Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Christian Gibbs. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Christian thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s start with a story that highlights an important way in which your brand diverges from the industry standard.

Our tagline is “The Emotionally Available Movers.”
Let’s face it – moving isn’t the sexiest most glamorous thing one has to do in their lifetime.
No one actually looks forward to packing their beloved items and allowing a stranger (aka moving company) to take temporary possession and transport it and hope that it all arrives safely.
Also the very nature of “moving” is sometimes not just a logistical situation, such as, finding a bigger apartment, or downscaling into a more affordable one.

Many times people move due to a divorce, a union of love (marriage), assisting an elderly parent into a nursing home, transporting belongings of a friend or family member who has passed.

We have seen it all, so we like our clients to feel comfortable in talking with us about the anxiety of their move and hopefully we can put them at ease. We also like to keep things light and have a good sense of humour.

Not to mention I work as my other job in trauma centers and drug rehabs as a kind of music therapist of sorts. So we have a little background in dealing with whatever nerves come up for a move!

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Wooly Mammoth Movers happened somewhat on accident.
We moved to NYC from California as a band. Living in Williamsburg – Brooklyn in a one room loft. We quickly realized we needed a van to get to our shows. Our first van had a hotwire mechanism/magnet starter and it was a Ford 1973 that we bought for $300.00

Friends knew we had a van so they would rope us gullible young dudes into moving them. After about doing 5 free moves for friends, we started asking for Pizza. Then our demands grew from pizza to an hourly small fee. Then the word got around and we bought a bigger van. I worked for Jim Henson Productions in the mailroom and noticed they were paying $449 a month to store their company “muppet van.” I convinced HR and the admin to sell me this van and it would save them tons of money in storage costs.

So we (Morning Glories was the band) toured with the muppet van all over the country.
When we weren’t touring we were a man with a van service moving people, businesses .

That band broke up and I made a solo record that got the attention of Atlantic Records. Next thing I knew i had a six figure record deal with Atlantic Records.
My music business manager said “well we need to order you a van and trailer for the tour opening for John Mellencamp”,

I literally ordered a Ford Econoline E-350 over the phone and picked a color and had it delivered to my loft at the time in Soho on Broome and Centre St. We used the tour support budget to pay the monthly payments on the van and basically “rented” the van from ourselves with the tour support money . That way it didn’t come out of my personal finances.
After touring that record, my sales weren’t great and I got dropped from Atlantic but I still had a van and trailer that they bought me.

So I started moving again and this time called it Gibbs Moving Service.

Eventually i changed the name to Wooly Mammoth Movers after I did a Broadway show where the NY Times described my hair blocking the actors on stage as ” a head like a Wooly Mammoth.” and our name was born!

I started the LLC a couple years later and bought a series of box trucks.

Because I was now doing 8 shows a week on Broadway I realized I couldn’t physically do the jobs so that’s when I started trusting other people to run the jobs and began hiring friends at first to take care of things.
After being successful delegating the work and realizing I could still pencil out a profit I eventually put into play rudimentary systems to help streamline workers, estimates, and accounting.

Here at Wooly Mammoth we are mot proud of putting at ease our clients who have had not so great moving experiences in the past.
We can discuss any situation or nuance about your move and actually like to get on the phone with people to learn a little about their move and concerns.

We take pride in transporting peoples pride possessions with care while also being personable.
Also, we really enjoy learning about why people are moving and discovering what makes our clients tick.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

This is probably one of the most fundamental variables in our business. Moving is incredibly hard work, Especially in NYC when doing a 5 story walkup in 103 heat on a July day. Or in Winter where you have to dig the truck out for an hour before you can even get started. Not to mention -parking challenges.

I probably compensate a little more than other companies in the same trade. For instance I pay my crew $2 more an hr per flight of stairs past a 2nd floor. I do pass this on to the customer and it’s something we might evaluate later but it’s not a significant bump in price for the client to pay $6 more an hr of which 100% of that goes directly to the crew .

If they don’t get a tip at least they got paid more hourly for a really challenging move.
More advice for high morale is listening to your team.

It’s easy to get defensive ,and often I do, though I sit with it for a day before reacting if they complain about a work situation. I put myself in their shoes. I used to do all the jobs with one other guy when I first started so i know how hard the work is.

Also, whenever possible I try to have an employee lunch at a restaurant and obviously foot the bill.

If i’m in the vicinity I’ll buy waters and Gatorade and maybe some bagels and bring it to the site.
Little things like that make a difference.
Also, trying to be flexible with peoples schedules. Most of us are musicians / artists./ writers and played in each others bands. It’s important for them to be able to pursue other passions besides your work and be understanding of that – to a point.

I also think incentives for garnering new business is a good practice. tell your employee you’ll give them 5% of the net from the job if they initiate the job and get a new client.

Also- just basic empathy and acknowledgment for knowing they are working their asses off . A simple ‘thanks for helping us out today last minute.” for example. or “wow, that job was massive- thanks for pulling that off.”

Also – autonomy.
Not micro-managing the foreman throughout the day. It depends on the individual. Some foremen like you to check in a couple times throughout the job and others are “leave me alone and trust me, I got this.”

I like the latter as it leaves me time to do more estimates , communicate with more clients

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

You are going to hit bumps in the road. things will happen that challenge your business.

We had a truck catch on fire once. Everyone was safe. The engine blew and we rented another truck- got all the clients belongings out and transferred it all into a rental truck , finished the job and took other truck to mechanic.

I had a new employee that I didn’t vet very well on hindsight. He started verbally berating the guys on the job. They called me. I showed up with flip flops on and shorts and fired the guy on the spot and had to do a 4th floor walk up with my guys to get the job finished.

We have lost money on jobs where you are 150 miles from home with a fully loaded truck and it beaks down and you have to put the entire crew in a hotel room , get another truck to where you are and finish job. AND you have to give the clients a discount for their move running late.

There are a hundred stories I can tell you. The breakdowns aren’t very often but it’s not for the faint of heart. You just tell yourself: “this may be a short term loss-but long term -we will prevail and get more business.”

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.woolymammothmoving.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/woolymammothmovers/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/woolymoves/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBQIIOnqbOKHErSLj6UW48A
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/wooly-mammoth-movers-brooklyn
• Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/c-gibbs

Image Credits

christian gibbs