The RJ Towing Family Story: 15 Years on San Diego Roads

Most people don't think about towing companies until they need one. You're stranded somewhere, your car won't move, and you're searching your phone for whoever can get to you fastest. You don't care about their story. You care about how long it takes them to show up.

I understand that. But if you have a few minutes, maybe right now, maybe after we've already helped you and you're curious about who showed up at 2 AM on a Tuesday, here's who we are.

My name is Robert. I own RJ Towing Service. We're a family-owned towing company based in San Diego, and we've been on these roads for over fifteen years.

How It Started

I didn't grow up planning to run a towing company. But when you're from a family that works with their hands, that fixes things, that shows up when people need help, the towing business makes a kind of sense that's hard to explain to people who haven't done it.

The beginning was one truck. One phone. And a willingness to answer that phone at any hour.

The early calls were the ones that taught me the most. Every stranded driver has a different situation, a different stress level, a different need. Some people are calm. Some are scared. Some are angry, not at you, but at the situation. A young mother with a flat tire on I-5 at night with her kids in the backseat needs something different from a guy whose classic car won't start in his Hillcrest driveway on a Saturday afternoon. The towing is the same. The human part is not.

Those early years were about learning to handle both, the mechanical and the personal. How to load every kind of vehicle safely. And how to show up to every call as a person, not just a service provider.

Building the Fleet

One truck became two. Then three. Each new truck meant we could cover more of San Diego County without leaving anyone waiting too long. The goal was never to be the biggest towing company in the city, there are companies here with 50 trucks. The goal was to be the one people called back. The one they saved in their phone.

Today we run a fleet of five-plus trucks, flatbeds, wheel-lifts, and medium-duty rigs. Each one represents a bet we made on this business and on this city. Flatbeds because modern cars, EVs, and anything with all-wheel drive need zero-contact transport. Wheel-lifts because they're fast, they fit in tight spots, and they handle the bread-and-butter towing work that keeps the city moving. Medium-duty because San Diego has box trucks, delivery vans, shuttle buses, and RVs that need help too.

Every truck in the fleet is maintained on a strict schedule. When you're running 24/7, there's no room for a truck that's out of service because someone skipped maintenance. A broken-down tow truck helps nobody.

Both Sides of the Border

One thing that sets RJ Towing apart from nearly every other towing company in San Diego is that we serve both sides of the border. We have a dedicated Tijuana phone line, (664) 801-9382, and we handle towing between San Diego and Tijuana regularly.

This isn't a service we bolted on because it seemed like a good business opportunity. It's part of who we are. Our family has roots in the border region. We speak both languages fluently. We understand the logistics, the insurance requirements, the customs process, the port-of-entry timing, the relationships with officials on both sides.

Most San Diego towing companies won't cross the border. They don't have the insurance, the language skills, or the operational knowledge. When a driver's car breaks down in Tijuana and they need it brought back to San Diego, they usually face a confusing chain of subcontractors, handoffs, and miscommunication. We handle the entire process, one company, one point of contact, from pickup in TJ to delivery in SD.

San Diego is a binational city. The border isn't just a line on a map, hundreds of thousands of people cross it daily for work, family, shopping, healthcare. A towing company that serves San Diego without serving the border corridor is leaving a huge part of the community underserved.

The Team

I'm careful about who drives our trucks. When you call RJ Towing, the person who shows up represents our family name. That matters to me personally. Every driver we employ is someone I trust to treat your vehicle like their own and to treat you like a person having a hard day, because that's what a towing call is. Nobody calls a tow truck because everything is going great.

Our team is bilingual. Every dispatcher and every driver speaks English and Spanish. In a city where a significant percentage of the population speaks Spanish as a first language, this isn't a bonus, it's a baseline. If you're stressed, stranded, and worried, you should be able to communicate in the language you think in.

What a 24-Hour Day Looks Like

People sometimes ask what it's like to run a 24/7 business. The honest answer is that your phone never fully stops being a work phone. At 3 AM on a Wednesday, someone's car is going to break down somewhere in San Diego, and they're going to call. And someone on our team is going to answer, dispatch a truck, and go help them.

A typical day in the RJ Towing dispatch log might look like this:

6:15 AM, Jumpstart call in Chula Vista. A nurse finishing a night shift at Sharp Chula Vista Medical Center comes out to a dead battery. We get her started so she can get home.

8:40 AM, Lockout at a Starbucks in Hillcrest. Keys on the passenger seat, doors locked. We unlock it in four minutes.

10:00 AM, Flatbed tow of a Tesla Model 3 from a body shop in Kearny Mesa to the owner's home in Carmel Valley. Post-repair delivery. The owner can't drive it yet because they're still waiting on a calibration appointment.

12:30 PM, Flat tire on I-805 near the 54 merge. The driver has a spare but no jack. We change it and torque the lugs to spec.

2:15 PM, Accident tow in National City. Two-car collision at an intersection. We work with SDPD on scene, tow both vehicles to the insurance-approved body shop. Bilingual communication with one of the drivers who speaks only Spanish.

4:45 PM, Fuel delivery in La Jolla. A UCSD student ran out of gas on Torrey Pines Road. We deliver 3 gallons and she makes it to the nearest station.

7:30 PM, Cross-border tow. A family's van broke down in Tijuana near Avenida Revolución. We pick up on the TJ side, process through San Ysidro, and deliver to their home in San Ysidro.

11:00 PM, Winch-out at Silver Strand. Someone drove too far onto the beach and got buried in sand. We pull them out.

2:45 AM, Emergency tow on I-5 northbound near Old Town. Engine failure. The car is blocking the right lane. We get there fast, load it, and clear the lane.

No two days are the same. But the rhythm is consistent, people need help, and we go.

Why This Work Matters

Towing isn't glamorous work. Nobody's making a documentary about it. The trucks are loud, the hours are unpredictable, and you spend a lot of time on freeway shoulders with traffic blowing past you at 70 miles per hour.

But it matters. Every call is someone in a situation they can't fix alone. A parent with a broken-down car and a sick kid who needs to get to Rady Children's Hospital. A college student stranded in an unfamiliar neighborhood at night. A couple whose car died on their way home from the airport at midnight with all their luggage.

We don't just move vehicles. We restore people's ability to get where they need to go. That sounds like a tagline, but when you've done it a few thousand times, you realize it's literally what the job is.

Community Connection

We live in San Diego. Our kids go to school here. We shop at the same stores our customers shop at. When I'm off the clock, which isn't as often as my family would like, I'm at the same parks, the same restaurants, the same neighborhoods that our drivers serve every day.

Being a family business in a city this size means you see repeat customers. You tow someone's car, they call you back six months later for a jump start, they refer their neighbor, and their neighbor refers a coworker. That network of trust is something a national chain or an app-dispatched tow can't replicate. When you call RJ Towing, you're calling a family that lives here. We have every reason to do right by you, because we'll see you at the grocery store.

Looking Forward

Fifteen years in, I'm more committed to this business than I was on day one. The city is growing. The vehicles are changing, more EVs, more technology, more complexity. The border region is evolving. And the need for reliable, honest, professional towing isn't going away.

Our plans for the future are straightforward: keep growing the fleet so our response times stay fast. Keep training our team on new vehicle technology. Keep serving both sides of the border, because that's who we are. And keep answering the phone at 3 AM, because someone in San Diego is going to need us.

If you've made it this far, thank you for reading. If you ever need help on the road, a tow, a jump, a lockout, a tire, anything, call us at (619) 872-5285. If you're south of the border, call (664) 801-9382. We'll be there.

, Robert
Owner, RJ Towing Service

RJ Towing Service is a family-owned towing and roadside assistance company based at 2881 G St, San Diego, CA 92102. We provide emergency towing, flatbed towing, accident towing, roadside assistance, jumpstart service, lockout service, tire service, fuel delivery, and cross-border towing to Tijuana. 15+ years in business. 5.0 Google rating. 24/7/365. Fully bilingual English and Spanish. Call (619) 872-5285.