On a scale of running a marathon to sleeping while standing, I would say I am probably going to fall asleep standing up. Driving about eight hours a week has really done me in, but on the bright side I have seen all over the state of Ohio and Indiana!

During my time at Bane-Welker, I’ve been traveling from store to store in the state of Ohio, while also traveling to some different stores in Indiana. This week I experienced the life of a service tech, salesman, and parts counter employee!

On Monday I was in Eaton, and I went on a sales call with Eli. One of the salesmen and I had the pleasure to meet with a customer who was interested in purchasing a Kubota lawn mower.

On Tuesday I was at Wilmington; most of the day I worked on creating marketing material, but after that I decided to make my way to the shop. While I was in the shop, I was introduced to the assistant service manager, Nick. He helps the service manger with taking service calls, sending out service techs, and completing the hundreds of work orders that come in each week.

Nick taught me how to put in work orders that the service techs have completed. A work order is a sheet that has the customer information on it along with the piece of equipment they are wanting serviced and why. These work orders must be typed into our system word for word and are lengthy.

On Wednesday, I went back to Eaton and helped Marvin, the service manager, with his work orders, and I helped get some parts that the service techs needed.

Thursday, I traveled to Georgetown, Ohio. I was able to go on a service call to look at a planter with Brian, one of the service techs. We traveled to Kentucky and helped a customer that had damaged their planter. We also stopped by one of the large farms in the area — I was able to meet the owners who happened to be long-time customers of Bane-Welker.

Meeting customers is one of my favorite parts of this internship because they are the ones that keep this company moving, and I love to hear their stories of how the company has evolved and how they have been impacted.

Friday fun day, I did a sales shadow with Dallas, one of the salesmen at Pendleton, Indiana. He taught Austin, a fellow intern, and me how to set a customer up with new tractor. What I took away from this experience was that asking the price of a tractor is a very loaded question!

Well, that is how my second week at Bane-Welker operated and I cannot wait to get next week started! As always, from a fellow Buckeye … Go Bucks!

Macel Stowers is a summer intern with Bane-Welker Equipment and a student at The Ohio State University.