Ezyquip. We are a plant and equipment specialists, working across Queensland, New South Wales and the Northern Territory, on everything from a single roller for a remote council to a fleet of machines on a Tier 1 project. Earthmoving gear, backed by the servicing and support that keeps it running.

“We are not your typical hire company,” says Clayton Evans, CEO of Ezyquip.

Whether you need one machine or a couple of hundred, the first thing worth knowing about Ezyquip has nothing to do with the gear. It is the people. Ask our customers what keeps them coming back, and you tend to hear the same answer: the people, and the relationships behind them. That is exactly what we set out to build, and it is where the story starts.

Where it started

Ezyquip kicked off around the middle of 2008, and it began by solving a problem that was sitting in plain sight.

The Gardner family ran a construction business, civil and plenty else besides. Across their job sites sat a growing number of machines owned by different parts of the group, idle between jobs. Equipment parked up and not being utilised is not a great commercial decision, so they made a call. Get rid of the gear, or put it to work as a business when their own projects are not using it.

They started the hire business, and it grew from there. That beginning still matters, because it set the tone for everything after: a hire company started by people who were already on the tools and on the sites, who understood the work long before they ever hired out a machine.

The people are the business

Ask our customers why they stay with us, and they point to the same thing: our people and the relationships that come with them. That is exactly what we set out to build.

The difference is that the people running Ezyquip have done the work. They have kept the gear running, kept a site moving, kept a machine turning wheels when it counted. So when you deal with us, you are dealing with people who know the job from A to Z and know what to do when it does not go to plan.

That is not an accident. It is how the business has always operated. Area manager Kevin Woods started as a yardie in 2008, cleaning equipment, loading machines when the business ran only a handful of machines. He worked into service, then assistant branch manager, then branch manager, and today he oversees all of our hire operations. Clayton walked a version of the same path himself, from contract diesel fitter to CEO across sixteen years.

We keep those pathways open on purpose, running our own managing-others programs so a diesel fitter or a service coordinator who wants to head a different direction has a way to get there. The equipment is only ever as good as the people operating and maintaining it.

“Experience is one thing, but there is always the stuff you do not know yet,” Clayton says. “You only close that gap when the people above you back you to grow. When we say we invest in our people, that is what we mean.”

More than the machine

For years, the pitch was the gear itself. Low-hour equipment, a strong turnover strategy, and a modern fleet. That was a genuine edge once.

The market has changed. Plenty of operators run low-hour gear now, so on its own it no longer sets anyone apart. What does is the people and the support that come with the gear. It is also why we dropped a word from our name.

We are Ezyquip now, not Ezyquip Hire, because hire is only part of what we do. The main game is still hire, but in a lot of different forms. Operators and wet hire. Foundation drilling and road stabilisation. Maintenance contracts, pre-planned servicing, service kits, oils and parts, machine decals and telematics reporting off the machine.

“We are not very siloed, and I like to think we are agile,” Clayton says.

That comes back to how we look at a job. “It is not just about hiring out a piece of equipment,” Clayton says. “It is what are you trying to do, what does long-term success look like, and how else can we help you get there.” That mindset is what led us into remote work in the first place. We got genuinely interested in what our clients were building, and made ourselves part of it.

Fifty machines to 760

Sixteen years ago, Ezyquip ran around 50 pieces of equipment. Today we manage utilisation on about 760, and we are still growing 10 to 15 per cent a year.

Scale changes is the challenge. Keeping a modern fleet is straightforward at 50 machines and a much bigger task at 760. Sticking to a replacement strategy that holds in any market is where a lot of operators fall away. The excavators, dozers and rollers going out our gate today are backed the same way the first handful were.

The gear is only half of it

Staying invested in your end goal, not just the transaction, is what has built our longest partnerships.

On some of the bigger mining and resources work, managing our own equipment and crews well has given major clients the confidence to self-perform, work they would normally contract out. We have held some remote sites for more than a decade, on multi-year contracts that now cover maintenance support, supervision and, increasingly, operators, because those sites struggle to find enough good people and we can help.

The model holds at the other end too. A single machine on a council job gets the same support as a fleet on a major project. Same branch, same service coordinator, same account manager.

“That smaller customer is just as important to us as the large one,” Clayton says. “They have got a job to do and a project to deliver.”

The years that proved it

Every business talks about culture. Ezyquip found out what its culture was actually worth around 2014.

The gas work in the Bowen Basin came off, and future projects in the region were knocked on the head. A lot of our business sat there, so we were exposed. The call was hard and simple. We could not carry the brand new, fully fitted-out office, so we moved back to a block of dirt with a house on it, went back to bare bones and rolled our sleeves up.

Nobody left.

“Everyone stuck with us. We did not lose anyone,” Clayton says. “Everyone bunkered down. We had a tough couple of years and came out the other side still growing. If it were not for the culture we had at the time, I do not think we would have got through that period at all.”

That is the part you never see on a rate sheet. It is also the part that has stood behind every promise we have made since.

Giving back where we work

We put a fair bit back into the communities we work in. Junior sport mostly, at the grassroots level. Kids rugby league, soccer and cricket. In the regions where our work is concentrated, we get behind the go-kart club, the motocross club, the local rodeo and the fishing events, whatever keeps those towns ticking.

“We do not do it as a competitive advantage,” Clayton says. “We do it because I like to think we are good humans, and we want to give back to the community we operate in.”

Still not your typical hire company

Sixteen years, a name change, a downturn we nearly did not clear, and a fleet that has grown more than tenfold. Plenty has shifted. The one thing that has not is the thing our customers keep telling us they value most.

That is what you are really getting when you call us. Not just a machine, but the branch, the service coordinator and the crew who keep it running, on one machine or two hundred, in the middle of the city or a thousand kilometres past it.

They deliver, so you can.

FAQ

When did Ezyquip start, and how did it begin?

Ezyquip started around the middle of 2008, out of the Gardner family construction group. Equipment sitting idle between the group’s own jobs was put to work as a hire business, and it grew from there into the plant and equipment specialist it is today.

What does Ezyquip do beyond supplying equipment?

Supplying gear is still the core, but the business also provides operators and wet hire, foundation drilling and road stabilisation, maintenance contracts, pre-planned servicing, Decal kits for machines, service kits and parts, and telematics reporting. The focus is on your end goal, not just the machine.

How big is Ezyquip’s fleet?

Ezyquip manages utilisation on around 760 pieces of equipment, up from roughly 50 when the business began, and grows 10 to 15 per cent a year across QLD, NSW and the Northern Territory.

What makes Ezyquip different from other hire companies?

People and relationships, backed by a modern fleet and support that keeps machines running. A single machine gets the same branch, service coordinator and account manager as a major project.

Get the gear, and the people who stand behind it

Whether it is one machine or a fleet, you get the same support and the same people who take the time to get it right. Call 1300 399 784 to get the gear you need, when you need it. Or see the full range at ezyquip.com.au.