CONSHOHOCKEN, Pa. (KYW Newsradio) -- Larry Borden was living the dream, as the owner of Aardvark, a company that produces marketing experiences, sending branded trucks to festivals and big events to promote products and services from soft drinks to electronics.
"We were in a fun, cool, sexy business," he said in an interview at his spiffy, modern-industrial headquarters in Conshohocken. "Going to the Super Bowl and shooting music videos and working with Lady Gaga and her family."
Then COVID-19 hit.
"I came in every day, and I couldn't do anything. I couldn't even think," he recalled. "Everything I invested my entire life in was on hold."
A week into the COVID-19 closures, Borden stumbled onto an article about Israel's effort to get coronavirus testing to remote areas in shipping containers. And a light went on.
"I said, oh my God, we have this patented vehicle that, with a couple of tweaks, can be turned into a mobile health care unit."
Thus was born the COVID-19 testing truck, which Borden hopes will also serve as a vaccine van and, beyond the virus, for general medical service delivery. It has given Aardvark an entirely new mission.
Larry Borden's company, Aardvark, had to take a major turn after the COVID-19 crisis struck.Pat Loeb/KYW Newsradio
"There's a higher purpose here than just getting trucks on the road and making money, and we all talk about that every day," he said.
The city of Philadelphia, last week, unveiled the Aardvark truck it's leasing to get testing to underserved areas. Chester County has purchased two. Borden has sent trucks all over the country and also to private individuals, including an unnamed client who rented a plain white one to test guests at his daughter's wedding.
Chester County purchased two of the Aardvark's versatile fleet.Pat Loeb/KYW Newsradio
Borden has always considered his fleet the Swiss Army knife of vehicles. They've served as lounges, snack bars, remote offices -- even tiny houses, where hired grandmoms prepared meals to promote a sausage company.
The medical version provides both positive and negative air pressure and can be certified to bio-safety level two.
They are custom built on top of Isuzu chassis at three assembly plants, one near Lancaster, the others in North Carolina and Wisconsin. Aardvark sells some of them, but most of its business is leasing them and providing the driver and all maintenance to the vehicle.
Borden still has some commercial business. The pandemic has created a demand for mobile retail space so customers can browse and buy outdoors. And he'll be ready when large events return. The success of his old model is apparent in his office, in touches like the set of baseball bats autographed by the Phillies' entire starting lineup. (And, yes, the company is named Aardvark so it would be listed first in the yellow pages and business directories).
Borden, though, is pleased with the direction the business has taken.
"There are real lives at stake here and we as a company, with our equipment, are able to allow people to get tested who may not have been able to get tested somewhere else," he said. "We're hoping that it lasts longer than COVID-19."
