Mar 1, 2008 12:00 PM

The company finds the engineering software particularly useful for the specialized trucks that railroads require.

“CAD data on all the tools that railroads typically need have been loaded into our computer library,” Dondlinger says. “We incorporate that data into the drawings we produce of the trucks we build. The software we have enables us to produce three-dimensional drawings of the trucks before we ever cut metal.”

Major customers

Government agencies in the Chicago area are a major source of business for the Bensenville location. Auto Truck is the City of Chicago's supplier for products such as dump trucks, snow and ice equipment, platform bodies equipped with liftgates, and hazmat trucks.

O'Hare Airport has some unusual truck needs. Auto Truck engineered and produced a mobile weather station for the airport as well as a mobile x-ray unit. The truck-mounted system, enclosed inside a van body, is designed to screen suspicious luggage away from the airport, protecting the building and its occupants.

Railroads are another consumer of highly specialized truck equipment. Auto Truck's strength with railroads has helped propel the company into its present position as an upfitter with a national customer base.

National scope

Auto Truck's base in the Chicago area is also the home for a number of national fleets. But it is the company's ship-through operations that have really enabled Auto Truck to serve the national market.

Auto Truck made its first move as a ship-through operation in 1987, just after General Motors began truck production in Fort Wayne.

The company subsequently increased its national footprint by acquiring Layton Truck Equipment in Colorado Springs. Formerly owned by a car dealer, Layton had considerable experience operating chassis pools by the time Auto Truck acquired them. Auto Truck further strengthened its presence in Colorado by opening a second Layton shop in Denver.

Keeping it together

Managing a multi-location as geographically widespread as the Auto Truck Group takes skill and technology. Thanks in large part to computer and telecommunication systems, the company can operate its Louisville location with only two people in the front office — in spite of the fact that thousands of trucks move through the two Louisville shops each year.

The same can't be said of Bensenville, where the company's engineering and administrative staffs are concentrated.

“We have the ability to work with the same customer out of any of our locations,” Jones says. “All of our locations are supported by the same computer system based in Bensenville. It's a major advantage. With it, we can save huge sums of money, particularly in our accounting expenses and in the level of inventory we need.”

The software, a product of Spokane Computer, has been part of the Auto Truck Group since 1999. The system has been able to keep up with the company's expansion, enabling the locations to network easily.

“There's no way we do what we do without being able to operate these locations under a single system,” Jones says.

At it a long time

It's not surprising that Auto Truck has it figured out by now. The company celebrates 90 years of doing business this year.

The company got its start at the end of the war — World War I — and has remained a family business all these years. Founded by Eugene Dondlinger in 1918, Auto Truck is now in its fourth generation of Dondlinger family management. Jim Dondlinger, Eugene Dondlinger's grandson, has overall management responsibility. Pete Dondlinger, Jim's son, manages the Bensenville operation.

Jim Dondlinger sees a simple reason for the company's success.

“We bring value to the customer,” he says. “If the customer wants a $100,000 truck, he needs to get it the way he wants it. We make trucks into tools, and it's something we have been doing since 1918.”

Auto Truck Vice-President Dennis Jones chosen NTEA president

Dennis Jones, vice-president of sales & marketing for Auto Truck Group, was installed as the 44th president of the National Truck Equipment Association February 27 during the association's recent convention.

Jones accepted the gavel from immediate past president Tom Rawson, CEO of RKI Inc of Houston, Texas, during the President's Breakfast and annual meeting in Atlanta, Georgia.

Jones began his career in the truck industry upon graduating from The College of St. Thomas in 1973.

He worked first at the Truck Division of International Harvester. He joined the Auto Truck Group in 1986, helping launch the Fort Wayne operation.

“This was a major transition for me. I went from buying truck equipment from distributors to selling and installing truck equipment for the very customers by whom I used to be employed,” he says. “Building a facility from 13 acres of weeds, opening it without a truck on the ground and operating it for many years has been a very rewarding adventure.”

Auto Truck Group has been a distributor member of the NTEA since 1973. Jones has served on the NTEA Board of Trustees since 2003.

“I am both excited and committed to the role of president of the NTEA and the opportunity to lead the board in furthering the association's ability to serve this great industry,” Jones says. “NTEA has given so much and in many different ways already, yet I believe as our industry changes we have just begun our work. Thank you for allowing me to represent you.”

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