welcome to talk and tires the podcast that delves deep into the world of tires join us as we explore everything from the science behind the manufacturing to the latest Innovations intire recycling our aim is to provide you with a comprehensive understanding of tires including how they work how to maintain them and how to dispose of them responsibly whether you’re a season mechanic curious car Enthusiast or an avid recycler talking tires is the perfect podcast for anyone who wants to learn about the essential component of the modern vehicle and heavy equipment so buckle up and join us for an informative and engaging journey into the world of tires all right welcome to another episode of talking tires I’m here with my dad Bill Hunter now Bill Hunter has had a lot of uh companies over the years so I can’t just throw out a name of a company and a title and you might recognize the name or the company name because there’s been many over the years but that’s kind of what I wanted to talk about today because for some reason I’ve had an entrepreneur blood and it’s been from Just a Little

Tike and that had to start somewhere and I mean this is a a podcast about tires and talking tires and what I hope people understand when we talk about this is that really you can insert anything into any industry and it’s really about the tenacity and the drive the ability to innovate and why one innovates but um starting with you I feel like for business we almost have to go back to Childhood I mean I guess we should start with there’s going to be some viewers from back home so um we’ll share this with friends and family so you you come from my grandma and grandpa dorsay and Cecil Hunter and Bakersfield California your sisters were Joyce and Glenda right and just the three of you yep y raised right there in Bakersfield California and why don’t you start there cuz I know it in in obviously this is going to relatively tie into business but it’s personal too it’s a podcast so it’s literally just about everything and just for me it’s it had to start somewhere and I know it was Grandpa was an entrepreneur right so start there I would say

it all started in the dust bowl and uh the migration from Oklahoma to California by my mom and dad my sisters um and you were in Grandma’s tummy at that time right no no no no uh matter of fact uh they were so broke and so desperate just losing their Farm to start all over I’m going to go back so this is like that movie or book The Grapes of Wrath so they moved from dustow everybody’s Farms dried up which we couldn’t even imagine that around here because we have God’s country which I’ll explain where we’re at in a minute and why we’re here but that just the idea of everything just literally poofed back then just went away and and as it turned out after studies were run that it was mostly not only a weather event but a soil conditioning event because they didn’t know to reclaim they didn’t know to rotate their crops to protect their soil from blowing away so when uh the perfect storm hit that’s what wiped everybody out and that going to tie in later too back in yeah yeah because you know as we moved to

California my dad got a job as a farmer a manager Farm manager and um you know at first when they got there they were picking fruit in the fields my mom and my dad and my sisters lived in a tent in shaer California and picked fruit sounds familiar right I mean it sounds like a lot of the migrant stories now it’s the same scenario they they were just they were just trying to find a new place to live and uh they caught a lot of flack there in Bakersfield when they show there were signs okis go home there’s no jobs here and just you know all that type of discrimination that uh people do yeah and did a lot more in the so he probably had late 30s early 40s had an assful of that and was ready to own his own company right so well what started the way it worked out he uh he finally got a job managing a ranch that was just bare land the very tip of the Southern sadw walking Valley where the valley hits the the mountains that that was all desert at that time and a

man hired my dad to break all that soil in and plow up all the cactus and sage bush and Tumble weeds and they hired him because being from Oklahoma he was a cotton farmer so they put cotton in for the first first time and then eventually they they that was a new crop in Bakersfield when you no not necessarily but there that weren’t that many cotton Growers that knew how to grow cotton in that hot of weather you know and lack of water plus good old oy determination you know to go in and break out soil and kill rattlesnakes by the pickup loads and things like that you know they had to clear the land so it was a lot of work so he was right it was perfect for him and uh and what got him going in business for himself in California was the fact that uh back then all commercial all fertilizers were handled in bags 80 lb sacks and my dad during planting season would take the company’s flatbed pickup or truck and go to town and get a load of fertilizer and a load of potato seed and come

back to the farm and they’d plant the potatoes and then when they would do that then when they got through a guy started the other farmers in the area would say hey cea when you get through hauling yours Can You Haul mine and uh so my dad said he took his hat in hand and went to Bank of America and asked for a loan and they gave him a the risk right that’s where it comes that’s when you risk capital and he bought an old Chevy flatbed two axle truck gas gasoline and and that was the beginning of Cecil Hunter Trucking and uh so is that where you got your first set of keys well yeah at about uh about 13 12 13 years old back then the law wasn’t what it is today so right we uh yeah I was I was driving Holland fertilizer and potatoes when I was in my teens early teens and then my dad um and my mother and my grand grandfather got in the grocery store business right that’s the Lancaster side that’s the Lancaster side and they had that for several years until we moved out

into the country then we left the sold the store my mom and dad sold their interest in the grocery stores and we moved out into the country and went strictly in trucking and then um and on my 15th birthday uh my dad brought home two wrecked trucks brought home a 1962 wreck Peter belt that the front end had been smashed and we had a we had a 1950 auto car and my dad told me if I could take the engine and transmission out of the Peter belt and put it in the wrecked I mean and put it in the good 1950 auto car that he would give me the pink slip so that so I think about those kind of things like that scenario cuz Brett uh eart and I are always talking about our kids and how easily it would be to just give them whatever they want right cuz Grandpa could have easily just paid someone to put a motor in right and it might even have been cheaper like we had a whole yard full of trucks at that time yeah so there’s something about I had to do it by

myself I I couldn’t have anybody help me so it was like a proof almost or like earn your stripes pay my DN there you know and uh and learn so then did you start making money with that truck is that where it all started day he said all I had to do was drive it around the house and he would give me the pink slip and I did and he said okay go out there and hook onto that set of trailers and go get a load of rice and I went and hauled rice all summer long and U I started my sophomore year at high school with a new car a new motorcycle and uh and my own truck so so that started me and the trucking company then and then later on was that your summer gig then that was my you played all sports so yeah I yeah I was yeah had go all summertime you know and it fertilizer season was in the fall but I was playing football or whatever then so I you know I couldn’t do that but then all that ended so now you graduating high school

and you got a truck already so you just go right to truck TR and then I I had you and your brother and a next investment so we had a friend of ours that was in the fertilizer spreading application with the flotation tires and all that and um my dad was intrigued by it and he seen how that guy was Distributing a lot of the material we were hauling the fertilizer business so he wanted me to learn how to run an applicator on my own so I took a job with him during the winter you know and uh oh with the guy who’s already doing it yeah okay sounds familiar cuz we do a lot I mean when we see something we want to do we usually try to find a friend out of the market that’s already doing it or something that’s why my dad picked him because he knew what he was doing you know his name was a Donnie something anyway um he um and at the end of that he offered me and my dad a spreader that he wanted to get rid of a 1970 International and so my

dad and I swung it and we bought it and he gave us a job and our first job was uh putting in fertilizer ahead of almond tree orchard or no I’m sorry a pistachio tree orchard for uh a company called Tri farms and the owners were and for you old guys will know this it was Bob Hope Lucille Ball and vice president Spiro agnu and so that was our first spreading job and we did it and uh when we got through after a new engine in the spreader and the new tires on the spreader we split $22,000 after everything after everything was done and I told my dad I want to get in spreading business so in 1975 I bought a new diesel truck with a one-year-old my brother was born 74 Y and then uh in 1978 I bought a brand new spreader truck and I bought another one in 1985 and two more in 1986 so that’s Hunter that’s where Hunter C Hunter son okay so it’s still combined well you know I’m still flying low so I had to have a an investor or a backer just like

everybody does right and that just happened to be my dad so a Cecil Hunter Trucking and spreading is that was that and then it changed no it changed it went from Cecil Hunter Trucking to Cecil Hunter and Sun Trucking then it went to Cecil Hunter and Sun Trucking and spreading and then my dad retired and then I sold the trucks and invested the money in spreaders and it went to straight un spreading right and that’s what I’m familiar and that’s where you came into the game you were old enough to understand what that was and ride the three-wheelers and back that that’s perfect cuz that brings us to why we’re sitting right where we’re at so just so everybody knows I’m driving from boyc to my dad’s side of the state near Pocatello after a nice memorial weekend with the big family all living here in Idaho now uh those stories we were just telling from California so now we’re on our way back across and I couldn’t help us stop where we first landed when we came from California to Idaho and you had those spreader Rigs and you had payments to

make so how did we get to I well in 1984 when I bought my first boom truck I actually demoed my first boom truck um being from California most of the fields in California are small they they’re you know 40 60 80 acres surrounded by oil wells soccer moms stray dogs you name it they’re running everywhere so you didn’t have much room to maneuver something with 60t of boobs ferer the fertilizer applicator so if I was going to step in from the fan spreaders to the boom spreaders I felt like I needed some training again so I went to the sour and I researched Idaho and American Falls where we’re sitting right now at that time was the highest amount of millionaires per capita in the state so I had the machine delivered here and I went to Jr Simplot and negotiated a contract from the 1st of March till the 30th of May for 5 years and then we bought another one and so that’s and I know this but just so everybody else understand so that’s taking your equipment that you utilized in one season in Southern California and you could transport

on flatbed no we drove drove them you drove those big flotation spreaders all the way up to right here American 1000 bucks used them for that March 1st to May 30 and then went back and worked another season so then you had a double season yeah well California started the Thanksgiving day and it ended around you might have a foot of snow Thanksgiving absolutely absolutely and then plant so then I would take a month or so to service for me and you to go skiing and and have a little off time Y and then we came to Idaho spread through to May and then we got went home and played baseball for the summer and service the equipment ran the trucks okay now it’s been the and then we bought the deli yeah that was fun too yeah so that was uh diversification was part of your game early on even as a spreader operator you had other businesses rentals and business uh that was a Del does it have gas it seemed like it had gas no we didn’t have gas we took the tanks out yes but it was like a little

Mark a Mart and then I had a check caching business onside of that that’s right so I I did payroll for the local Farm if that was a good thing so that’s um that’s all the sunshiny story so something happened in California to get us up here there was a a drought of well on the compost you know so we moved from California to Bakersville what happened well in uh I think it was 75 a guy gave me a book called Black Gold and it was a paperback and it was about compost and what compost does for the soil and how it could change the structure of soil and and I that all went back to my dad telling me about how the farmers hurt all the soil by not putting any organic material right so that was earlier when we were talking about dust B to go back so that kept on me and and every time we go fishing my grandpa and my dad would tell me take the guts from all the fish and plant and dig a hole and put them around the tree trunks because they would break down

and fertilize the trees this is knowledge that that you know they don’t teach in school the old as old school guys and when I saw the compost I thought well this is a way that we can do this on a commercial level so I studied it and read the book front back and learn it taught you how to build a compost jar and what you know how to temperature gauge it moisture gauge it and all that so I learned how to make compost so I started the composting business and I divided the fertilizer into a chemical Division and an organic Division and that California the organic started this late 80s this is before anybody was talking Organics or yeah early that in 1981 I bought the big a4500 spreader which would carry about 11 tons of compost and that opened up the application end of it and I already had the commercial end of it and I had the trucking part of it so I just about had it all tied up so all it was was education educating the farmers to do the Organics right so now you’re up here in American Falls

and you’re spreading commercial fertilizer for a 5year contract for Jr simp plot right right and uh pus comes up tell me about that story well the best one was is there was a guy right across the street and his field was so dusty and powdery that uh I told him I said why don’t you take some of that Dairy manure you got over there with all them cows and put it on this field and he goes well why would I put that trash on my Fields he said I do everything I can to keep that out of my fields so I started talking to more and more guys and then Jr s plot sent a lawyer to me and told me to cease to never speak Organics if I was going to spread commercial fertilizer I needed to shut that off and being under a five-year contract I shut it off and so I took that many years for you boys to get old enough to where I could jerk root and move here because I felt like here was more opportunity than California California had already it had taken off right remember

I had the handles and all the other spreader companies were starting to do it and haras opened up the compost yard then the city of Los Angeles started bringing all their waist into Kurt County and turn it into compost so I figured I’d rode that horse as far as it was going to run right and up here not only were they not talking about it you have the local commercial fertilizer producer telling you to not talk about not talk about and anytime somebody tells me not to do something there’s a reason that’s what I’m after that’s that and and so you knew you were on to something I knew I’d hit a vein but you know I just compete against a a powerful organization so I just had to bite the bullet I had to eat some bologo and and get by until I could convince enough people to try it and so so then that started and again back into you’re living here now in Idaho at the in the part of this story and um you’ve decided that compost is the future for Idaho in your mind or at least the future

for a commercially sustainable Compost Facility that makes compost and goes out on big fields for large acreage not just all these little pockets of compost here and there like something that could do it as a major company make an impact yeah that could actually do something well here you got Fields with 320 640 I mean you got AC you got some acreage which you could deal with and not only that and this is a maybe the emotional side of it or or something I would say what drives a businessman succeed he has to have something in his heart that he’s doing the right thing yes and with the compost when I figured the millions of pounds and tons of chemicals that I had dumped on the soil for so many years to make a living that when I realized that compost could literally heal that damage I felt it was that was the driving thing more than the money and then one just follows the other your wife your wife right so you know and I mean I had my ups and downs I’ve had my you know guys said it would never work

and some of those guys now that told me it wouldn’t work do it all the time yeah and we drive we just drove across the state and I mean I’m going I’m going to give you credit whether you deserve it or whether other people think you deserve it but I think you deserve credit that there’s a pile of compos in just about every pivot corner from there to here it was none when we got here no and and let me tell this the subplot story all right the last year I worked for Jr subplot um he sent me to Pasco Washington to do his private farm and it’s just huge huge farm right along the Columbia River and at the bottom of the main gate going in was a feed lck and I drove right through that feed lot every night every day and spread chemical fertilizers on Jr’s land and then one night I got held up there waiting for a truck to deliver imagine that waiting on a truck to deliver but anyway it was late when he showed up well when the lights all went out I mean when the sun

went down all of a sudden I seen down at the feed lot lights fire up on equipment moving all over the place and pretty soon sure enough there was about 10 manure spreaders manure right up that road and spreading on Jr’s private farm this is the guy that told me to never mention organic fertilizer and on his front gate there a sign as big as a bus that says Jr s plot the most productive Farm on the planet and I thought like 10 minutes what a jerk well it he a businessman it is it’s all it is business and his him and his wife’s names are on buildings at my son’s college called well you I gave him credit where credit did yeah they I mean they they got on to something early but sometimes I often wonder and I’ve shared this too is you know what might have happened if if when that lawyer came out to told you to cease and toist talking organic technology if if they might have invited you into the office what are you talking about like teach us this show us that like what do you but

instead you I don’t know if it’s ego or just fear maybe fear holding you down like fear but then they did that probably for a couple decades because every time we go out here and knock on the door in aine or American Falls you know we would hear negative negative connotation after negative thing about compost that we knew wasn’t true and we knew that you know uh that weed seeds would cook in the process and die and the pathogens too and that everything that they said negative about it was somebody saying that compost is gaining steam we got to stop that but here we are so I think kind of the cherry on top was we get to do this podcast together but we also got to work together at the end of my sales career and going into you know promoting Tire reclaim and becoming the president of Tire reclaim we got to start a uh compost company Legacy compost and we jumped from just a few truck loads hundreds of truck boats annually seemingly overnight with that company the demand was there the ideas were there it just took you all of

your ideas and my corporate background to put some spreadsheets and get some things together and make that happen and then the relationships you had already built I didn’t have to go find customers I didn’t have to go find even the suppliers if you remember uh Fe Interstate feeders was an Open Door you and I just walked right in and told them hey this is our plan I wouldn’t have had that meeting without you you know what I mean so that all it had to like come together at a moment and then now I sold that company to have our the tire replay now that has read all of this success that allows for a camera crew and people to help us you know so the success has come full circle and and and the tire reclaim is recycling yeah absolutely and and manure is just manure until you processing then it’s a product that you can distribute and and make a living from not only at the same time serving your fellow men and cleaning the planet out so you get everybody on board once they learn that it’s good for everybody right and

and it’s good business it’s money it’s and I can say that like as an open statement about both Industries because they yeah they were trash right one man’s trash is another man’s trash it’s a perfect example is when I first started they used to pay me to clean the manure out of their dairies right then they went to well we’ll just give it to you Bill and then another year later well we need a couple of bucks for that bill yeah and so well I’m sad to say that I think that’s probably where tires will end up we we talk about it I I really do I I think tires are going to end up being the aluminum can of the waste industry because as but we’re talking it could be a decade it could be two decades it could be two years but what I’m getting at is just what you’re saying cuz my uh cuz Brett saw it in the metals industry cuz with the appliances and stuff you used to take them and drop them off and they charge you to get rid of your old refrigerator or this or that

now you go there as long as the freon’s cleaned out of it but you take it there they pay you for the metal scrap right recycling so I think that day is coming and without men like you pioneering and doing those you know like I said you didn’t have to build that truck that Grandpa wanted you to put a motor in you didn’t have to go and learn how to put down fertilizer and then make it into a six or seven spreader Fleet you know you didn’t have to do any of that you were literally doing that I’m sure to make money right but also to grow and to be a part of something to change and that’s really I thought that’s why this was is a perfect opportunity to have a podcast cuz whether it’s about tires or manure or you know this coffee cup it’s about you know somebody having the gumption to get up every morning and try and and whether you get knocked down and some people don’t get up some people get up running yeah and so you you know you can’t give up I mean Jr ran me

out of here in ‘ 89 and we didn’t get back here until 96 yeah so we lost a considerable amount of time here but you know that like I said that’s just uh that was just business yeah and uh as you get older you learn that you learn now you’re retired it’s a now I’m retired sit on the ranch come and visit the grandkids when you want to that’s it that’s what a man told me one time is being rich is being able to do whatever you want to when you want to then I’m very rich I I don’t I don’t even do anything other than uh I still pedal a little hay once in a while you know still got a little livestock well which that should I mean always 208 40909 that’s my dad’s number any hay for sale or that you need to buy this is the guy to call we’re talking Feer well you know I got uh 836 phone numbers in my in my phone one of Might ring after this it’s uh it’s all about making connections holding those connections uh fortifying those connections and not forgetting even

the littlest guy you know even if in my book if a guy had 20 acres or if he had 2,000 acres if he called and asked for help I give it to because it’s not always about the money but it is and that 20 acre guy guy might inherit 2,000 acres next week right and you treated him the same as you did a big guy he’s going to call you first so yeah I always felt like you should you should treat every customer as as if they’re just as important as the next shake a hand Pat a back that’s a good one to invite appreciate you sitting with me