Cat® Reman Dealer Showcase: Thompson Machinery

With a history that stretches back to 1944, Thompson Machinery delivers new, used and rental equipment, as well as parts like Cat Reman — offering an extensive inventory and service capabilities to a diverse range of businesses. Chris Rowan notes, “We've got customers in road construction, building construction, aggregates, mining, forestry, electric power generation, marine, ag. We've got customers from all different areas. All of them will use Cat Reman.”

Thompson Product Support Service Representative (PSSR) Daniel Ray says the appeal of Cat Reman products comes down to one thing: “Everybody's trying to make a living. Anywhere from [someone] that's got two machines up to [someone] that's got 100 machines, Cat Reman works for all of them.” 

What makes Caterpillar’s remanufactured product line so effective for Thompson customers? Chris Rowan says the Cat Reman combination of low cost*, high quality and a same-as-new warranty** delivers the Caterpillar experience that customers expect.  

He explains, “There are aftermarket options that some customers feel they have a need for. If they've got a utility machine that maybe they see is coming to the end of its life, they still want it as a backup machine, and so they want to limit their costs. Cat Reman helps us with that because the Cat Reman [product line] offers them a much lower cost [than new].”  

“A lot of times it's not even about money,” Daniel Ray adds. “If you've got a Cat Reman engine sitting somewhere and the dozer's down, they want it fixed now. They don't want to wait two weeks, three weeks for us to build it. They'd really [rather] just get it off a shelf… Put it in a dozer and let's go back to moving dirt.” 

Daniel Ray says that fast repair turnaround often can — and should — outweigh cost in a customer’s choice of repair options. ”Sometimes, the downtime's going to cost you much more than what the actual [part is] going to cost you.” 

He cites an example from a major landfill in the Memphis area. When one of the operation’s dozers needed a new engine block, he says, “We ended up going with Cat Reman because if we take the engine out [of] the dozer and take it back to our shop and build it, you're looking at two weeks. Just using Cat Reman probably saved at least eight days. That's work days. That's a big game in the landfill industry.” 

The key to that quick turnaround, says Thompson PSSR John Ware, is availability. “I try to promote the Cat Reman parts because of the parts availability. They're usually easier to get. They're easier to deal with because they're typically more on hand.”

Ware explains that availability is simply built into “the Cat Reman process.” When Thompson pulls a used part from a machine, or when a customer returns one, it gets sent to a Caterpillar remanufacturing facility. There, cutting-edge technologies and processes are employed to strip the part to its core and rebuild it to like new specifications. In the meantime, customers can exchange their old part for a remanufactured one, which delivers like new performance at a fraction of the cost of a new part with core return, and carries a same-as-new Caterpillar warranty. 

Ware notes, “When the customer comes in or they call and they ask for a particular part,” Cat Reman off-the-shelf availability can mean that “they don't have to wait on one to be shipped in. Everything seems to be more readily available on the [Cat] Reman side.“

For customers who are concerned about the quality of a remanufactured part, Ware says not to worry because Caterpillar “spend[s] a lot of time and a lot of effort developing and trying to put a good, quality part back out for the customer at a quality price.” 

“The secret sauce is quality, a hundred percent.” Chris Rowan adds. “Cat Reman has a quality like new and so our customers have come to trust that. And more importantly, our parts employees have come to trust it so they can recommend it to our customers.” 

Thompson Machinery Technician Caleb Norris is one of those employees. As someone who installs new Cat parts every day, Norris admits even he’d be hard pressed to identify a Cat Reman part without looking closely. It can feel to Norris like, “there is no difference unless it has a Cat Reman sticker on it.” At first glance, he says, “That's the only way you know.”

“Whenever [we] have, say, a pump or a motor engine go down,” Norris continues, “nine times out of ten, we're going to lean more towards a Cat Reman part because it's going to save the customer money. And it's a trusted [part] because Caterpillar went through it. They've done everything [that] needs to be done to it, so it's ready to go when we get it.”  

Because Cat Reman parts are remanufactured to Caterpillar's original performance specifications and go through multiple, rigorous quality checks, Caterpillar is able to offer a same-as-new warranty. John Ware says it’s a major selling point for Thompson customers. “The warranty is a plus. They get the same warranty for less price.”

High quality, lower price, solid warranty — Cat Reman products check all the boxes for Thompson customers, Chris Rowan says. “We don't really have to convince our customers to understand the [Cat] Reman option because it's been out there for so many years. Cat Reman is known for its quality so it's accepted by our customers like new, it has the same-as-new warranty. So, if the customer knows there's a [Cat] Reman option, that's the option [they're] going to choose.”

One thing customers should also know about, Rowan adds, is the sustainability story of Cat Reman products. By reusing the cores of major components and remanufacturing as many parts as possible, Caterpillar remanufacturing facilities help reduce unnecessary waste, putting useable iron back into production. 

“Generally speaking, customers in the past have been more focused on the value of the part,” he says, “but as people are becoming more aware of sustainability issues, then I think it's going to be coming up more in the future.” 

He also notes that core return is one of the reasons Cat Reman parts cost less. “There's a significant amount of energy cost and value tied up in the old part. We're able to take that old part, return it to Caterpillar for remanufacture and then it's turned back into the system.”  

John Ware agrees. “If you reuse a cylinder head, a block, it does not go into the local scrap yard to be cut up and destroyed. You get to reuse a good, viable [core]… which eliminates a lot of the cost.”

Along with the price difference between Cat Reman and new parts, Thompson is able to work with customer budgets by offering a range of replacement options.

Daniel Ray asks, “If you have an engine go down, are you going to use a Cat Reman short block, long block [or a] complete engine? I mean, you've got options. How far out is it? If you can get it in three days and it may cost a couple thousand dollars more, we're getting it and [customers are] going to tell you ‘come on with it.’”  

Chris Rowan observes that Caterpillar is expanding the Cat Reman product line all the time, so those options will continue to grow… along with Thompson’s Cat Reman sales. “Five years out, I would predict that we're going to have even more Cat Reman options available to our customers. I would also predict that our percentage of [Cat] Reman parts would increase. Our customers already know the quality is there, it's got same-as-new warranty, and then of course the [approach to] sustainability.” 

In the end, Rowan says, it’s no surprise that “Cat Reman is used by our customers. Once we have a customer that has started with us, we explain to them what Cat Reman is — how the program works, that it has like new quality, it has same-as-new warranty — our customers learn to appreciate that, whatever industry they're in. If the customer knows there's a [Cat] Reman option, that's the option [they're] going to choose.”

Check out the range and variety of available Cat Reman parts.

^{*Cost savings based on return of core; core conditions apply.
**Warranty can vary by model and application; limitations apply. For complete details about the applicable Caterpillar Limited Warranty, contact an authorized Cat dealer.}