A four-day special event needs all-day service for hundreds of restrooms. A couple of service trucks break down during a busy national holiday weekend when all repair garages are closed.

Occasions like that could pose insurmountable challenges for some portable restroom companies. Not so for Starr Septic Services in Franklinville, New Jersey. 

As a division of a larger company, third-generation family business Starr General Contracting, Starr Septic can mobilize an abundance of equipment and personnel to deal with the unusual or unexpected and give customers exceptional service.

For big events, the company can move as many as 100 restrooms at once with its assortment of trucks and trailers. In especially busy times, office and field team members from the company’s other divisions can step in and lend assistance wherever needed. 

“I can’t think of anyone else locally, even national companies that have unlimited money behind them, who can do what we can,” says Mike Keenan, operations manager. “We’ve had quite a few instances where a major player has called us and said, ‘We booked this event; our people don’t work weekends. Can you help us out?’”

The diverse resources and the capacity to mobilize are reasons why Starr Septic has grown from scratch to an inventory of about 1,200 portable restrooms in just 10 years. The fleet includes about 125 oversized wheelchair-accessible units; the company also has 75 hand-wash sinks (Satellite Industries). 

A Simple Secret

Keenan and Vice President Chuck Starr III, son of President/CEO Chuck Starr Jr., and grandson of company founder Chuck Starr Sr., agree that the division’s growth took off during the pandemic for a simple reason. Says Keenan, “The feedback we got during COVID was that nobody else was answering their phones. We pride ourselves on answering and on responding quickly.” 

Besides calling in to the office, long-standing customers can reach key contacts on their personal cellphones. There’s also an office cellphone that team members alternate taking home overnight and on weekends. If it rings, it gets answered. And the Starr Septic website has a chat function, called LiveChat, that is also accessible 24/7. 

“As for accessibility to us, it’s almost guaranteed customers are going to reach somebody 24/7,” says Starr. “It’s been huge that we’re able to do that.” 

About 80% of the business is construction; the balance is special events, for which the division owns five two- and four-stall luxury restroom trailers from Optimus Industries and JAG Mobile Solutions. 

Fixing Up

When buying new standard restrooms, the division usually looks to PolyJohn, but much of the inventory consists of units purchased used, based on price, condition and need. That’s one place where team members from other divisions help out: They provide labor to refurbish the units to like-new condition.

“We have people in all kinds of trades,” says Keenan. “We’ve found that because other companies don’t have the manpower, they don’t have time to fix things once they get broken. The units become nonrentable.” 

Starr Septic, on the other hand, can assign a crew to work in the yard for a specified period fixing damage like cracked roofs, split corners, broken door springs, missing toilet seats and sanitizer dispensers. “Maybe the tank has to be taken out and repaired,” Starr says. “We’ve actually plastic-welded tanks back together.” The team looks to restroom manufacturers or third-party suppliers for replacement parts. 

Three of the restroom trailers were purchased used; team members from the construction and plumbing departments gutted and completely reconditioned them. 

Gearing Up

Special events are a key growth sector. The division has proven its ability to tackle big events by servicing the Barefoot Country Music Festival held in June on the beach at Wildwood. The 2024 festival drew peak attendance of 45,000, and the team serviced the restrooms around the clock from Thursday through Sunday.

“We moved 400 standard portables and seven restroom trailers in three days,” says Starr. “We had five four-stall trailers and two 10-stall trailers that a national company helped us with because we didn’t have all the trailers we needed. We serviced everything on the beach ourselves, with no other outside help.”

Keenan adds, “We handle large events very well. That’s because we have access to the additional labor force, and we have machinery that is not readily available to other vendors. For one event we did last summer on the beach in a town near us, we brought in a full-sized wheel loader in case our trucks got stuck in the sand. Our wheel loaders have forks on them, so we move a lot of equipment with them.”

Flexible Fleet

To haul restrooms the division has an International tractor-trailer that carries 28 units on a flatbed, plus two pickup-and-delivery trucks that haul six units apiece. Three trailers can transport 22, 12 and 10 standard units. “We can move a lot of restrooms in a hurry,” Starr says. 

As for service trucks, the newest is a Ford F-550 with a 1,100-gallon tank (900 waste, 200 freshwater) fabricated by FlowMark. “It can also carry two restrooms,” says Starr. “We use it to tow trailers if need be, it’s a workhorse. That truck doesn’t stop.” The fleet also includes: 

• Ford F-550, 450 gallons waste, 200 fresh, with back gate that flips down to haul two units 
• Dodge Ram with slide-in tank from Imperial, 450 gallons waste, 200 fresh
• Three Ford F-250s built in-house with slide-in units, one Pik Rite, two from Imperial (all 300-gallon waste and 150 freshwater)

In servicing restrooms, cleanliness is the name of the game. “We have people who are strictly dedicated to working in our yard,” Starr says. “There was a point last summer where we had six guys out there just getting units ready — cleaning, prepping, putting in the deodorizer chemical, making sure things were stocked so when the units got on site our people just had to place them and they were ready to go.” The deodorizer of choice is a liquid product from J&J.

Tight Ship

Once the units are in the field, Keenan and sales manager Steve Owens keep an eye on things, responding promptly if customers call to report damage or other issues, and ensuring that units are properly serviced. “Our people know if I’m driving past a unit, I’m stopping to look,” Keenan says. “And if I’m not happy with the way it looks, they will know about it. 

“I expect every nook and cranny to be wiped down, brushed up, whatever the case may be. They use a scrub brush and wet everything down. They rinse them out and if need be, spray them down. They hand-wipe the units versus scrubbing and spraying and leaving them wet. I find the units smell better and look better when we hand-wipe, especially the major areas.  

“A sales guy who worked here used to say, ‘I want you to think about if your mom or your grandma or your sister had to use the bathroom after you cleaned it.’ If the answer is no, then it’s not satisfactory. We preach that to our team.” 

Technology Tools

Technology helps Starr Septic operate efficiently. A CompanyCam smartphone app lets team members take photos that instantly upload to the cloud where all company personnel can see them. “We can have a technician on a site take a picture of something, then call in and say, ‘I just identified this issue — what do you think?’” says Starr. “Before, we used cameras and SD cards, and an office person actually had to transfer the picture onto our server.”

 The division also uses NexTraq GPS software to track vehicles. It helps in creating routes and enabling drivers to locate restrooms. Starr explains, “A route driver might call the office and say, ‘I’m where this restroom is supposed to be, but I can’t find it.’ Then we can go back in time to the last truck used to service that unit and cross-reference to see exactly where that was.”

For keeping trucks on the road, the division has access to two full-time Starr General Contracting mechanics. That in-house capability has come in incredibly handy, most notably one Fourth of July weekend when restrooms were deployed at a number of events across the state.

“We had three trucks down at one point, and they were back up very quickly because we had so many team members available, including the two mechanics,” says Starr. “A competitor would have been in a pinch because July 4 was a Thursday, and no service garage would open until Monday. Our guys came in at 11 p.m. and worked through the night.” 

One truck couldn’t be fixed overnight, so the team shifted the slide-in tank to a spare truck, which was ready to roll by 6 a.m. 

Building the Business

As the division has rapidly evolved, so have the facilities and the team. 

In the beginning, the business was run by Chuck Sr. and Chuck Jr., out of Chuck Starr Sr.’s backyard. After Chuck Sr.’s untimely passing in 2010, Chuck Jr. was able to build the business enough that by 2015, the backyard space had been outgrown and the entire operation moved to a large building space with a mechanic shop and an office in front. 

As of last July, President Chuck Starr Jr. started looking for more yard space or a warehouse to store consumables and other items, and by fall 2024, operations expanded to a second location in Franklinville, just minutes from the main office.

In the end, people have made the restroom business grow. “Our biggest driver is being family-oriented,” says Starr. “Even in the busy times, we try to accommodate people’s schedules and their wants and needs. That derives from being a multigeneration family business. Family is a core value of ours. 

“We recently added company-provided uniforms so our people look better out on the road. We’ve added health benefits as well. We are evolving as a better place to be, a place where people want to come to work.”

Starr Septic Services, Franklinville, New Jersey

PRESIDENT/CEO: Chuck Starr Jr.

YEARS IN BUSINESS: 40

EMPLOYEES: 20

SERVICES: Restroom rental, septic system pumping, inspection, repair and installation, drain cleaning, hydrojetting and commercial grease service

SERVICE AREA: 8 southern New Jersey counties

WEBSITE: starrseptic.com