For over twenty years Darrell Tarry, Director Of Maintenance at Nagle Companies, a Walbridge, Ohio trucking company, has kept a deep commitment to servicing all of the Nagle equipment to meet the highest industry standards so drivers can have the confidence that their vehicle is safe and ready to meet the demands of the road. Drivers are encouraged to talk directly with the Nagle maintenance team from day one. Mr. Tarry said, “Well some of the things I like to point out is how I make sure I introduce my team to them because I have always wanted a driver to understand that we always have his back and you are not going to be out there broke down and nobody is going to answer the phone. You are going to be able to come in here, you are going to be able to discuss with the technician what you are hearing, what you are feeling and what the truck is doing. When you leave out of here, we want to make sure that you realize that this is a group of guys that really care about you and that you are going down the road safely.”
Mr. Tarry pointed out that the Nagle mechanic team knows all of the equipment very well. He said, “Each one of these guys knows our fleet amazingly well. We are a paperless shop so they can go back and see what repairs have been done, if there is a complaint and if there is consistency to the complaint. There are side notes that they write on their Predictable Maintenance sheets the guys can look at. It is a very family atmosphere here with the technicians and the drivers and we promote interaction between them.”
Keeping ahead of any potential mechanical problems is one of the operating principles at Nagle. “Our preventative maintenance program is extensive”, Mr. Tarry said. “We have a 100-point inspection program every 25,000 and every 50,000 miles on the truck we do a major oil change. Every 25,000 miles we are doing a complete inspection right down to the DOT 396 Forms. And we encourage the drivers to stop by the shop on their way in and report any small things they may have noticed, so we see the vehicles quite often.”
Drivers generally stay with the same truck so they can become very familiar with their assigned vehicle. Mr. Tarry observed, “We only have a few of our local trucks that are slip seated, which means that there could be multiple drivers, but when you are a driver here, you are assigned a very clean, a very neat, complete ready-to-go piece of equipment. We do not move you around unless it is an absolute emergency and the repair would take too long and you still need to make your living.”
And if there is a breakdown while a driver is on the road, Mr. Tarry handles the problem himself. He said, “I handle all of the breakdowns for Nagle, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days out of the year. I used to give it to a mechanic on the weekends and at night but as it turned out I was much faster at making decisions on what we are going to do. I use some networks out there and I have built relationships with both smaller service shops and some of the bigger ones. We have great relationships with them. We stay in our lane so it is kind of easy for people to help you.”
Mr. Tarry feels that working at Nagle, a family-owned company, has real benefits. He said, “I have always worked for family-owned businesses, never been much interested in corporate America. And the four brothers at the time I started really had a deep passion for what their grandfather and father and mother had left behind. It was very intriguing and it has worked out well. It has been a very interesting road learning the refrigerated market, but when you grow with a group of guys your own age it makes it a lot easier when you’re working that way.”
The feedback from drivers through the years has given Mr. Tarry the confidence that the Nagle system works very well. He reported, “I have had more people tell us they appreciate the team here in maintenance and more than where they have been in the past because when they are here they walk in and they are listened to and they are allowed to interact with the actual technician that is going to work on the truck. We do really like them to give us our space once we start, but we do a good job here. I pride myself on the fact that these guys make sure we are safe out on the roads.”
If you are a driver looking for a new job, contact Joanie Rozek at jrosek@naglecompanies.com or just call her at 419-327-0142 and talk to her about all the benefits of working at Nagle Companies.
