OXFORD — Joyce Van Lines is a family-owned business that specializes in providing for people’s moving and storage needs throughout the country.

Whether someone is moving near or far, professionals at Joyce Van Lines work to ensure customers receive a high quality of care and attention.

Joyce Van Lines President Yon Manzano says the business was established in the 1980s when the company’s founder, William Joyce, Sr, was a “truck driver in the industry of household goods and moving.”

Joyce’s career led him to see where other businesses lacked and craft how he could improve the trade to give customers a better experience.

“He saw the deficiencies in the other bigger van lines, that are still around, but he knew how to capitalize on their mistakes and make it more personable for the customer,” Manzano said. “At our company, if you have an issue, the emergency line at night goes to one of our directors — if not to me.”

Manzano shares that not only does Joyce continuing to be very hands-on in the company as CEO and board president, but his son, William Joyce, Jr, also is involved in the family business as the company’s chief operating officer.

Today, Joyce Van Lines has facilities throughout the United States, including Florida, Indiana, and California. It also has multiple locations in Connecticut with its Oxford facility, at 195 Christian Street, being the closest to Newtown.

“We specialize in white glove service,” Manzano said. “Our teams are trained to come into the house, pack everything up, get everything loaded, get everything written up in the inventory, bring it onto the truck, bring it across wherever they are moving to — whether locally or across state lines — and deliver it, and put it where the customer wants it.”

Joyce Van Lines also operates as a professional storage facility that uses sealed wooden vaults, as opposed to closed door storage units.

When a customer wishes to access their storage vault, there is a fee and a warehouse worker onsite assists the customer in the process of moving items around to ensure no damage occurs.

People can store home or commercial business items of a variety of sizes. However, Manzano noted that “what cannot be stored is anything flammable, chemicals, or ammunition.”

Treated Like Family

While Joyce Van Lines does not operate internationally, it does help companies outside the United States have a trusted source for their moving needs stateside.

“We are destination agents for international companies,” Manzano said. “What they do is they call us and say they have a shipment coming in from, any country, usually it’s Italy or Ireland, and they ask us if we can deliver it stateside once it crosses all the customs.”

Another special component of Joyce Van Lines is the company’s relationship with helping the military.

Manzano, who is a military veteran, explained, “We act as agents for the military as far as moving our service personnel from base to base... I take it to heart to make sure that our military customers are very well taken care of. I’ve moved with the military a couple times and had some not great experiences, because the military tends to go with the lowest bidder.”

At Joyce Van Lines, Manzano says what sets the company apart from others in its field is their ethos.

“From the top of the ladder all the way to the bottom, everybody is involved in that, and we treat everyone like they are actual family. Every time I get a call from a customer — whether good, bad, or indifferent — I base it off if it was my mom calling and had just moved. That’s the difference… before I worked for Joyce, I’ve used a different company before and you’re just a number to them.” Manzano said.

For those interested in getting an estimate for a move, there are multiple options to do so.

“We offer in home surveys, telephone surveys, and… if someone does not want to deal with talking to a salesperson and feels that is too much pressure, they can go to our website, click the link, and they can do it themselves. Within 72 hours they’ll get back an estimate for their move,” Manzano said.

For more information about Joyce Van Lines, visit joycevanlines.com or call 203-881-1687.

Reporter Alissa Silber can be reached at alissa@thebee.com.