And we we want we we want to format this show and we want to we want to build this show for what the audience wants. So um, you know, if we get comments here on yours about things about topics people want to hear from, please reach out. Let us know if there's a topic that maybe uh is something you don't want to discuss here, you want to kick it over to us, maybe it's something that we all get together and have, great. But we we want to have open and honest discussions about what is happening in the industry.
SPEAKER_03:100%, Dennis.
SPEAKER_06:Man, I love it. I love it. I think that can only help the industry and help us all grow as a as a family in the industry because let's face it, at the end of the day, um, this this industry is a family. I got in publishing when I was 24 years old. I'm 52 now, I've been in various different markets, and this is the industry that speaks to me. I absolutely love it. And the reason being is because just about everybody I meet in the industry is just like you two. They're passionate, they're excited about it. Anytime you mention it, they got a smile on their face. And and you know, I tell my wife, she's uh she helps um she's the CEO of the Weaver Foundation, I call it, which that is uh the housewife. She takes care of our child as many needs. And um, she says, you know, you do a hard job. And I said, you know, with with this industry, I get to call my friends, find a solution, uh, talk to them about their kids, what's going on, and check, show up in the mail. You know, this is a a family industry, and uh you guys have really embraced that as well. I think the podcast is gonna be a blessing uh for everyone out there. Well, the the last question what topics are you most excited to explore on the podcast going forward?
SPEAKER_03:All of them. I mean, I don't I don't really I don't really prioritize one over the other because we need so much innovation and so much innovation has come through all these different segments that we have already previously mentioned. So um I think for me, Darren, it's gonna be more about the people that we get to talk to and learning more about their business processes because how many towing company, how many towing companies in the US run their business the same? That would be a big zero, not one. They're a similar a dispatch is a dispatch, a completed job is a completed job. I mean that's that's um you know it that's exactly what it is. But I love hearing how they got their start and the lessons that they've learned that they're gonna share so that other people don't make that mistake like they did. And just hearing the story and how they used all these tools to be more efficient and scale the business for me. That's awesome.
SPEAKER_06:You dance?
SPEAKER_01:Any comments on that one? I I wholeheartedly agree with everything Shelly said there, and I will also just add that I am excited to see where they're looking to be in the future, and that's that's really where I come in, is is looking at the future. And I know we've talked about this, and I've probably said future about 47 times here, but uh uh that is the the the goal that we're looking for, right? What what's next in the industry? What are we doing next, and how are we taking this industry further than how we found it, right? How do we make this industry better than when we arrived here?
SPEAKER_06:Amen. That's that's the truth, and that's uh as they say, that's why the uh rear view mirror is small and the front windshield so big, because uh if you're looking at rear view mirror all the time, you're you're not going forward, you're gonna end up in a bad spot. Uh gotta look at the front windshield. So, man, this is fantastic. Well, uh tell tell our listeners this. Can they uh find out more about you? Where would you want them to go with that? Um tell them it's a web address and uh a phone number if you want to give out for them to uh to reach out and find out more about the software.
SPEAKER_03:Absolutely. Our website's gonna be www.atura.com. That's a-t-u-ra-a.com. You can find us on our website and reach out to us that way. Our socials are going to be simply A Torah on Instagram, YouTube, and also Facebook. And then the podcast is gonna be available on the platforms that Darren mentioned um that he has. Spotify, I think we've launched our first one today, Dennis.
SPEAKER_01:Yep. Uh today is also uh, I believe national uh or international podcast day. So we've got that uh so great to be here and and that yeah, we're dropping on Spotify, iTunes, uh all the usual places, right? Amazon Music, uh we'll be in all the all the usual places there as well. And if you can't find us, please reach out and we'll be more than happy to send you a link. And uh if you uh are are on the Autora email list, you probably should have gotten an email in the last couple of hours as well.
SPEAKER_06:Fantastic. And this podcast will be made available to you guys so you can send that out on your e-list to your network there and share it with them. So uh fantastic. Well, thank you. Thank you both so much for for coming on um for the the wealth of knowledge that you were able to uh to share with our listeners um and explain to them. Because uh without a doubt, I think uh software is the key for their growth. And I think picking the software that fits their company and having the knowledgeable base behind it that can support them, that's end of the day, that's everything. And uh you guys uh certainly have brought a tremendous amount to the field. So thanks so much for being on. Uh and as always, listeners, uh, I want to finish this uh podcast with a prayer. Um, dear Heavenly Father, we just thank you for every one of our vendors. We ask that you bless them uh for their knowledge, for the products they bring to the industry, uh, bless them with prosperity, uh, growth, and wealth in the industry, and help them reach others for their products. And dear Heavenly Father, we thank you for every one of our uh our towers, our first responders, the men and women uh with a servant's heart that go out there and serve others on a daily basis. And Father, we ask you just cover them, protect them out there while they're serving and bring them back to their families, bless them with prosperity, health, and finances, and uh and show them that they are appreciated in this industry. We ask this in your name. Amen. And as always, listeners, we thank you uh for making Toe Professional number one in the industry, Toe Professional on the Go podcast. Until next time, we'll be back with more fantastic industry experts like Shelly Hawkins and Dennis McGowan with our Torah. Thanks again for listening. We'll be back with you in the future. God bless you.