● Open 24 Hours, 7 Days  ·  ● Under 30-Minute Response in Portage  ·  ● Serving Kalamazoo County Since 2018

☎ (269) 350-8697
☎ Call Now — (269) 350-8697
Portage Tow Truck operators standing beside a flatbed tow truck in Portage, Michigan

  Independent and locally run since 2018

About Portage Tow Truck

A small, independent towing and roadside outfit working Portage and Kalamazoo County. No franchise agreement, no dispatch center three states away, and no repair shop of our own.

☎ Call (269) 350-8697

Who you’re calling

A Local Operation, Not a Call Center

Portage Tow Truck has been running since 2018. We are independently owned, based in Portage, and we are not part of a national towing network or a lead-broker platform. When you call the number on this site, the phone rings here — not at a booking desk in another state that then shops your job around to whoever answers first.

That matters more than it sounds. A lot of what looks like a local tow company online is a marketing layer sitting on top of whichever truck is available. You get quoted one price, dispatched by someone with no local knowledge, and the operator who turns up has no relationship with the person who took your money. We do our own dispatching and drive our own trucks, so the price we agree on the phone is the price you pay the operator.

We cover Portage in both the 49002 and 49024 ZIP codes and work outward roughly 20 miles from there — Kalamazoo, Oshtemo, Comstock, Parchment, Vicksburg, Schoolcraft, Richland, Galesburg and Mattawan. We run 24 hours a day, every day, including the nights nobody wants to be out in.

Our aim in Portage itself is to be with you inside 30 minutes. That is a target rather than a promise. Traffic on Westnedge, weather in February and where you are relative to the truck all move that number, and we would rather give you a realistic ETA on the phone than a flattering one.

The short version

Independent since 2018Locally owned. No parent company, no franchise, no national call center taking a cut.
Towing and roadside onlyWe do not run a repair shop, so we have nothing to gain by towing your car to one.
Open 24 hours, 7 daysNights, weekends and holidays. The same two people you would get at noon.
Every truck typeFlatbed, wheel-lift, and full heavy-duty up to Class 8 including on-scene load transfers.
Priced before we rollYou get a figure in US dollars on the call, not a surprise at the drop-off.

The people, not the logo

Who Actually Shows Up

It is a short list, and that is the point. You are not getting a rotating pool of subcontractors.

David Peterson — Owner

Fifteen-plus years in towing and recovery. David owns the business, answers a good share of the calls himself, and still drives. If you have a question about a price or a complaint about a job, he is the one who deals with it — there is no layer above him.

Mike Thompson — Lead Operator

Over a decade on the trucks. Mike handles most of the technical recovery work — winch-outs, awkward-access jobs and the heavy-duty side, including load transfers done on the scene rather than dragging a loaded trailer somewhere first.

The person on the phone

One of the two of them, or someone who works directly with them. They know where Romence Road is, which Portage apartment decks have low clearance, and which I-94 exits are miserable in the dark. That shapes the ETA you get told.

How we work

The Rules We Run By

Your car goes where you say

Because we own no repair shop, we have no financial interest in your destination. Your mechanic, your dealer, your driveway — you name it, we take it there. This is the single biggest reason people call us back.

The right truck, even when it costs us

If your vehicle needs a flatbed, we send a flatbed and say why, rather than putting it on a cheaper wheel-lift and hoping. Getting the drivetrain call wrong is expensive months later, and it would be your bill, not ours.

An honest ETA

If we are on the far side of the county or stuck in a recovery, we tell you a real number. In an ice storm on M-43 that might be 90 minutes. You can decide with accurate information; you cannot with a comforting guess.

The tow you do not need

A jump start, a fuel drop or a lockout is often cheaper and faster than a tow, and sometimes we will talk you out of the bigger job on the phone. Losing one call is a fair trade for being the number you save.

Price agreed before dispatch

You hear the figure before a truck leaves. Distance, vehicle type and access are what move it, and if the situation on scene turns out to be different from what was described, we talk about it before we start.

Local knowledge, not a map app

Portage neighborhoods with narrow drives, the parking decks off Romence, the on-ramps where a stranded car is genuinely dangerous. Knowing the ground is what turns a 45-minute job into a 20-minute one.

Straight answers

Questions About the Company

How long has Portage Tow Truck been in business?
Since 2018, working out of Portage, Michigan. Between the two of us there is roughly 25 years of towing and recovery experience, most of it earned in Kalamazoo County rather than somewhere else and transplanted here.
Are you part of a national chain or franchise?
No. There is no parent company and no franchise agreement. That means nobody sets our prices from a head office, and it also means we cannot hide behind one when something goes wrong. If a job is handled badly, the owner is the person you speak to about it.
Do you have your own repair shop?
No, and we think that is a feature. Towing companies attached to a garage make money twice — once on the tow, again on the repair — which quietly influences where your car ends up. We only make money on the tow, so we will take your vehicle to whichever shop you choose, or to your own driveway if you would rather sort it out yourself.
How far out from Portage do you go?
Our routine coverage runs about 20 miles from Portage, which takes in Kalamazoo, Oshtemo, Comstock, Parchment, Vicksburg, Schoolcraft, Richland, Galesburg and Mattawan. We also do long-distance work well beyond that — out-of-state moves included — but those are quoted individually and booked rather than dispatched on the spot.
Is the 30-minute response time realistic?
Inside Portage, most of the time, yes — it is what we aim for and usually hit. It is a target rather than a guarantee, and we will not pretend otherwise. Snow, a truck already committed to a recovery, or a location out toward the edge of the county all push it out. You will be told the actual number on the call, not the marketing one.
Do you only tow cars, or heavy vehicles too?
Both. Standard passenger vehicles are the bulk of the work, but we handle the full heavy-duty range up to Class 8 — tractor units, loaded trailers, box trucks and buses — including load transfers carried out on the scene. Motorcycles are handled as their own job with proper straps and a chock, not treated as a small car.
Who owns the trucks you send out?
We do. Every job is run on our own equipment by our own operators — we do not sell your call on to a third party and take a margin, which is what a lot of the listings you find online actually do. It means we can tell you honestly which truck is coming and roughly when, because we know exactly where it is.

What We Do

Flatbed Towing

All four wheels off the ground. The default for all-wheel drive, electric and low-clearance vehicles.

Heavy-Duty Towing

Up to Class 8, including on-scene load transfers for tractor units and loaded trailers.

Winch-Out & Recovery

Ditches, snowbanks and soft ground around Kalamazoo County — often without a tow at all.

Stuck Somewhere in Portage?

Call and you will get one of us, at any hour. Tell us where you are and what it is doing.

☎ Call (269) 350-8697
Portage Tow Truck
Portage, MI 49002 & 49024
Phone: (269) 350-8697
Email: info@portagetowtruck.com
Open 24 hours, 7 days a week