Circle Bar A Inc. of San Antonio, TX, has seen a lot of change since its founding in 2003. Somehow, as they grew and diversified, they found a way to become more efficient rather than less. We interviewed Director of Safety and IT Services, Charlie Metzger, to learn how Axon Software’s integrated system helped the company evolve and streamline its operations.
Q&A
Tell us about yourself and the company.
I’m Charlie Metzger, the Director of Safety and IT Services for Circle Bar A Inc. in San Antonio, Texas.
Circle Bar A was founded in 2003, beginning as a mobile home moving company. From there, we progressed to site work and septic systems. Because we had trucks for hauling material, we got into the material hauling business around 2009.
When the oilfield came around, we got extremely involved in the sand business. We saw a downturn in that workload around 2014 or 2015, so we started diversifying by buying liquid tankers to haul agricultural products.
Today, about 85 percent of our work is liquid tanker, whether it be ag products or non-hazmat chemicals. The other 15 percent is split up between flatbeds, a couple of reefers, and a couple of cow trucks.
Basically, we’re an all-around kind of bunch.
At what point did you start using Axon?
As we were growing, it didn’t seem like the accounting programs we were using would be suitable for our needs, so we searched for a solution. After looking around in the market, we were impressed with Axon.
It’s been great. When we initially adopted it, there was a bit of a learning curve, and we’re still learning every day. But the support we get from Axon is excellent. We’ve never had a problem that didn’t get resolved.
The product training we went through was very good. I liked that we were able to connect any time we wanted to, share screens, and get answers to our questions. It was pretty much on demand.
The way we use the system now, it pretty much runs the whole company.
Has Axon changed the way you do business and manage staff?
It has allowed us to reduce our staff. That wasn’t the goal, but these days it’s hard to find people that want to work, so it was nice that we had a system in place that could handle it for us.
We used to have a total of four people in accounting, including the office manager. Now we have two, so we cut our staff in half while our fleet size stayed the same. The two staff members left on their own, but we were able to utilize the system to pick up the slack, and it didn’t max anybody out. Without Axon, I’m quite sure we would have been buried in paperwork.
Is Axon providing the reports you need to do your job properly?
Oh, yeah. My big thing in Axon is the recurring reports. That saves me a lot of time. Every month I get a reminder report that has all the items I’ve set up in it, so it basically plans my day for me and keeps me from forgetting things.
I use it for all kinds of things. For example, Texas state inspections are an annual requirement, so I have a report set up for that. I also use it to track driver’s license expirations, medical card expirations, and specific tank and VIC inspections. I even use it to track birthdays. It’s wide open. You can build it out however you want, and that makes it really easy.
If someone in the industry asked you about your experience with Axon, what would you say?
I’d tell them it works great and I’d definitely recommend it. I think it’s paid for itself already. I would say it probably paid for itself within the first two years, just in streamlining everything.
