Area business expands
New building going up in New Plymouth

By Larry Hurrle
Argus Observer
Thursday, October 29, 2009 11:12 AM PDT

The new, three-story building being erected in downtown New Plymouth will house the Internet Truckstop, Roady’s Truck Stops and new businesses U Drove and U Drove Wireless when it is completed by mid-summer 2010.

New Plymouth — The Internet Truckstop owner Scott Moscrip watches across the road from his New Plymouth office as a three-story, steel frame building takes shape — a new, state-of-the-art structure that will house the growing Internet Truckstop business, along with Roady’s Truck Stops and other ventures that have spawned from the New Plymouth company.

“The new building will house everyone that we have in New Plymouth (around 100 employees) plus another 130 to 140 comfortably,” Moscrip said about the Internet Truckstop’s headquarters which, when finished, will be between 65,000 and 66,000 square feet. “And this is just Building 1.”

Currently, Moscrip said, there are no concrete plans for other buildings. Still, he said, forecasting the growth of his company with future expansions could mean more space would be needed.

The new building is an economic stimulus, of sorts, without the backing of any government money. Moscrip said the building is being solely funded by the Internet Truckstop and Roady’s and focuses on using Idaho products and as much local labor as possible.

“We have two local companies doing the general (contracting) on this building,” Moscrip said. “There are a few materials that don’t come from Idaho, but we care who is working on this building. Everything we spend is in Idaho and helps stimulate the Idaho economy.”

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The building is projected to be complete by mid-summer 2010. That is, if concrete can be poured before winter sets in, allowing crews to continue construction through the winter months.

“We need a little Indian Summer,” Moscrip said. “If we can get the concrete poured, we can continue to construct through the winter. If not, then we have to wait until April.”

In order to get the concrete poured, Moscrip said, temperatures cannot dip below 40 degrees Fahrenheit for more than eight hours.

Plans for the new, behemoth building began more than three years ago when Moscrip realized they were quickly running out of space in the building current occupied in New Plymouth.

Originally, a building was scheduled to be erected in Fruitland near the old cider plant, but problems with the location prevented plans from being followed through. Instead, DNS Factors found a home in the former Student Loans of Idaho building just south of the Fruitland city limits.

The move of DNS Factors freed up some space at Internet Truckstop, but a new building was still needed, and a nearly one-square block of downtown New Plymouth was the perfect site.

Besides housing the Internet Truckstop and Roady’s, the building will also accommodate two new businesses which should be up and running by the first of the year.

U Drove and U Drove Wireless are currently in the testing phase and will enhance truck drivers’ abilities to file mandatory reports quicker and with more efficiency.

Moscrip said drivers are faced with more and more governmental mandates for filing reports such as time on the road, fuel consumption and fuel taxes, loads, etc. As well, he said, the government is requiring trucks to have electronic on-board readers, which are expensive to use.

“The government is forcing them to use EOBRs to record everything the truck and driver is doing,” Moscrip said. “We were trying to figure out how to solve that problem inexpensively. We want to get more information from the driver, but not be Big Brother.”

U Drove is a company that wrote an application that can be used on today’s smart phones and allows drivers to file the necessary reports with the company with minimal effort and less expensively. Currently, the industry charges around $150 per month to truckers plus service to use electronic readers. Moscrip said U Drove will be about $25 per month for the service, which will save time, money and keep truckers in business.

U Drove Wireless, he said, will focus solely on the selling of cellular telephones which will accept the applications and allow the truckers to file.

“We’re putting it into the final format for the Version I release,” Moscrip said.

He said the target date for kicking off U Drove and U Drove Wireless is Dec. 1, but said it could be as late as Jan. 1, 2010, depending on updates.

Currently, he said, each business has one employee, but he expects that, to change quickly.

“Our fear is that if this takes off, we will need about another 100 customer service people,” he said. “As this thing takes off, it will be like wildfire, but we will adapt.”

Moscrip said he expects to need one customer service representative for every 1,000 customers. Rather than begin hiring right away, he said he will sit and “watch what’s going on” before making any moves.