What to Do When the Rig Count Drops and Rental Tools Sit in the Yard

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By Amanda Leon, founder of OilMoney.io. Houston-raised, came up in the Houston marketing team of Vallourec, and has run Unrth, a brand and growth studio for oil and gas and industrial companies, since 2017, with her boots on client locations in Midland and Odessa. Last reviewed October 21, 2026.

When the rig count drops and your rental tools sit in the yard, spend the slow weeks getting known by the customers you want next, so your name is already familiar to them when work picks up. Plan off dated numbers instead of yard talk, and be straight with yourself about the calls a name can't win.

Nine rounds of interviews. That's what one job in L.A. took, and I wanted it badly enough to go through every one. What we work for, we value. Customers aren't so different: a name they've watched do good work for a while carries more weight with them than one that just showed up on their phone. A slow yard hands you rounds of your own. Put them in now with the customers you want next, so when work picks up, they've already seen what you do and your first call to them isn't a cold one.

Where the Permian Rig Count Stood

Baker Hughes counted 272 rigs in the Permian for the week ending October 16, 2026, down 2 from the week before, while the total U.S. count held at 603, according to Oil & Gas 360's report on the Baker Hughes numbers. Two rigs in one week is a wiggle, and nobody should re-plan a territory over a wiggle.

Rental and fishing work rides on what the rigs are doing, so the count deserves a glance every week and a hard look every quarter. When you take the hard look, hold the count against a month ago and against the start of the year. One reading tells you very little. A run of months tells you what to plan for.

For the wider Permian picture in your line of work, see Oilfield Rental Tools and Fishing Sales in the Permian Basin, Without More Windshield Time.

What the Last Drop Looked Like: 304 to 247 Rigs

The last real drop isn't ancient history. The Permian count started 2025 at 304 rigs and fell through the year to 247 on December 30, 2025, an 18.75 percent drop, according to Baker Hughes figures reported by Permian Basin Oil and Gas Magazine.

Two things about that drop are worth carrying forward. It ran the whole year, and a drop that plays out over twelve months gives a rep time to get ready, if he uses it. And if you were selling through 2025, your own book holds better detail on that year than any magazine does.

Before 2025 fades, write down what it taught you:

  • Which customers kept a rig running, and who on their side kept calling you.
  • Which tools stayed out longest, and which came back to the yard first.
  • Which calls you lost to a cheaper bid or to stock somebody else had on the shelf.
  • Which customers you wish you'd known before the count started falling.

That last one is where your rounds start.

The Rebound, in One Frac Company's Words

On July 29, 2026, with its second-quarter results, ProPetro, a public frac company, said industry attrition had meaningfully reduced available frac capacity, and it pointed to early pricing momentum. It said the Permian Basin rig count was up nearly 10% from its first-quarter low, and that it expected to activate a thirteenth active frac fleet.

That's a frac company's read on frac, from July. It's still worth a rental rep's attention for what the company talked about once the count came off its low: capacity and price. When work does come back, a customer who needs a tool calls somebody fast, and you'd want to already be in his phone by then.

In the week ending October 16, 2026, the Permian count was 272, above the 247 where 2025 ended. Rounds you put in during a low month don't expire when the count turns.

Tight Margins, Even on the Way Back Up

The Dallas Fed's third-quarter 2026 survey, which covers oilfield service firms overall rather than rental alone, put the input cost index at 60.4 against a prices received index of 16.3. Both are indexes, not dollars: above zero means more firms reported an increase than a decrease. On net, costs were climbing for far more firms than prices were.

One respondent wrote, "We continue to see pricing pressure from operators."

In a rental yard, that squeeze has a shape you already know. Tools sitting still cost money to inspect and keep ready, and the operator on the other end of the phone is the one applying the pressure that respondent described. That's why a cheaper vendor can look awfully good in a slow month, even to a customer who likes you.

Put In Your Rounds While the Tools Sit

This is the work I'd do in a slow yard, roughly in this order:

  1. Name the customers you want next. Leave off the ones who already call you. Write down the operators, drilling superintendents, and company men you haven't worked for, and what each of them would need from a rental or fishing hand. How to Get New Customers for Oilfield Rental Tools and Fishing Jobs walks through finding them.
  2. Show the work they'd hire you for. A fishing job that came out clean, a tool that saved a trip, a problem your shop solved at a bad hour. Tell it under your own name, and leave out any customer who hasn't said yes to being named.
  3. Put your weekly answers in writing. The rep who explained it before the job is the one a junior engineer remembers when the job comes.
  4. Stay close to the customers you have. Ask about their work, not your inventory, so the new names don't cost you the old ones.
  5. Know when the budgets get set. Your rounds count for more if they land before next year's plan is written. See When Do Oil and Gas Operators Set Their Budgets for Next Year?

The Warm Walk-In™ takes most of the writing in steps two and three off your plate: you give us one story dump a quarter, and we turn it into posts in your voice on a fixed calendar, each one approved by you, so your name keeps putting in rounds while you're out on a job. There's more for reps like you on the rental tools and fishing page.

What a Permian Founder Wrote After His Intake

After his intake, a Permian service-company founder we work with, fourth generation in the oilfield, wrote that he was "impressed y'all came up with as many topics from my intake form". A slow week in the yard is a good week for yours, because the jobs are fresh in your head and the phone is quiet enough to tell them. Read the full story.

Where Price and Inventory Decide

When rigs drop, a cheaper vendor with stock on the shelf can win the call no matter whose name is better known. And if a customer has a first-call agreement with somebody else, that agreement doesn't move because you post. I'd rather you hear that from me now than learn it in the yard.

So sort your calls. Where price and inventory decide, compete on price and inventory, or let the call go. Your name has its best shot with the operator you haven't worked for yet, and on the job where the tools on both shelves match and the buyer picks the person.

If your customer gets acquired, that's a different problem with its own page: What Happens to Your MSA When Your Customer Gets Acquired. And if the whole pipeline thins out at once, start with What Do I Do When Oil Drops and My Pipeline Dries Up?

Get Your Bison Walk-Around

While the tools sit, let us take the first look. Send us your LinkedIn. We'll send back the Bison Walk-Around: five minutes of plain English on what's costing you callbacks and what we'd build. No call. No invoice. We give first.

Get your Bison Walk-Around

Sources and As-Of Dates

The Warm Walk-In™ is an original method created by Amanda Leon and owned by The Valours Creative Innovation LLC.

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