More new owners for RACQ
Carolyn and Dave with kids Tristan, April, Jack and Paige now provide Rainbow Beach’s Roadside Assist program
It’s busy time for Dave Elder and Carolyn Wall, new owners of Rainbow Beach’s Towing Roadside Assist. Not only did they purchase a new business last month, they are preparing for their wedding in five weeks!
Carolyn said they had started looking at what was available locally so they could build a business together, “With Dave’s experience in roadside assistance and my management experience, we thought this was the perfect choice. “
It has come full circle for Dave as he started his working career as an apprentice mechanic in an RACQ workshop and was also Roma’s RACQ roadside assistance and towing representative for five years.
After growing up on a 4000 acre farm near Roma, he couldn’t resist a job offer at beautiful Rainbow Beach, and worked as a casual mechanic for Rainbow Beach Adventure Company.
Dave managed the workshop for the last five of his nine years with the company, responsible for the team of eight staff and maintenance of nearly 70 Tag Along vehicles.
Carolyn moved here from Hervey Bay, “I was working from home as an administration manager of a mining company with my three children and niece, when nearly four years ago I bumped into Dave in a park. Six months later we were engaged!
“Before meeting Dave I had never been to Rainbow, I fell in love with the town and the lifestyle so the natural progression was to move to our house in Cooloola Cove. But that was not close enough for us – so now we rent our house out and live in town.”
RACQ have changed their business model and redesigned the service areas on the Cooloola Coast for Roadside Assist, “There will now be one RACQ area rather than two (Tin Can Bay/Cooloola and Rainbow Beach), they now require larger companies to be a main hub and contract holder for the whole regional area.
“After the 28th April RACQ will be located in Cooloola Cove and will be run by Action Auto Group in Gympie. This was determined prior to our purchase of the business.”
Dave and Carolyn will still be providing a break down service for other roadside assist programs like Allianz and Global Assist. “We will be focusing on 4wd off-road assistance as RACQ membership does not cover anything off-road and we are also providing roadside assistance to those who are not members of any roadside assist program.”
Their 4wd recovery Nissan patrol will continue to help get people out of the sand and they will continue to offer towing services from Fraser Island and in all local areas with the 4wd tow truck and 2wd tow truck.
“We also now offer special local and aged pension rates, regularly reviewing our processes and charges so we can offer a high service level and affordability to the local community.”
Rainbow Beach 4×4 Hire will also operate from the same premises on Karoonda Road, where both Dave and Carolyn will be based, working alongside Gary and Katie Sanderson with the RACQ mechanical workshop.
Carolyn says, “I will also continue my role as General Manager of GreenBizCheck, the world’s largest cloud based Environmental Certification company.”
Despite the wedding (Carolyn assures it is all “on track”) and juggling the busy Easter season and kids on school holidays, they are enjoying their new business adventure, “Now it means we can build a future for us and our four children in Rainbow Beach.” Visit their business Facebook page and website for further updates.
