Home Is Where The Horsepower Is
St. Joseph Truck Technician takes pride in his work and his community.
Trucking’s often a solitary job — days, sometimes weeks, spent alone in the cab. But it’s a sense of community that brings truckers to the Foley Truck Service in St. Joseph, Missouri.That’s what Matt Lee believes, anyway. And he ought to know. He’s spent nearly half of his 28-year career as a service technician there — and his roots in St. Joseph date back even further.
“This is home,” Matt says. “I know who my customers are, and they know me.”
A love for horsepower
Matt was born in St. Joseph and raised in a small town nearby. His love for all things mechanical goes back as far as he can remember.
“My mom would tell you she knew I was going to be a mechanic when I was 3 years old,” Matt says. That’s when he took apart the family’s wind-up alarm clock to figure out what made the “tick-tick” sound.
Matt studied truck and tractor mechanics at Linn State Technical College, then started work at Dean Machinery (later purchased by Foley Equipment) in 1995. After about a dozen years as a field service technician, he transitioned to the trucking side of the business. It was a natural fit.
“My dad drove a truck, and I’ve been around trucks all my life,” Matt says. “I’ve always had that love of making horsepower.”
360 degrees of service
Making horsepower — or more accurately, maintaining it — is Matt’s top priority at the St. Joseph Foley Truck Service. Despite the fact that the shop is owned and operated by Foley Equipment, a Cat® dealer, you won’t find him working solely on Cat powered trucks.
“We’re not just Caterpillar, and we don’t just work on engines,” Matt says. “We’re here to serve any type of trucking outfit.”
That includes all makes and models of trucks — from Freightliner and Kenworth to Mack and Peterbilt and beyond — plus brakes, clutches, differentials, drivelines, electrical systems, engines and transmissions of various brands.
“The idea behind Foley Truck Service is that we’re going to do everything we can all the way around the truck,” Matt says. “We do whatever we can to serve the customer, and we do it as quickly and cost-effectively as possible.”
Service isn’t limited to big rigs, either. The St. Joseph Foley Truck team works on trucks of all sizes, other vehicles like school buses and even industrial equipment. Recently, they also started performing more onsite work — taking their tools and talents to customers whose trucks rarely leave a facility or aren’t licensed to do so.
Still running an older truck engine, like a 3406B or 3406C? Matt and his team have you covered there, too.
“The technology has changed a lot in my years here, but I was blessed to learn from the old truck engine experts,” Matt says. “We still know how to support the old mechanical engines. I actually look forward to working on them.”
A meeting of the minds
Matt brings nearly three decades of technical know-how to every job — a level of expertise that’s hard to find at other local truck shops. But he insists it’s the collective experience of the four St. Joseph-based technicians that truly sets Foley apart.
One team member, for example, is a Cummins engine specialist. Another brings a strong PACCAR/Kenworth background.
“We’re more diversified now than we’ve ever been before, and that’s saying something,” Matt says. “We share our thoughts and help each other out wherever we can. We’re each one person with four minds, so to speak.”
Actually, five minds — because Matt and his team are committed to bringing the customer into the process.
“At a lot of other places, you’re going to talk to the service manager or advisor,” Matt says. “Here, you get to talk to someone who’s hands on with your truck. This is one of the very few shops I’ve been into where customers have an opportunity to build a relationship with the technicians.”
The advantage of that approach? Speed.
“As technicians, we’re getting the information straight from the customer, and we’ll call them directly if we have more questions or see other issues,” Matt says. “We spend a lot less time trying to figure out the problem when we’re talking directly to the customer. We can move things along and get them back on the job fast.”
Building the tools of the trade
Getting trucks back to work requires trained technicians, so Matt’s doing his part to help ease the skills gap that’s affecting the entire industry. He sits on the advisory board for the diesel technology program at Northland Career Center in Platte City and works with other area schools to get the word out about the skilled trades.
“I like to talk to students and parents about the trades and that they’re no longer the place you go because you didn’t want to go to college,” Matt says. “With the cost of college these days, the trades are where it’s at.”
He’s also spent nearly 20 years volunteering with Cub Scout and Boy Scout troops in the St. Joseph community, spearheading local pinewood derby races.
“My boys were involved with it, and then I got involved with them, and I just never stopped,” Matt says. “It’s my way of helping build better men in the world. It’s my way of giving back to the community.”
A community that Matt — and the whole Foley Truck team — is proud to call home.
History is made here
What do the rapper Eminem, the outlaw Jesse James, thousands of migrants on the Oregon Trail, thousands of messages delivered via Pony Express, the Kansas City Chiefs and the Cherry Mash have in common?
Actually, “Where do they have in common?” might be a better question. The answer is St. Joseph, Missouri. Officially incorporated in 1843, the city was one of the jumping-off points for travelers headed west on the Oregon Trail. Between April 1860 and October 1861, it was one of two endpoints of the Pony Express, the short-lived express mail service connecting the Wild West with the rest of the nation. In 1882, Jesse James was shot at his home in St. Joseph.More recent history: Eminem was born here in 1972, though he grew up in Detroit, Michigan. And the Kansas City Chiefs have held summer training camp at Missouri Western State University in St. Joseph for 13 years. St. Joseph is also where the very first Cherry Mash candy was concocted.
At Foley, our St. Joseph ties date back to 1957, when the original Midland Machinery established a branch store in the community.