Never Idle, a Wisconsin-based equipment marketplace designed by contractors, for contractors, recently announced the acquisition of FleetRight, Inc., which is now operating under that company name.
Financial details of the acquisition were not disclosed.
Founded in 2015 by Zach Schreiber, FleetRight, Inc. was established as Lincoln’s first trusted online community marketplace and auction platform dedicated to contractors buying and selling heavy equipment.
Schreiber said that in the early days, he used his connections from working at Ritchie Brothers Auctioneers to host auctions online.
“The benefit was that you wouldn’t have to haul your equipment to a live site,” said Schreiber. “You’re mitigating a ton of overhead. Also, having your own company, you can reduce the commission rate. You’re empowering the contractor with a lot more tools.
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As Schreiber identified new trends and challenges his clients were facing in that space, it led to the evolution of the business into an economy sharing platform.
“Auctions weren’t really pushing the envelope for me, and I knew I always wanted to create a bigger marketplace and empower contractors with more tools,” said Schreiber. “I took the big leap and started a rental platform as part of the marketplace.”
It didn’t take long for the platform to gain traction and get noticed.
“There’s a lot of opportunities and gap to pursue for heavy-equipment transactions,” said Schreiber. “I stayed close to the people I worked with in the past and connected with. It wasn’t soon after that I started gaining traction and investors reaching out to me.”
Schreiber’s new service model aligned with that of Never Idle, founded by Terry Dolan, former president of Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers.
“Zach and I shared the same vision for our contractor marketplace, so we decided it was best to join forces,” said Dolan in a press release. “Together, our key focus remains supporting contractors who are looking for ways to maximize their return on investment by providing a platform and tools to manage underutilized equipment.”
As a result of Never Idle’s acquisition of FleetRight, local contractors now have access to a larger inventory of assets populated by a larger membership network.
Schreiber said he’s excited to see the business succeed and is still heavily invested in this platform and its day-to-day operations.
“I still wear a ton of different hats since it’s’ still technically a startup, but my major focus is continuing to work with my contractors here in Nebraska, Iowa and wherever I need to be,” said Schreiber.
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Christine Burright McGuigan is the Managing Editor of Silicon Prairie News.
