About Us

My name is Ron Guenther, “Pickle” to friends and family the founder of PickleBarrel Dillivers 24/7, Lewis County, Washington. I have never had the desire to move out of the area. Here we have four distinct seasons, comfortably warm-hot summers, cool damp and wet rainy windy falls, guaranteed wet, cold and some snowy freezing winter days and the blossoming warm hydrated springs. Springtime is the best season, longer daylight days, bright bone warming sun rays, and calm weathered evenings give ambition to all that’s tired of the packing firewood and cold wet winter.

As for the nickname, “Pickle”, that goes back to the 3rd grade in Napavine, WA. Meatloaf, tunafish, peanut butter, sandwiches, and home made dill pickles were my go to brown sack school lunch daily. With this combination, you can only surmise how I acquired the nickname “Pickle” from fellow classmates.

At a young age I was fascinated with the mechanical workings of equipment, transmissions, differentials, anything that had moving parts and did mechanical advantage work, especially like in a transmission box where I couldn’t see the actual moving gears, shafts, and oil slinging around doing the multiplied work and speed. In my highschool years, I could be found helping somebody that had a greasy oily vehicle fix-it project. Engines, clutches, transmissions, were a new and exciting adventure to satisfy my curiosity.

After High School, I enrolled at the Olympia Technical Community College in the Diesel Heavy Equipment Mechanic Trade School Program. Shop time and hands-on experience time was awesome, paperwork and bookwork I could have done without, but gotta take the bad with the good. Moving on with an associate technical arts degree in diesel mechanics, and knowing just enough to be dangerous, I got a job with a local trucking company in the shop as a “mechanic”.

Little did they know that I didn’t know sick em’ about semi-trucks – it was challenging, and sometimes a stressful learning curve about Cummins, Cat, Detroit diesel engines, 13-speed Fuller transmissions, Rockwell and Eaton rear ends, and bumper to bumper suspension, frame, and electrical issues. Then, of course, since I went to trade school I also know “how to weld”. There were repairs and fabrication work to do…. “Learn.” Thank God there were acquaintances along my journey who knew something about mechanic work on semi-trucks and could guide me through the trials and errors to become a fleet mechanic. One common thread from my guidance toolbox list of go-to people was: Is it better than the original, will it last, does it make the job less physically demanding and easier, and is it safe? The philosophy of skilled tradesmen.

Fast forward 11 years I landed a retirement dream job at the local P.U.D. fixing equipment, working on a line crew, shipping and receiving warehouse work, and systems dispatcher was the next 31 years of experience. While in dispatch the last few years at P.U.D., a co-worker from a line crew approached me, him knowing I liked a good challenge, and asked me if I could come up with a better way to get material, specifically rock, out to the job site and into the pole hole. His comment 55 gallon barrels, dirt skirts, and shovels just are not working well, I challenge you to come up with something better. Two years later with head scratching, sleepless nights, and weekends in my shop cutting and welding a design prototype ½ scale “Rock Hopper” was born. 

Crudely built and subject to modifications as needed, A twist here, a tweak there, and one year later came the full scale Rock Hopper. With an under the radar test team, several years, and suggestions, they helped me develop the unit into what it is today and, I must add, “they” named it Pickle Barrel.

Recognizing some of the quirky names linemen have for their tools, shotgun, pigtail, hand, chicken lips, bugwire, to name a few, I decided to let their nickname stick, so Pickle Barrel it is.

It’s been suggested by some that it’s too big and heavy, it’s actually physically smaller than a dirt skirt, a little bigger than a 55 gallon drum, but it has test noted lifting eyes with W.L.L. Rated shackles and cable slings included. Others suggest it needs to hold more material which will make it a little bigger yet heavier. At the end of the day, I’ve come to the following conclusion: some will use it, some will not, others will try it, others absolutely not. After five years plus of use and testing and hundreds of poles set, the test team has NOT had one close call to anyone getting hurt using Pickle Barrel, and they have enjoyed not using the #2 shovel and the physical twisting labor that accompanies its use.

Lastly, outside of the prefilling inspections, the only other thing that’s required is an occasional battery swap, an inside rinse, and a squirt of grease. My goal was longevity, user-friendly, and a maintenance-free tool, and I feel mission accomplished.