With an engineering background and an interest in building things, Anthony Halsch took a natural interest to shipping containers.
What he realized at his first container sales company was that the industry was stagnant, lacking the innovative thinking to bring it forward. After a couple of years brokering container deals across the country, Halsch stepped outside of the box.
He took on an investor and built out his first container bar for his new Denver-based startup, Roxbox.
Fast forward a few years and the company is experiencing explosive growth as it builds out its product portfolio. No longer is Roxbox just a mobile bar manufacturer, it now touts a lineup that includes outdoor dining options, modular office construction, bitcoin mining and much more.
“We can pretty much build anything,” Halsch said, as the hum of machinery buzzed in the background.
Amid Covid-19, Roxbox has seen an increased demand for its offerings, across a variety of industries.
“As unfortunate as 2020 has been for everybody else, fortunately for us, our infrastructure solutions are able to help out substantially within this pandemic situation,” Halsch said.
The company recently introduced its Patiobox offering, a product designed to help restaurants remain open and compliant during Covid-19 indoor dining closures. The boxes come in multiple sizes and are able to accommodate up to 36 guests with multiple openings, lights and electrical hookups, heaters and three glass roll-up doors.
COO Beau Bergman said once the state announced its outdoor dining extension, Roxbox jumped at the opportunity to develop a portable solution. The Patiobox, which he compared to a metal tent, is just one example of Roxbox’s agility as a startup.
“We can innovate products quickly and get them to a very high quality very fast,” Bergman said.
Roxbox Containers
As the current pandemic has caused near- or at-capacity hospital systems, Roxbox is ready to deploy a solution for the health care industry. Halsch said the company is able to customize their shipping containers for a variety of medical uses, including mobile ICUs and Covid-19 testing centers, as well as vaccine storage and distribution.
The 40-foot containers can have three exam rooms or two ICU-level rooms complete with hospital level air filtration. To date, the company hasn’t received orders for this product, but remains ready and waiting to step-up.
“It’s been very weird to go through this whole pandemic, the entire summer and be waiting for an order of these,” he said. “They keep pushing it off, pushing it off and now we’re behind the eight ball and we’re surging again and hospitals are running out of capacity. It’s been really tough for us to sit here and watch this.”
In addition to a traditional grid-tied unit, Roxbox is currently developing a solar container that has freezing and cold-storage capabilities, while remaining off the power grid.
As it continues growing, the 12-person company is focused on leveraging its partnerships to grow its customer base and increase market awareness.
“Our methodology is shifting a little bit from one-off custom projects for the local bar and restaurant to working with national franchises and chains and Fortune 500s to be an additional manufacturer for them,” Halsch said.
