The independents who pull ahead in the equipment rental industry usually share one habit. They keep finding small ways to make life easier for customers and staff, and they do it without losing the relationships that got them there.
On episode 110 of The Rental Roundtable, I sat down with Brittany Haas, office manager at Crown Rental in Minnesota. She’s a second-generation leader who grew up in the business, and she helps run three locations that blend equipment rental with party and event rental. Crown Rental keeps testing new ideas, like a 24/7 self-service locker system, and somehow keeps the personal service that makes an independent worth choosing in the first place.
A Second-Generation Leader Who Earned Her Seat
Brittany didn’t grow up planning to run a rental company. She started at 12, riding along with her dad to set up graduation deliveries and washing linens at home with her mom. As a teenager she worked the counter around her class schedule, opening the store in the morning, heading to college classes midday, and closing at night. Over 20 years she worked almost every job in the building, from counter person to lead to office manager.
That path matters, because a lot of second-generation owners deal with the same quiet pressure of proving they didn’t just inherit their role. If you took over a family business, you already know the feeling.
“The newer employees thought that I was handed the position I had. A lot of them didn’t know that I worked my way through. I don’t want to be that person who thinks they got handed something, and I’ve always worked harder than that.” Brittany Haas, Office Manager at Crown Rental, (19:48)
I hear this from a lot of the operators I talk to. When you’re the owner’s kid, respect isn’t handed to you. You earn it by doing the work, and Brittany’s team knows she gets just as sweaty as everyone else. That credibility is what lets her push new ideas without the team pushing back.
The 24/7 Locker System That Solved an After-Hours Problem
Here’s the idea I think more independents should pay attention to. Crown Rental built a 24/7 self-service locker system so customers can return and pick up equipment any time, day or night. It started as a security fix. One of their lots isn’t secured and sits in an area known for higher crime, so when they stopped opening on Sundays, they needed a safe way for customers to drop off gear after hours.
The system uses Bluetooth locks and locking points throughout the lot. Customers can rent a lock when they pick up equipment, or grab one from the locker to secure whatever they’re returning. The lockers even hold smaller general-tool rental items like chainsaws, generators, pumps, and fans, so customers can pick them up when the store’s closed. In Minnesota winters, they swap some of that out for sewer snakes, which get popular around the holidays.
What’s funny is that Brittany was the skeptic. She plays devil’s advocate on a lot of Doug’s ideas, and this was one of them.
“Our after hours has been one of the best innovations that I never could have imagined to work as well as it did, especially because I fought it. I fought it pretty hard.” Brittany Haas, (16:30)
Holiday weekends are when the lockers really shine, because customers who need to get to work Monday morning or head out of town can still return their gear on their own time.
Built on a Simple Truth: People Pay for Convenience
The lesson underneath all of this is one Crown Rental keeps coming back to.
“People pay for convenience. That’s one thing we’ve learned.” Brittany Haas, (18:29)
COVID taught them they didn’t have to be open seven days a week. Now they run Sunday hours only in May and June, their busiest stretch for spring projects and graduation season. The rest of the year they’re closed Sundays, and the locker system fills the gap. They looked at the numbers, saw they were breaking even on Sundays, and adjusted around what customers actually valued instead of what they’d always done.
What Crown Rental Is Building Next
Crown Rental isn’t stopping there. Their next idea is customized storage containers with individual slots and locking codes, so customers can pick up bigger items like tillers and aerators after hours too. One idea led to the next, and neither happened overnight.
How Crown Rental Uses AI Without Losing the Human Touch
Brittany has leaned into AI for marketing, and she keeps it simple. She uses ChatGPT to draft social posts, then brings them into Canva to add her own touch. She’s learned how to work with it, even training it on her tone of voice.
“You can tell who’s using AI and you can tell who’s not. A lot of the posts are the same, but you can also kind of customize it a little bit, and that’s what I’ve been working on.” Brittany Haas, (25:05)
That’s the right instinct. AI can get you a first draft fast, but the operators who stand out are the ones who still make it sound like them. Brittany’s also started using AI for HR tasks like offer letters and cleaning up emails, though she’s quick to note that accounting is one place she hasn’t trusted it yet, because those numbers have to be perfect.
She’s clear that AI has limits, especially in an industry built on relationships.
“You can say, I want a trencher, and it’s going to book you a trencher, but is a trencher really the right equipment for the job? So there’s that aspect, and you still need that human aspect.” Brittany Haas, (29:22)
I think about it the same way, and it’s why we built Quinn the way we did. Quinn is Quipli’s AI agent. It answers after-hours calls and books rentals so those requests don’t just sit in voicemail overnight. But it’s built to take the busy work off your plate, not to replace the handshake. The relationship part of rental isn’t going anywhere, and it shouldn’t.
The Staffing Reality: Why Mechanics Are So Hard to Find
If you’re growing, you already know how hard it is to find good people, and Crown Rental feels it too. Their toughest hire right now is a mechanic. Brittany had an ad out for over a week with zero responses. Fewer people tinker with engines the way they used to, and Minnesota rules keep anyone under 18 from operating equipment, which cuts off a pipeline of high school hires on the equipment side.
So Crown Rental changed how they hire. They stopped relying on resumes and started hiring for personality, especially for sales roles. They’ve also noticed that January is their best month for hiring, when people are looking for a fresh start.
There’s a lot of worry right now about AI taking jobs. But most operators I talk to can’t even fill the roles they already have. AI isn’t replacing the mechanic. At best, it covers the roles you were never going to fill anyway, so your people can focus on the work only they can do.
The Playbook Worth Borrowing
If you’re running a growing operation, there’s a real lesson in how Crown Rental operates. They didn’t wait for a perfect plan. They tested a locker system they weren’t sure would work, watched what customers actually did with their Sunday hours, and let the numbers decide instead of habit. AI handles the busy work. People still handle the relationships. And the team running the floor is trusted enough to keep it running when the owner isn’t standing there.
None of that works if the software is fighting you the whole time. That’s part of why we built Quipli, and why Quinn is built to catch the after-hours work that used to slip through the cracks. Get the tools out of the way, and the energy you save goes back into the part of the business that actually grows it: taking care of people.
Keep Building
Brittany’s best career advice has now come up three episodes in a row, and I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
“Never stop learning. You’ve got to be humbled every now and then. You’re never better than the next guy, so never stop learning.” Brittany Haas, (31:21)
