LANSING, MI – Care, inclusion, community, and integrity are four of six core values that moving company Two Men and a Truck instill in their employees.
The dedication from everyone to exhibit qualities of those values are part of what makes the company so special to their employees and customers.
Michael Arrieta has been working with the company for nearly 16 years. His journey with Two Men first started with his role as a general manager at the South Lansing location, and he now works at the corporate office as a start up manager.
What drew Arrieta to the company, and what has kept him there for so long, is the consistency across so many locations.
“Our company gives a lot back to the community…we partnered with the American Cancer Society so we donated 10 cents off of every move back to them,” Arrieta said.
Among the company’s efforts to give back to the community is their recent partnership with Convoy of Hope, a nonprofit that provides logistics to communities suffering from the aftermaths of natural disasters.
Franchises work with local communities to find out what resources are needed, and then send out truckloads of those resources to affected areas. More information on Convoy of Hope’s efforts can be found at Disaster Relief | Initiatives | Disaster Services | Convoy of Hope.
For Leah Ciolek, who has been with the company for eight years, the best part of being employed by Two Men is the familial environment.
“The people here really make it important, our involvement in the community makes it a really great place,” Ciolek said..
Despite Two Men and a Truck being a company with over 350 locations worldwide, the sense of family causes some to believe that the company is strictly local.
“If you meet people from other states and you tell them you work for Two Men, they say, ‘Oh, yeah! I know the people who started the entire business in Colorado.’ I’m like, not so much, we started in Okemos,” Arrieta said.
Adorning the walls of one of the hallways at the Two Men corporate office is a complete timeline of the company’s journey, starting with two men from Okemos, Michigan who wanted to make some extra cash while in college.
Two Men still honors their roots by recognizing those in their communities who need assistance.
Not only does the company work with different charities at the corporate level, but each franchise also does its own charity work on a local level.
One challenge that they work with is saying no to those asking for donations or help from them, and balancing the different things they do for the community.
“ I wish that we could help out everybody who asks for a donated move or storage…if we can’t make it work in our budget, we still do whatever we can to help out whoever is asking us,” Gianni Massaro said. Massaro works as the company’s marketing coordinator.
The company gets the most requests for help around the Thanksgiving and holiday season near the end of the year, making it even more disappointing when they have to turn people away.
One event that the company facilitates every year is ‘Movers for Moms’ where every franchise in the system works with a local women’s shelter to collect and deliver items that single mothers may need.
Another one of the company’s core values is ‘the grandma rule’, which means to treat everyone the way they would want their grandmother to be treated.
“If this company didn’t have the family atmosphere that it has, I don’t know if moving would be my thing…It’s the people here that make it really important and makes it a really great place to work,” Ciolek said.