How Ford ProTM FinSimpleTM Helped Jolly Roofing With Fleet Financing
Apr 11, 2024 | 4 min read
When Greg McOlgan and John Jolly Jr. first met at 12 years old in Memphis, Tennessee, they didn’t know they’d go from childhood friends to business partners. “John and I grew up together,” McOlgan said. “And when I got out of high school and started college, I was fortunate enough that his dad, John Jolly Sr., gave me an opportunity to roof at his company.”
That company was Jolly Roofing, and though much has changed since then, Jolly Roofing remains a family-owned and -operated business. In 1995, Jolly Jr. took over as CEO, and in 2003, McOlgan was appointed chief operating officer. Under their leadership, the commercial roofing contractor has expanded from Tennessee to all 48 states within the continental U.S.1121
Vehicles play a crucial role in the day-to-day operation of construction businesses like Jolly Roofing, and Trip Swords, controller, has grown the commercial fleet with the business. “I’ve been with Jolly Roofing for more than 23 years,” Swords said. “My first year, our commercial fleet consisted of just over 30 vehicles, and now, we’re at 165-plus.”
According to McOlgan, vehicles—specifically Ford vehicles—have always been the backbone of Jolly Roofing’s operation. “Ford has been our vehicle provider for well over 20 years, and it’s been a great relationship,” McOlgan said. “We use almost every one of the vehicles Ford makes, from the F-150® truck all the way up through the F-450® truck.”
For the folks at Jolly Roofing, working with Ford ProTM FinSimpleTM to finance their fleet of vehicles felt like a natural next step in an already longstanding relationship.
Fleet Financing Without the Headache
With so much rapid growth, Jolly Roofing’s finance team, led by Swords, had started to feel the constraints of the traditional commercial fleet financing process. “Most of the time, if we wanted to get a new truck, we had to show up at a dealership, sit down with the credit manager, wait for paperwork,” Swords said. “It was a long, drawn-out process.”
To help alleviate this fleet financing pain point, Jolly Roofing’s longtime Ford Dealer Rick Bohne of AutoNation Ford connected Swords with Brian Harbison, Ford Pro FinSimple commercial business development manager. Step one was reducing the amount of manual paperwork. “I reached out to Trip Swords and asked, ‘How can I help?’” Harbison said. “We ended up getting his accounts all set up on electronic funds transfer—or AHC—and that helped reduce the hassle of writing checks.”
Harbison worked with Swords to set up a Ford ProTM FinSimpleTM Commercial Line of Credit.728
Then, to ensure that Swords could acquire vehicles as needed without having to reapply for financing each time, Harbison set Jolly Roofing up with a Commercial Line of Credit. “The Ford Pro FinSimple Commercial Line of Credit728 makes it easy for Jolly Roofing to order multiple vehicles at a time,” said Harbison. “It also helps Rick for planning purposes. He knows the outstanding balance on the line of credit, and he can order vehicles freely up to that point.”
“The fleet financing process is a lot different now, being able to utilize Ford Pro FinSimple,” Swords said. “It’s helped me get my day back.”
Adding Intelligence to Operations
In spring 2022, Jolly Roofing also started using Ford Pro Fleet Management Software291 and Ford Pro Telematics867 to further optimize fleet operations. Ford Pro Fleet Management Software291 helps digitize cost-related fleet data, which has been an enormous benefit to Jolly Roofing. “We have over 165 trucks in our fleet, and it wasn’t uncommon to receive more than 50 bills in any given month,” Swords said. “The fact that we can get those bills consolidated into one monthly bill is huge for us.”
A Ford Pro Telematics867 subscription allows commercial fleets like Jolly Roofing to track the real-time location of their vehicles, vehicle health data, and driver behavior, among other things. Interpreting and acting on this telematics data help improve vehicle uptime and maximize productivity.
Fleet managers can access telematics data from one convenient Ford Pro Telematics867 dashboard.
“It’s been great to not have to go through all the different vendors and systems to figure out how many times a certain truck’s oil has been changed or the amount of times that we’ve had to do any sort of repairs,” Swords said. “We have all that at our fingertips now, and it makes managing the business so much easier on a daily basis.”
McOlgan doesn’t see Jolly Roofing slowing down anytime soon. “I see Jolly Roofing continuing to grow over the next five to 10 years, and I think that Ford will be a huge part of that because they’ve given us the flexibility with our fleet as well as the confidence in their vehicles to continue to grow our business.”
Ford Pro offers an entire suite of end-to-end solutions—from vehicles to software to fleet financing to service—designed to grow with your commercial fleet.
Disclosure(s)
- 1)
"Company Profile." Jolly Roofing & Contracting Company, Inc. Accessed Feb. 9, 2024. https://www.jollyroofing.com/company-profile/
- 2)
Subject to credit approval, meeting eligibility requirements, and undergoing periodic reviews.
- 3)
Some software packages may require a fee and/or subscription. Terms and conditions apply. See dealer for details.
- 4)
Available on vehicles with embedded modem or equipped with approved plug-in device (PID). May require modem activation. Ford Pro™ Telematics and Ford Pro™ Data Services require a purchased subscription. Terms and conditions apply. Telematics service and features, and access to vehicle data, depend on subscription and compatible cellular network availability. Evolving technology/cellular networks/vehicle capability may limit functionality and prevent operation of connected features.