________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Lakes Gas
Lakes Gas( Lakes) is a major propane retailer in the upper Midwest that sells and distributes propane for residential, commercial, industrial, and agricultural uses. CEO Trent Hampton briefly outlines the company’ s history:“ The business was founded in Forest Lake, Minnesota, in 1959 by Howard Sargeant, when he purchased the Harguth Oil Company. Through his expertise in acquisitions, he grew the small operation into the 14th largest retail marketer of propane in the United States. His five children and 16 grandchildren, who all still reside in Minnesota, remain the beneficial owners of the company, and today, Lakes is the second or third largest familyowned propane business in the country.” Trent then goes on to explain the strategy behind the company’ s approach:“ To put it simply, we zig where others zag.
Our value proposition is providing a local service through our many communitybased offices. We have over 57 locations within our geographic footprint, far more than anybody else. Propane demographics in the upper Midwest tend to be somewhat rural and slightly older. We know that our customers enjoy having personal service in their hometowns. Many of our competitors have moved towards national or even international call centers; they’ ve closed branches to save money. This produces an impersonal service. We have taken the opposite approach, and we’ re growing organically because we’ re providing personalized, local service that customers value. This also enables us to have much shorter delivery windows, which clients appreciate; during peak times, this can be up to two weeks less than our competitors.
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We choose to continue working with Westmor because they have helped us design what we feel is the best bobtail out there. Our drivers love the
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We know and trust them, and they know and trust us. We lean on them heavily and know that they will perform
Ergoload ® deck, center mount meter, and rear deck toolbox. All of these only found on the Westmor Blueline ® bobtail. |
as promised. |
- Trent Hampton, CEO |
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- Jason Hellendrung, Fleet Manager |
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