1-800-GOT-JUNK? Making cash from trash

One junk-hauling business aims to have 250 franchises within four years.
VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) -- In Brian Scudamore's vision of the future, the next great North American brand -- in the mold of Starbucks and Federal Express -- will be boldly colored trucks that haul away your junk.
The name is also the phone number -- 1-800-GOT JUNK? -- for an expanding network of franchises that turn trash to cash by getting rid of all that unwanted stuff accumulated over the years.
Got 18,000 sardine cans past the expiration date? No problem. The blue-and-green shirted haulers from 1-800-GOT-JUNK? have handled it all, from discarded boats to frozen animal carcasses to prosthetic devices that prompted wisecracks about charging "an arm and a leg."
It is a modern model for one of the oldest of urban services, with friendly, clean-cut workers in shining trucks replacing the grimy, grizzled junk men in ramshackle carts of yore.
Company's goal
With 27 established franchises so far and 23 more on the way, the company of 400 employees and a projected $7 million in revenue this year intends to operate in the 30 largest metropolitan areas of North America by the end of 2003.
Scudamore, 32, the founder and chief executive, and Cameron Herold, the 37-year-old vice president of operations and franchise support, want to reach $100 million in revenue from 250 franchises in four years, with the ultimate goal of recognition as the world leader of the presently undefined junk removal industry.
"It's the building of what we believe is one of the next great North American brands," Herold said in an interview at the Vancouver headquarters, called the Junktion. "We really think we're building or going after building a real true North American brand, a household name."
To do that, Scudamore and Herold have adapted progressive management and marketing ideas to the junk removal industry, creating a clearly identified brand where none has existed.
An effective name
The key is the phone number for a name, which lodges in the mind of people who see it in giant block figures on trucks around town. It worked for Mike Kwak, 30, a repeat customer who recently had an old table, futon, television set and stereo receiver hauled away for $54.
All calls go to the Vancouver headquarters, answered by workers in a row of cubicles using specially designed software that sorts and categorizes incoming orders to set appointments, usually within hours.
Franchise owners get assignments by computer or cell phone, picking up the junk and taking it to appropriate dumps, recycling centers or transfer stations.
"As much as we haul junk, we're very much a technology-driven company," Herold said.
That combination appealed to Alan Remer, who bought a franchise in the Philadelphia area this year for $28,000. He was looking for a change after a decade as a stock trader and seeing a hijacked plane hit the second World Trade Center tower Sept. 11, 2001.
"I'm just having a blast doing it," Remer, 32, said in a telephone interview.