Broadhead Equipment was founded in 2019 by father-son duo Richard, owner, and Jordan Broadhead, owner and business manager, who started the business with a service truck and 2 Cat D11 engines in an empty shop. With a total of 7 employees and total 2024 revenue at $7.7 million, the business is one of the fastest growing tractor dealers in the north-central Alabama area, they say. The Broadheads takes pride in becoming Alabama’s leading Kioti dealer, and one of the top in the Southeast. 

Rural Lifestyle Dealer sat down with Richard and Jordan in their Sumiton, Ala., dealership for an extensive discussion about how it came to be, the challenges they’ve faced and what’s shaped their success — all which contributed to Broadhead Equipment being named Rural Lifestyle Dealer’s 2025 Dealership of the Year.

Family Business Philosophy

Is there a secret to their success? According to Richard, there definitely is. He says, “We strive to treat everyone we deal with like part of the family. We do our best to be the dealership we would want to do business with by being honest and transparent and by having the best service department around.”  That commitment, along with several significant changes, helped bolster the business, especially in the past several years.

“Our people in all areas of the dealership are prepared to make sure the customer experience is outstanding, from assisting them when they’re making a choice to ongoing maintenance and customization,” Jordan says. “We value the opportunity to create a long-term relationship with our customers, and we do that by giving them the best customer service available. We are a family business dedicated to giving the best service. We service what we sell. Whether a customer is getting a new tractor, renting a mini-excavator or needs an engine rebuilt for a bulldozer, we treat them as part of the Broadhead family.”

It’s been a fast and furious time since opening. The business sold its first tractor in 2020 and its first Kioti in 2021. Richard’s background is heavy equipment repair and Jordan has a degree in wildlife management, but they admit neither had any business management experience when they opened the business.

Behind the Scenes of Broadhead’s Revenue Rise

In 2024, the dealership was able to increase revenue by 49% and reduced its expenses by 25%. 

“There have been several significant changes made within the last 3 years,” explains Jordan. “At the end of 2023 we dropped Yanmar, Hustler and LiuGong and decided to focus on Kioti tractors and Bad Boy Mowers. Doing this focused our sales team, made our marketing dollars more efficient and set us up to double our tractor sales in 2024 when the market was down as much as 25% at the end of last year.”

In 2024, Broadhead sold 126 tractors — double the number of sales from the previous year. Jordan spoke candidly about the year-over-year challenges and changes.

“At the end of 2023, I’ll be honest, we weren’t profitable at all. 2023 was a terrible year for us. At the end of the year, we sat down and I poured over the books. Some of the things I found were that we had too many employees. We had too many lines, some less profitable than others. Going into 2024, we cut the lines that weren’t as profitable and focused on Kioti tractors and Bad Boy mowers. We decided to start the year lean and mean, and stay as lean and mean as possible throughout the entire year.” 

Richard credits Kioti and Charlie Jones, Broadhead’s Kioti territory rep, with allowing the dealership to grow at its own pace. 

Another factor they note is that in 2023, they changed the name from J.E.S. Equipment Solutions to Broadhead Equipment in order to separate themselves from a different JES that wasn’t connected or related to them.

Service Start

“When we started this business, it wasn’t set out to be a tractor dealership at all,” says Jordan. “Richard bought the property in October 2018, and I had graduated from Auburn in December of 2017. I’d spent a year out west doing field work for wildlife biology and moved back home and started working with him rebuilding engines for mining equipment. We started this as a heavy equipment repair, with an empty building. It was basically as he bought it when it had been abandoned as a sprinkler manufacturer.”

“The original plan was just for the back shop, that’s all,” offers Richard. “I didn’t really have a plan for the front up here. We started doing the heavy equipment repair and it was doing OK. He’s my son and I’m a mechanic. That’s what I’ve done for 30 years, heavy equipment mechanics. But the mechanic gene fell far from the tree when it came to Jordan.”  

Broadhead Equipment’s roots are in the service business, and as a result it continues to be a primary driver for the growing rural lifestyle dealership. Connor Campbell

Jordan continued the story, explaining that from 2 D11 engines in an empty shop, Richard sent out emails to all the different manufacturers he could find. After Bad Boy reached out first, they became a Bad Boy mowers dealer and sold 2 in the first year. He says they got nervous because by the time spring came, they had a lot of mowers but not necessarily a plan on how to sell them.

“I started diving into Rural Lifestyle Dealer magazine, YouTube, watching other dealers, figuring out what they’ve done to be successful, how to sell a lawn mower,” Jordan explains. 

With a nod to the role of mentors, he credits their initial Bad Boy rep for being helpful in teaching them the basics, and for connecting them to Jones, who was with Yanmar at the time. In early 2019, the Broadheads took on Yanmar, their first tractor line, and continue to praise Charlie — who eventually went to Kioti and remains their territory rep — for offering valuable input into selling tractors and building the business. 

Richard gives credit to his son for working to restructure the business by concentrating on marketing and how to run the entire business from front to back. “That’s when things started to change,” says Richard. “Once it changed, it was like he struck a match to gasoline. I let him have at it and he became self-taught on marketing, digital, how to contact people, Facebook ads, the whole run of it. We started taking on employees, overhead, insurance, etc.” He credits Jordan for teaching himself on the accounting system and other self-taught lessons, emphasizing that Jordan’s setting up a budget was a game-changer. 

“Seeing your son do something that he excels at, that’s a proud papa moment,” says Richard. 

Jordan explains he started searching for what other dealers use to manage their books, inventory and service departments. After testing a few business systems, he says they preferred RIMSS. 

“When we went from QuickBooks to RIMSS, our revenues went from $1.6 million to about $3.4 million,” says Jordan, adding, “It was a game-changer in how easy it was to keep track of inventory and build customers and know what we had in each tractor.”

Customer Profile

While they haven’t broken it down into percentages, Jordan says the majority of their customers are rural lifestylers with anywhere from 5-500 acres.

“Most people have a couple acres, maybe cows or some horses and they need a tractor or zero-turn to take care of their property or animals. Others have hunting clubs out farther in the county needing a tractor to prepare their club, keep the trails cut, green fields, etc. That’s the majority of our customers.” 

Jordan continues, “We’re growing our segments of municipalities, commercial lawn cutters and construction. Since Kioti came out with its skid steers, a lot of the customers for those are owner-operators. People will buy those for farm use and large properties. We also have concrete crews or tree service customers who trust us because of our service background. They know that we’re going to be able to take care of them if or when something goes wrong.”

Prioritizing Customers

Richard Broadhead:

“I want them to know when they walk in the dealership that they’re going to get treated the way you want to be treated. I want to feel like if we give them a deal that we’ve gave them the best deal that we possibly can, not that we’re trying to cheat them out of anything. Same way on the service side of it. If they bring it to me for service, I want them to know that we’ve done the best we can and they’re in good hands when they bring it to us for service. Those are the things I want them to know.”

Jordan Broadhead:

“Since we started out as a service facility instead of starting out as sales, I sometimes say we are going at this tractor dealership thing backwards. I tell customers that I want to be the tractor dealership that I’d want to buy my equipment from.” He added that he knows that some dealers start out with a background in sales, marketing or business and then decide to sell tractors and start a dealership, but that they are in the group which started out a service and now sell tractors.”

Creating Customer Loyalty

Jordan emphasizes the Broadhead Equipment website and its emphasis on package deals as a primary driver of customer growth and loyalty. He always asks himself how they can make the buyer come in educated. 

“We want to make it as easy as possible for the customer to submit a lead with as much information as possible. That was our key to success in the last quarter of 2024,” says Jordan.

Richard concurs. “What we see is most of the customers who come to us now, they’re already educated. They’ve already been all over the internet. They already know the particular tractor. I’d say 70% of them when they walk in the door, they say, ‘I want this tractor with this implement with this trailer.’”

“Absolutely, they want the price and they want to know why choose us over another Kioti dealer or why choose Kioti over Kubota or others,” adds Jordan.

The difference, they say, is service. Richard notes, “We really hawk the service side of it because if you buy your tractor from us, you’re not only buying the tractor, you’re buying the dealership.  If you buy the tractor and no service after the sale, that’s defeating the purpose. As Jordan explains it, they started the dealership backward. “We started on the service side and it worked into the sales/marketing side, which is totally backward from the way most people do it. We’ve learned the front side trial by fire.”

Simplifying the Buying Process

Jordan explains the specific ways he makes customer inquiries and purchases easier.

“We have Dealer Spike as our website host. I send them emails all the time to tweak our website. I’m always looking at dealers I feel are doing a good job and I emulate what they do because it’s working for them. I guess you could say there is a secret formula to a successful dealership. Other dealers have found it, and I’m just trying to figure out the formula they’ve figured out as I’m trying to make our website look as nice as possible, easy to use and easy to navigate.” 

In 2024, he was looking for an easy way for customers to build packages. Many customers come in to buy a tractor and know they want a rotary cutter, box blade, disc, trailer, any combination of implements. Jordan figured it would be easier if they could share those details before they stop in or when submitting a lead, instead of only getting a price on the tractor through the website. He’d noticed other dealers offering package deals on Facebook, so he reworked the lead generation form to make the process easier, then placed it prominently onto the website front page.

“Our ‘Create a tractor package’ promotion there has worked out great,” says Jordan. “Ever since doing that, our lead conversions from people coming through our Google Ads and to our website has increased significantly. Just having a big button that urges them to create their own package is a lot easier to navigate than going through the different tractors we have in stock and figuring out an email to send asking for a package price.”

The Key to Keeping Good Employees

When asked what they’ve found to be the best way to find and keep employees, both Richard and Jordan explain a simple solution.

“One of the things with the employees is that most of our employees have small children. I know the pain of that so I let them work their own schedule,” Richard says. “Our mechanics, they don’t have to be here for the customers who are just coming and going. I’ve got people in place to do that. Most of my mechanics come in at 5:00 a.m. and leave at 2:00 p.m. Many of them make up time in the evenings if they have to be somewhere with their families later in the day. It’s worked out really well for us and for them.”

Owner Richard Broadhead (r) emphasizes the value of being in constant communication with staff and customers at his Sumiton, Ala., dealership. Connor Campbell

“I’m in a lot of Facebook groups of other equipment dealers and everyone’s always saying they can’t find service people,” notes Jordan. “Service people are the hardest. I don’t know what our secret formula is for the excellent guys that we have, but it’s also something that he (Richard) is doing back there.”

“I get it,” explains Richard. “When I walk back here and they’re trying to put a loader on and I can see they’re frustrated, instead of saying, ‘Hurry up, hurry up,’ I say, ‘Set it down right there. Let’s walk outside and get a bottle of water.’ We’ll walk right outside and we may talk about football or hunting or the date they went on this weekend. Let’s go try that loader and that’s the secret right there. I’ll go back there and cut up with them. You’ll tell jokes and try to make it a good atmosphere. ”

Management & Multi-Tasking

The owners often add staff to help offset the heavy workload as needed.

“We hired a parts and service gentleman just to take some off of Jordan’s plate. I still run what feels like 1,000 miles some days because I’m in the back, I’m up here, I’ll help all the guys if they have mechanical issues. I’ll stop and talk to the new parts and service gentleman that we’ve hired, trying to make sure he’s on track. He’s phenomenal so far. He’s picked it all up quickly.”

“With 7 employees, everybody has a pretty high level of autonomy,” says Jordan. “We don’t have departmental managers at this stage in our business growth. We do have a bookkeeper and she makes sure that RIMSS is up-to-date, all the bills that have come in get paid. Richard sits down once a week and makes sure our vendors are kept up and happy. I help our sales guy make sure the equipment is on the lot and ordered, make sure the parts are here for the service department.”

Sales, Parts & Service 

In discussing how the salesman works, and how they work to get the customer the best deal, he says this: “I would rather make a thousand dollars on a tractor than let the dealer across town get it — because even though it’s a teeny tiny margin on the tractor, last year there were dealers closing their doors. If we could get that sale, that’s a thousand dollars in our pocket.” He is well aware of the competition.

Both Richard and Jordan acknowledge they are always gaining new know-how. The parts segment of the business is one example. While that area is growing, they say they’ve learned a lot since starting out. 

“There was no book telling us how many parts to stock for whatever number of units you have in the field,” says Jordan. Since we got RIMSS, I’ve been able to look at the past year sales. I try to keep 70% of the previous year sales in stock. I know that may not necessarily be the best way to do it — you want to keep a certain number of fast-moving parts and you don’t want to have slow-moving parts on the shelf — but we’re still young and I haven’t learned all the lessons that are out there yet. There are always things to learn. I don’t have a parts manager whose job is to sit over our parts department and make sure that it’s as efficient as possible. We’ll get there. For now, about 70% is where I try to keep our parts from the previous year.” 

On service, Richard remains focused on connecting with customers each and every opportunity that presents itself. 

“Especially on the tractor side of things, I try to meet all the customers who come in when I can and if I don’t, then my service manager does. We are in constant communication with each other. If the customer wants to hear something every day, we try to call them every day even if we haven’t done anything, ‘Hey, Mr. so-and-so, unfortunately we hadn’t got it in the shop just yet,’ or, ‘We’ve got it in the shop now and here’s where we are.” 

He adds that while they have the equipment being worked on, they always try to upsell any kind of service. “There’s a big market in that, so we upsell everything we do. We definitely did that throughout the year, and last year we needed another mechanic to keep up.”

“His ability to problem solve has led us to be a dealership that, willingly or not, finds us solving a lot of other dealers’ problems,” says Jordan, crediting Richard’s nearly 40 years of experience. 

“I was always the one when nobody else could fix it, I’d get the call,” Richard humbly explains. 

He worked for Caterpillar as an equipment repairman for mining equipment and explains that he would be the one to rebuild the engines on the 40-yard digging machines in the mine, the D11s and 200-ton rock truck. 

“I eventually connected with a man who was the largest surface mine coal miner, independently-owned surface coal miner in the U.S. when he sold out, so I did the same thing,” Richard says. “I set up a shop.” His experience as a service tech was leveraged for his own business success down the road. 

Richard says that after much deliberation and a couple of independent gigs, he decided it was time to do it for himself, which is how he started what is now Broadhead Equipment. 

What’s the Future Forecast for Broadhead? 

“This is his retirement plan just as much as it is mine,” says Jordan. “I’m only 30, so I’ve got a long way to go before I hit retirement. I would like to see this dealership max out our potential from the single-store location, and then ideally with cash, purchase or build multiple locations. I’d like to see us, probably by the time I retire, with 4 or 5 locations. I’ll say that, but there’s some dealers that have gone from 1 location to 7 in the past 3 years, so who knows what the future holds for us.”

“My plan is to build this as big as I can build it, and when I hand the football off to him, then if he wants to take it to multi-location, I’m still going to be in the back, I’m not going home, I’m not the type to go home and sit down. If he wants to do that, then I’ll be here to support him along the way, but it’ll be his dime,” says Richard with a smile.

“We’ll need to grow to the point that we have a sales manager and a parts manager before I feel comfortable expanding to a second location,” says Jordan. “We’ve been growing anywhere from 32-48% a year for the past several years, so whenever we start to plateau, I’ll have an idea of when to start looking for that. We’ve just been taking it one year at a time.”

The father-son duo is poised for growth and optimistic. When asked about 2025, and what sales increase they budgeted for, Jordan offers a bright outlook. 

Just before going to print with this issue, Jordan offered this update on the strong results so far:

“This year is already shaping up to be better than anticipated. January revenue was 43% up from last January with profits up 127%. We’ve already matched last February numbers for revenue and tractors sold. I know the year is still young, but I’m projecting revenues of $10-11 million this year and 180-200 tractors sold.” 

How does it feel to be RLD’s Dealership of the Year?

Each was asked how it felt to be awarded Dealership of the Year.

“This is awesome and such an honor! I have imposter syndrome right now. I don’t feel like I deserve to win an award of this caliber … It’s probably the biggest award I’ve won in my life,” said Jordan enthusiastically.

“I’m blessed really, truly blessed, because we put everything into making this business a success,” said Richard. “We’re Christians, so this whole thing started by prayer. We were on our knees, and just like when I first started to buy the building, it was, ‘Good Lord, if that’s what you want me to do, open the door, if not, close the door.’ It happened, and now that we’ve won it, wow, that’s about all I can say. All this is because of the Good Lord, it really is. Thank you all, thank you all, thank you all. It’s a huge deal, it really is.” 

Broadhead Equipment shared additional insight into their business success story — from value-added customer service to community outreach — with Rural Lifestyle Dealer.

Prioritizing Customer and Community Service

Jordan Broadhead discussed that his dad, Richard, still does most of the deliveries. Richard expanded on that, saying:

“I do. It has always seemed to me that doing that seems to add a little personal touch. Of course, as we’ve gotten bigger, I can’t do that quite as much as I have at the start, but it really adds a personal touch when I hear them say ‘Wow, the owner delivered my tractor.’ I try to spend 30-45 minutes with them. The other day (late January) when it was seven degrees, I was with a customer in their big field for about 20 minutes. I told him, ‘I apologize profusely. Look, if you have any questions, call me and I will come back another day and go over it. But I’m cold, I’m freezing to death.’ But it was important to make the trip.” 

Jordan added, “We have a service truck that he (dad) bought when I was five years old, 25 years ago. It’s the big purple truck out back, and all of the customers he had before we came here, the heavy equipment repair customers, and now the new ones, know him from the purple truck. 

When asked to share how the business and its owners are involved in the community, Richard and Jordan were enthused to share outreach that keeps them connected to the areas they serve. 

“We do a lot with the local high school bands because we’re both band people,” explained Richard. Dora and Corner High School are the two local schools, and Jordan attended Corner High. Richard explains that the dealership will buy them a large number of cases of water at the start of their season. He added that one of the schools has a big band competition for which they buy equipment and banners. 

“You’re kind of creating a relationship because those kids are going to graduate and now they get married and then they’ll need a lawnmower and they need a tractor, ‘Hey Mr. Broadhead, I remember he helped us out,’ which we feel good about,” said Richard. The dealership is also active in the local Cattlemen Association, to which Jordan belongs, and they sponsor steak night dinners and other activities throughout the year. Christmas parades and local trade shows also help them stay in contact with people they already know are involved in those organizations over the counties (Jefferson and Walker) in their region.

Helping the next generation is important to them. Richard noted that Jordan went back to his high school at the request of a teacher to speak to the Future Farmers of America (FFA) students and the Future Business Leader Group to talk about running a business and about tractors, where he took a tractor to let the kids drive around the greenhouse.