2014 HVAC Residential and Commercial Service Vehicle Survey: Truckin' On!

With a recovering economy and a spurt of growth in the commercial construction marketplace, it’s time to examine HVAC contractors’ current truck needs, any trends in their buying habits, and how those buying habits differ between the following construction market segments: commercial/institutional, industrial, and residential.

So we commissioned a web-based survey of our readers who work in those segments, and this report is the result of their input. More than 480 HVAC contractors responded to our request and of those, 344 reported being involved in truck/vehicle buying decisions.

Of the total base of respondents, 84% said they were involved in residential construction, 70% did commercial/institutional work, and 23% targeted the industrial sector. The types of trucks and vehicles they most likely own or lease (Figure 2) are vans (more than 74% across the board), followed by pickup trucks (more than 68% across the board.)

This is a change when compared to last year when respondents told us that pickup trucks (71%) and box/cube trucks (56%) were the second most popular truck types. Last year this was an anomaly to other studies done over the years, so it seems in 2014, we’re returning to the traditional contractor truck preferences.

The bottom line here is that HVAC contractor fleets are vital and expensive assets that require attention to get the most value for the dollars invested in them. The goal of this study is a comparison of where your company stands against a national average.

So take a few minutes and run through this series of slides and see what our respondents had to say about their preferred brands, whether they buy or lease their trucks, how they track them, and how they choose to maintain them (plus a lot more). How do stack up?

We'd love to hear from you about how you manage your fleets as well. Please feel free to drop me a note via email, Facebook, Twitter, or on HVAC-Talk.com (private message The Editor).

See you on the roadways. Keep on truckin’, baby!