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BILL JACOB, UPS
by Tara Baukus Mello
Car enthusiasts get your
packages delivered on time
I
t may seem that UPS has been a fixture at the
Street Rod Nationals Plus forever, but the
relationship actually evolved out of the NSRA
making Louisville the permanent home for the
Nationals nearly two decades ago. Louisville
happens to be the airline headquarters for UPS
and a very large number of its 20,000
employees are car enthusiasts who have
attended all the Nationals events, both as
participants and as spectators.
"At the Nats in the early ‘90s, Bob Reynolds
from the NSRA and a couple of the guys who
worked at UPS were telling him Louisville is the
home of the UPS airline and they brainstormed
that it would be cool to have a
UPS counter at the show for
people who wanted to ship
packages home," explains
Bill Jacob, vice president
of Airline Ground
Support Equipment at
UPS Air Group.
The customer counter
appeared the following
year, filled with free packing
materials and staffed by
volunteer UPS employees who
boxed up everything that rodders brought in
Louisville is the UPS airline headquarters and many of its 20,000 employees are car enthusiasts who have
attended the Nationals events, both as participants and as spectators.
82 APRIL 2012
Staffed by UPS volunteers, the
shipping counter allows
rodders to ship items they buy
that they can't easily transport
home. Boxes and packaging
materials are free and packages
are priced at current UPS rates,
though a portion of every
shipment fee goes to charity.
and then slated it to be
shipped all over the world.
Organizing a customer
counter and support for it at
the Nationals was easy.
(Fellow car enthusiasts
surround Bill within his
department, the airline
automotive group, which
primarily focuses on the
vehicles that assist the UPS
airlines with their loads,
including baggage tractors,
movers and like.) "Most of the
people in my department
started out as mechanics and
they are car fanatics as a result,
so they didn't need to be
asked twice if they wanted to
help out at an event where
they could check out more
than 10,000 amazing cars," Bill
says. Bill himself is a rodder,
owning a '66 Corvette, a '51
Chevy pickup he's currently
rodding and a mildly-rodded
'55 Chevy pickup he brings to
the Nationals.
The customer counter has
been a fixture at the
Nationals every year
APRIL 2012 83
since.
While
the
shipping
counter
is now
headed
up by
the
owner of
a local UPS
store who
volunteers her time, it is still staffed by volunteer
UPS employees (present and retired), some of
whom have worked the Nationals customer
counter every year since its inception. Boxes and
packaging materials are free and the volunteers
supply the labor to make sure the rodders latest
treasures are packed securely. Boxes are weighed
and priced at current UPS rates, though a portion
of every shipment fee goes to a charity that UPS
selects.
The brainstorming didn't stop at the Nationals
customer counter, however. The year after that
84 APRIL 2012
Bill Jacob and the Ground
Support Equipment team at
UPS coordinate the
partnership between UPS
and the NSRA, while a team
of UPS car enthusiasts
volunteers their time at the
Street Rod Nationals Plus to
ensure everything operates
smoothly.
was created, the idea to create scales that could
weigh rods came about. "We use scales at every
airport as part of our shipping process, so in the
off-season we took one of our portable scales and
modified it with ramps so a car could be driven
onto it. Then we brought it to the next Nationals
and it's been there ever since," says Bill. UPS uses
the scales as a fundraiser for the designated
charity, with rodders who get their cars weighed
making an on-the-spot donation as they see fit.
About the same time, UPS developed a small line
of merchandise, including rodding-oriented mugs
and T-shirts that it sold as an
additional way to raise
money for its selected
charity.
In the late ‘90s, the
original hot rod UPS
truck arrived at the UPS
display at the Nationals.
It was a stock brown
UPS delivery truck
(called a "package car"
in UPS-speak) with a
flamed nose and
chromed wheels. "It
was a huge hit," Bill
says. "It was so
unlike UPS because we are
such a conservative
company, but this was about
the same time we started a
NASCAR sponsorship too."
The car was displayed at
the Nationals for a couple of
years and people kept asking
to see under the hood and the
UPS volunteers in the booth
were somewhat embarrassed
since it was entirely stock. They
even nicknamed the car "the
poser." At that point, a UPS
employee named Bob Sarges,
who had been overseeing the
UPS program at the Nationals,
advocated to build a "real" UPS
hot rod. The necessary
corporate approvals were
gotten, car enthusiast
volunteers stepped up to
participate in the build and a
variety of rodding companies
donated items. A UPS package
car that had made deliveries
for 20 years and was getting
ready to be retired was
rescued from the crusher for
the project. (Typically, when
UPS vehicles have reached the
UPS employees Dennis Grant,
left, and Doug Feuerhelm, right,
volunteered at the UPS
merchandise booth at the
Nationals, selling T-shirts, posters
and other products whose
proceeds are all donated to
charity.
APRIL 2012 85
Affordable Metal Working Equipment
end of their life span, the useful parts are
removed and the vehicles are sent to be
crushed.)
The volunteer group spent their free time over
one winter building this second UPS rod, which
is thoroughly rodded including a 464-cubic-inch
Ford built by Roush. The car
is not street legal, so it is
transported on a flatbed
trailer to the Nationals, as
well as at other local events
where UPS is involved.
About five years ago,
UPS started
talking with
the NSRA
about how
it could be
more
involved and it
became a sponsor company. It
now sponsors Commercial Way
at the Nationals, selecting three
cars to receive trophies, as well
as sponsors the pins that are
given out to all the NSRA
volunteers that work at the
Nationals.
While UPS may be a
conservative company, the
No trunk space? UPS gets it home for you
T
he UPS shipping counter has
been a long-time staple at the
NSRA Street Rod Nationals Plus in
Louisville, but few people realize
that this counter offers way
more than simply shipping an
item. All the packing materials
are free and the volunteer staff
will box and securely pack
anything you bring them—
including such oddball items as
fenders, bicycles and even a
carousel horse with a pole
running through it! They also
offer an "open box" service,
where you can keep a box with
them open all weekend
dropping off items as you shop.
Shippers pay no extra
charge for these services and
only the standard shipping
rates they'd pay at any UPS
Store. (UPS donates a portion
of the shipping fees to
86 APRIL 2012
charity.)
All boxes are held until
Monday morning when they are
loaded up into the UPS "poser"
(see main article for details) and
brought to a UPS hub near the
Louisville airport to begin their
journey. For packages that are
going UPS Ground, they are
routed onto a series of semitrucks and sometimes railroad
cars, depending on their final
destination. (UPS is the largest
user of the railroad in the U.S.)
For packages that are going
overseas or a faster method
within the U.S., they are routed
through the nearby hub and
over to the Louisville airport
facility, the hub for UPS' airline
fleet where over 150 UPS
airplanes take off and land daily
to transport packages all over
the world.
The Pearl in Texas: Bill is a
rodder who owns a '66
Corvette, a '51 Chevy pickup
he's currently rodding and a
mildly-rodded '55 Chevy pickup
(shown here) he brings to the
Nationals.
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A group of UPS employees who
are car enthusiasts volunteered
their time to build this UPS rod,
which is thoroughly tricked out,
including a 464ci Ford engine
built by Roush.
relationship with the NSRA is a
natural for the Louisville Airline
Headquarters, which has 20,000
employees. "This is where almost
all of our airplane engineers and
mechanics are. These are closet
car guys," says Bill. "We would be
out there on the fairgrounds
regardless. This just gives us a
way to be more involved."
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