Ask Michael Hinton about living in Woodson, ARK, and he’ll tell you straight up: There’s no place he would rather be.

It wasn’t always that way, of course.

Woodson, ARK, a small incorporated community in Southern Pulaski County, is where Michael was born and raised. It’s the kind of place where everybody knows everybody. Michael’s entire family grew up mere streets away from him – aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, and more. His first round in Woodson, he couldn’t wait to get out.

But life has a funny way of circling back.

Upon graduating, Michael joined the Navy. He saw the world, made some great friends, and kept moving, from place to place, and job to job, most recently as a driver for a plumbing company. Eight years ago, he landed back in Woodson, and with it, a career with Datamax as a delivery driver.

In both instances, Michael, who’s traveled the world and is on the road for the better part of every workday, has found a great place to settle in. Just as he’s grown into his Datamax role and intentionally honed his skills as a valuable team asset, he’s grown to like — love, even — his hometown.

So what makes Woodson such a great place today, for himself and his three English Mastiff “babies”?

Well, it has a lot to do with family.

“I find a lot more peace down there, the older I get. It’s nice to have my family there all in one place. Especially in this day and time, with people passing away unexpectedly. It’s important to spend as much time as you can with your loved ones,” Michael says.

Delivering With Intentionality. 

To put it simply, Michael is always prepared.

From pulling up his next delivery on Google Street View to scout the location, to checking with multiple parties to see if stairs are present, to taking all measures to make sure equipment is loaded exactly to spec, Michael is extremely intentional in his delivery approach.

But he’s also intentionally taking on more, by learning general connectivity skills to be of even more value once the equipment is off the truck.

“I don’t think I could ever learn enough, not just at Datamax but in life itself,” Michael said. “There’s always room to learn and grow. The more I know, the less pressure I can take off another guy on my team. Sometimes we have a Connect Team member who might be running behind; someone might be out with COVID; so if I can deliver a machine, pop a couple of IP addresses in, that takes some of the pressure off my team.”

Delivering for the Customer.

Perhaps Michael’s favorite part of his job? Seeing the customers’ faces as the new Canon or Konica Minolta device rolls out into their office floor. Or, as he calls it, “Christmas in July.”

“I love interacting with the customers. It’s always a great feeling to see their reactions. It honestly feels like, hey, we are making a difference. I know some people’s jobs just feel like a regular job, and they start to ask themselves if they are really making a difference. I believe that we are.”

Delivering for the Family.

In a way, it’s the same feeling he gets back home in Woodson.

He delivers for a lot of reasons, but mostly for the folks he shares four walls with on Kanis Road every workday. His logistics crew. His supervisors. The people in admin and sales. Datamax feels a lot like family to Michael today.

“The people here at this job are basically what makes this such a great fit for me. The personalities. Everybody pretty much gets along…. I was sick for a little while, and Barry called and checked in on me. Ken Allison called me. Tony called me. All these people I knew I had a good relationship with, but I didn’t know to what extent. It was really cool.”

Michael admits the past two years haven’t been easy. Delivery drivers, after all, don’t get to work from home, and walking into businesses with COVID looming had its scary moments. But just as he always does, he stayed prepared. He put on the mask, sanitized at every turn, got in and got out, never considering turning back.

“It’s like, let’s suit up and do what we gotta do, and be as careful as we gotta be to get the job done,” Michael says. “There wasn’t a day that I was like, ‘I’m not doing it.’”

And with that, he pauses to reflect on the past couple of years, his career at Datamax, and tries to convey what sustains his drive to deliver again and again and again for his team.

His explanation? Well, it has a lot to do with family.