Season 2, Episode 58 - Delia Moon Meier: Iowa 80, The World’s Largest Truck Stop

 

 

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Jay “Lightning” Tilles (0s):

The subject line to this email to Lightning at truck Show Podcast dot com is as follows, your limited edition foundation series. Cybertruck is ready to order.

Sean P. Holman (13s):

I like how you posted and were like, should I do it? I’m like, let’s see. Your wife already told you no. Right? You don’t have a charger at home. You don’t, your driveway’s not wide enough for it. And then like the, all the clowning and comments from from social were pretty funny. And

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (29s):

Yet I still am interested as an early reservation holder, you have been invited to order your foundation series Cybertruck with early access to delivery. Your Cybertruck will be fully optioned and will include limited addition laser etched, badging, premium accessories, charging equipment with power share, home backup hardware, all terrain tires, full self-driving capability, and much more delivery for how much have begun. For how much in California, Texas with more states in 2024

Sean P. Holman (57s):

Or how

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (58s):

Much? The one that I want Yep. Is not the one that you see driving around right now. Okay. The one you’re seeing driving right now is the dual motor I have held out for the tri motor, which is called the Cyber Beast. Cyber Beast will be out in third or fourth quarter of this year starting price $116,000. Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (1m 19s):

That, that’s not happening. Like why even tease people at that? Like you, you were barely able to pull a TRX off. You,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 27s):

You, the thing is, it

Sean P. Holman (1m 28s):

Doesn’t even fit your lifestyle.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 29s):

It No, it doesn’t. The thing is, is that I could probably break even on the TRX if I’m lucky ’cause I got a great deal on it and then I’d have some, some pretty sizable payments to make on a Cybertruck.

Sean P. Holman (1m 45s):

But your wife’s already making payments on a Porsche that she

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 48s):

Got so, and a and a and a golf cart. So then yeah, we’re not left with, there’s not much headroom in this equation. But

Sean P. Holman (1m 56s):

What are you gonna do with it? Okay. Lightning’s decided a Cybertruck What’s step two?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 60s):

I’m, I’m not deciding that I am getting one.

Sean P. Holman (2m 2s):

No, this is in theory, I wanna know because it doesn’t fit, it doesn’t fit your lifestyle at

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 6s):

All. No it doesn’t. So

Sean P. Holman (2m 7s):

Like, but you So

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 8s):

I think the only reason, but you

Sean P. Holman (2m 9s):

Would get it anyway despite yourself.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 10s):

No. So the only reason to get the Cybertruck for me is the, Hey, look at me. Which everyone thinks that I have anyway. Right? You

Sean P. Holman (2m 17s):

Do. You already have It

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 18s):

Is look at me, right? And then so, but then after two weeks the hey look at me is over. Yeah. So now you’re stuck with, then you just

Sean P. Holman (2m 23s):

Look like a douche.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 24s):

Now you, yeah, now you look like every dude in Newport Beach or wherever, you know? And so they, like,

Sean P. Holman (2m 29s):

If you were gonna get

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 29s):

It flaunt, the Lamborghini Gudo or

Sean P. Holman (2m 31s):

If you’re gonna get it per fit, your lifestyle, and you were like a early adopter Mr. Like, I want all the new technology and I have an infinite budget and a charging at my house and I want to go use it and like, make whistling Diesel style videos of it offroading and Okay, you could probably make a go at it, but for your, like what you drive around and stuff,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 53s):

It would sit in the driveway a lot. Wouldn’t do me much good. So that’s a,

Sean P. Holman (2m 59s):

I it’s, it’s why not just put $116,000 into the house you own and get closer to paying that off?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (3m 6s):

No, that’s

Sean P. Holman (3m 6s):

Boring. Rather than sitting, having that thing sit in your driveway. No, it’s

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (3m 9s):

Dumb. Listen, why

Sean P. Holman (3m 10s):

Would I do that? It’s not right for everybody. Some people it could be, it’s, I’m just gonna say as your friend, it’s not right for you.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (3m 15s):

No, no, it’s not right for me at all. Like, I, this is not me trying to fool myself. It’s not right for me at all. It doesn’t mean that I don’t want it. So look, they’re probably gonna keep my a hundred bucks, whatever, as long as I’m not tied into buying the damn thing. But it was really interesting though, Holman, is that when I put it up on Facebook and said, Hey, what do you know? Should I go through with this? It was about 60, 40, 60, no,

Sean P. Holman (3m 38s):

40%. See, Jay says, nope, nay negative. Uhuh, negatory, NLOL. Like my opinion matters. I’ll see your decision in your next post. There was a yes, a no, it’s not gonna order itself. Sure you can always pimp it at up at your job, which no, you Gale would disown you. There’s nothing for you there. Here’s your final chance. So what did you do? Just go with the Duramax truck show. Experiment it up with wrap decals and test the living heck out of it. You can do a truck review every few weeks and give it its own jingle. Okay, Tim, stop. Stop drinking the sauce, dude.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (4m 13s):

Okay, well, So it, it, it looks like I’m, I’m probably not gonna be pulling the trigger on the Cybertruck after all. You know, and I think that’s what you guys were thinking anyway. You’re like, just the lightning’s not gonna do it. There was there, there were some people that are like Oh. no, he changes vehicles like underwear. He is gonna get rid of the TRX. He never really liked the TRX anyway. He’s just doing whatever’s cool. That’s not true. I really, really enjoyed the TRX and I’ve customized it. I got it the way I want it. It sounds, the way I want it to sound it ask you this the way I want it to. Look.

Sean P. Holman (4m 38s):

You’ve decided to get Cybertruck.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (4m 39s):

I didn’t decide to get a Cybertruck truck.

Sean P. Holman (4m 41s):

This is in theory,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (4m 42s):

Okay?

Sean P. Holman (4m 43s):

Same price as a Raptor

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (4m 44s):

RI haven’t heard enough good about the, the Raptor r The Cybertruck wins. The Cybertruck wins over the Raptor are for sure. If I, I’m not, I’m not gonna trade out of the TRX to get into another V eight, supercharge V eight. It’s, that’s, that’s silly.

Sean P. Holman (5m 1s):

But the Cybertruck for you is not silly.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (5m 3s):

I didn’t say it wasn’t silly. Just, it’s just so different. It’s so radical. You know, All, right.

Sean P. Holman (5m 8s):

Well, let’s focus on things that matter to people who are listening to this podcast, like our guest for this episode. So I’ve been chasing them for a little while. It’s one of my favorite places in the entire United States. And they’re gonna be on the show.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (5m 23s):

That’s a big tease.

Sean P. Holman (5m 24s):

Think about it. They’ve got a store, a theater, showers, a Museum, restaurants

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (5m 33s):

Everything. Truck accessories. Oh my gosh. Fuel. Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (5m 37s):

You charge your Cybertruck there if you wanted to, but you don’t have to. ’cause they also have gas and Diesel. Okay. Can, you guess who we might be having on the show.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (5m 47s):

The senior vice president of Iowa 80, the world’s largest truck stop.

Sean P. Holman (5m 54s):

I have a pilfered. That place of their most giant cup of Dr. Pepper And. it was delicious and ice cold.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 0s):

You guys are going to meet Delia Moon Meier, the senior vice president of that fine establishment on this episode,

Sean P. Holman (6m 7s):

And a direct descendant of the founder of Iowa 80, as you’ll find out later in the episode. So anyway, if you’ve ever traveled across the country, you may have seen the world’s largest truck stop. Iowa 80 off of Interstate 80. And It is a place where many of you have probably spent time stop taking a rest or spent the night or hung out at And. It’s an amazing place that I always stop when I’m traveling cross country on Interstate 80. And I figure, you know what, let’s do something different than we normally do and have something fun and and unusual on The Truck Show Podcast. And I think you’ll find that this interview is going to check all the boxes of awesomeness.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 40s):

And speaking of checking boxes of awesomeness, the SHOT Show looked like he was off the chain.

Sean P. Holman (6m 47s):

It was pretty cool. I met a a couple celebrities while I was there. So this is

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 51s):

A big convention. A it’s

Sean P. Holman (6m 53s):

SEMA for guns. For Guns,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 54s):

Okay. And in Las Vegas.

Sean P. Holman (6m 55s):

Right? In Las. Vegas. Yep. So,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 57s):

Geez, guns in Las. Vegas It is amazing.

Sean P. Holman (6m 58s):

Come on. It’s it’s, it’s enormous. It’s, I don’t know what the square footage difference is with SEMA, but it, I walked eight miles a day that I was there. And did

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 8s):

You lose any weight?

Sean P. Holman (7m 9s):

About 40 pounds. 40

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 11s):

Pounds. and then you put it All right back on. I

Sean P. Holman (7m 13s):

Had to eat a White Castle on the way home. Don don’t do that.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 16s):

It’s horrible. Oh. no, you didn’t do that.

Sean P. Holman (7m 17s):

Really? It’s so horrible.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 18s):

You did. That’s twice you’ve done White Castle on the Way home. Which,

Sean P. Holman (7m 21s):

No, I didn’t do it on the way home. Actually had it one night walking back from the Venetian And. it was on the way to our hotel and I’m like, You, know what? I’m gonna hungry. But

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 27s):

You know, it’s bad, it bad in the morning. You know, white Castle

Sean P. Holman (7m 30s):

Is bad. But it’s one of those things that it always disappoints 100% of the time, but also 100% of the time. I think this next time’s gonna be better. Why? don don’t know. It’s just, I’m like, it sounds good. And you go in there and you’re like, yeah, I’ll take a slight, you can’t mess up a slider. and then you go there and you’re going like these, the soggy disgusting things are,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 46s):

The next time you’re thinking about it, just text me and I’m gonna remind you that it’s ass and I’ll still, and I’ll still do it. It’s an

Sean P. Holman (7m 51s):

Asperger. I mean, I just don’t learn. Honestly. I went in there for the Dr. Pepper and I went, eh, All, right? I didn’t eat dinner, I’m kinda hungry. And then they were there and the fries are good and I went and the dude was super nice. He gave me a fourth one for free.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 3s):

A fourth one. What? What was

Sean P. Holman (8m 4s):

A three slider deal? Yeah. And just a cool dude. He goes, ah, I got you.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 8s):

But the fourth one isn’t any better than the third or the second or the first. But

Sean P. Holman (8m 11s):

I went to bed with the full bellies So. it was good.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 14s):

Full

Sean P. Holman (8m 14s):

Belly. It wasn’t great dog de no it was, they’re better than Dog Dew I mean it’s just cardboard. Whataburger’s probably better. Just barely. So anyway, I was, I was in Vegas, which the SHOT Show and I got a few interviews while I was there and I met Mark Hall Patton, who you might know as the beard of knowledge on Pawn Stars and some of the history channel shows, which is pretty cool. And had a nice conversation with him. And then by happenstance, I was at a, a lounge drinking. And the lady next to me was superstar, was a country superstar, Gretchen Wilson. What? And so we ended up drinking with her for four hours and just Hold on,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 51s):

Wait, wait, wait minute. Were you actually drinking with her or were you

Sean P. Holman (8m 53s):

Yeah, no, no. Or

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 54s):

Were you star gazing? No, no.

Sean P. Holman (8m 56s):

Were you were hanging out. It was a whole thing.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 57s):

You preventing her from leaving? No, no,

Sean P. Holman (8m 59s):

No. And, she was a riot. That that woman is legit like full on. You listen to the lyrics of her song. That’s exactly who she is in real life. And yeah. Zero Fs as a celebrity. Just, she’s like, listen, if I didn’t have a scene career, I would be a, a redneck down the street. And I’m like, I, this is why we can be friends. I

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (9m 16s):

Got the question, what was she drinking?

Sean P. Holman (9m 19s):

She was drinking wine. Wine? Yeah, she was drinking wine. But she was, she was good. She had a, I think SHOT Show maybe hired her or somebody did. She had a show earlier in the day, And. she was just kicking back and then we just got to talking And. she, we told dirty jokes and So I told her a few good ones. Did you make her laugh? Oh, totally. Really? That’s how I got in. And after that we were like fast friends. She’s telling us stories when she’s on tour. Like Kenny Chesney, And, she was telling all sorts of stuff. So anyway, n no I didn’t record anything for this podcast. I recorded something for my daughter ’cause she gave my daughters into bass and guitar right now. And, she’s learning all this stuff. And So I asked her questions. She recorded a nice message for my daughter. So just a shout out to Gretchen Wilson. ’cause she’s rad.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (9m 56s):

Did you get her phone number?

Sean P. Holman (9m 57s):

I did not get her phone number, but I did walk her to her elevator lobby to make sure that she got into the elevator. Okay. So

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 3s):

Did she ask you to, or you again just fanning out? No, no.

Sean P. Holman (10m 6s):

I, I asked her, I was with my friend Corey and my friend Holly, and we said, Hey, can we make sure you get off? She’s like, that’d be great. It was cool. We even watched her purse. She trusted us And. she goes like, you go to the bathroom, you guys watch my purse for me? We’re like, yeah,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 19s):

Okay. That was, that was generous of you.

Sean P. Holman (10m 20s):

So anyway, that, that was cool. It’s only in Vegas. I I only bring it up ’cause it’s funny, like I’ll, I travel a lot every once in a while there’ll just be a random moment where you connect with the human. Then they’re like, oh, I know you from somewhere. Oh yeah. That’s why. So, so yeah. So SHOT Show was cool. Got a few interviews. We’ll go over that and then we will cover a few of the emails you guys have sent us to Truck Show Podcast at gmail.com. And,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 42s):

And hey listen, you guys have been awesome and have sent us a lot of events, a lot

Sean P. Holman (10m 48s):

All

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 48s):

Around the country. To the extent that I had to call up the, I actually had to send an email to the developer of the calendar page. It’s got like a plugin on our website, truck Show Podcast dot com. Do

Sean P. Holman (10m 59s):

You break

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 59s):

It? We maxed it out. I’m not joking. I didn’t know it maxed out at 40 events and I, oh that’s not enough.

Sean P. Holman (11m 4s):

And I

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (11m 5s):

Was trying to figure out why. Like I go SEMA, I keep, I kept entering the SEMA show and I go, why isn’t it popping up? It’s in November. I go, there’s something wrong. and then I realized there was about 10 or 11 events around SEMA that also weren’t showing. So what

Sean P. Holman (11m 18s):

Did, what’s the solution? I

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (11m 19s):

Already fixed it. Sent developer within 24 hours. He goes, I just expanded it. You can now put a hundred up there. Perfect. So we’re at like 70 events on the page.

Sean P. Holman (11m 27s):

All, right? We’ll send more people. Well I I mean truck Show Podcast dot com hit the events tab. It is a lot, It is a lot. And we’ll go over some of the upcoming ones at the end of the show. But before then we have to thank our friends over at Nissan who are the presenting sponsor of The Truck. Show Podcast. This show is brought to you by them and the Nissan Frontier, Nissan Titan and Nissan Titan Xd. Exceptional trucks. For those of you who are looking for a pickup, you wanna head on down to your local Nissan dealer where you can check ’em out. The Titan and Titan XD have the industry’s best warranty. Five year, 100,000 miles. And oh by the way, I took the frontier to Vegas and back got 22 miles per gallon at 75 miles per hour with cruise control set. That’s good. Yeah, It was great. It’s just the perfect size, great truck. I’m really enjoying having it.

Sean P. Holman (12m 7s):

If you wanna get one for yourself and enjoy all the things I’ve been enjoying with our Pro four x head over to Nissan usa.com where you can build and price

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (12m 14s):

And Holman. Two days ago a guy named Ernesto had his 2017 Ram with a 6.7 liter Cummins towed to Banks. Why do you suppose he had it towed to Banks?

Sean P. Holman (12m 24s):

Because he wanted to make it better.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (12m 27s):

So he did the jiggle test, which so many Ram owners do now. Now that we’ve kind of popularized how you go about it. You find your grid heater 12 volt lead, it goes to the post, it electrifies the grid heater and you wiggle it. And if it’s rock solid you’re good. But if it moves, if there’s play, it means that the bolt that connects that It is loosening stud to the grid heater has potentially melted and may fall off now. So he did the jiggle test. And it moved. So he flat, he towed it to us. I video recorded, it’s on my phone right now and Matt, one of our installers took it off. He gotta pull the factory elbow off and then you gotta pull the fuel lines out and then you get to the grid here, he flips it upside down.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (13m 11s):

Matt touches it with his index finger falls right off onto the ground. He was days away from this nut falling, taking outta his whole truck. Falling into the intake manifold. Yep. Rolling down into cylinder six and destroying dancing around, destroying a $20,000 engine. So

Sean P. Holman (13m 29s):

How do you fix it? Lightning. You

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (13m 30s):

Buy a bank’s monster Ram. The bank’s Monster Ram is a high flow intake elbow And. it comes with a high flow billet intake plate that eliminates the factory grid heater that will almost certainly fail on a 2013 to 2018 Ram 6.7 liter Cummins. If you want to investigate one for your truck, head over to Banks Power dot com. Type in your year make and model. There is a monster RAM for your Ram

Sean P. Holman (13m 53s):

All. right? And if you’re looking for a subscription to OVR Magazine, I have a offer for you guys. We’re gonna start doing this for 2024. If you want a free digital subscription for one year, I do head over to

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (14m 7s):

No seriously do though.

Sean P. Holman (14m 9s):

OVR mag.com. Yeah. Down to the subscription page and type in at truck Show Podcast. And if you’re one of those folks who loves a high quality print Magazine 10% discount on a year subscription to print. Again, that’s OVR Magazine. Head to the subscription tab, type in the offer code at Truck Show Podcast. Then we’ll also add this to our offer page on the website so you’ll be able to find in the future. This deal is gonna be good all year in 2024,

2 (14m 35s):

The truck show. We’re gonna show you what we know. We’re gonna answer what? The truck, because truck rides with the truck show. We have the lifted. We have the lowered and everything in between. We’ll talk about trucks that run on Diesel and the ones that run on gasoline. The truck show. The truck show. The truck show. Whoa.

3 (15m 6s):

It’s the truck show with your hosts Lightning and Holman

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (15m 14s):

Holman. Picture this. Imagine if you will a truck stop with a 300 seat restaurant, a gift store, a super truck showroom, a dentist’s office, a barbershop, a chiropractor, a workout room, laundry facilities, a movie theater, a lounge, 24 private showers. A food truck with Wendy’s Dairy Queen Orange. Julie’s

Sean P. Holman (15m 33s):

Talk about Have. you been there?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (15m 35s):

Caribou? A convenience store, a custom embroidery and vinyl shop. 42 gas islands.

Sean P. Holman (15m 39s):

Yeah, you’ve been there.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (15m 41s):

How about a cat scale and a Doggo Mat? Pet Wash

Sean P. Holman (15m 43s):

Have. you been there? No. I don’t have to imagine. I’ve been there a bunch of times. What? Let’s, let’s call Delia Meier from Iowa 80. The World largest truck. Stop.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (15m 55s):

Get my new hero on the phone. Oh wait, I have the phone. I’ll dial.

Delia (16m 9s):

Hello, it’s Delia

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (16m 10s):

Delia. Lightning and Holman Truck. Show Podcast. How you doing? I’m

Delia (16m 14s):

Good. How are you?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (16m 15s):

We are so much better. Now that you, you’re on the phone. Wonderful. We have so much to ask you, but everyone gets an intro and you are no different. You are truck famous. Hang tight. Here

3 (16m 24s):

We go. Truck Famous, hero Star. VIP, ACE, big Wave. Hot Shot Truck. Famous Big shot. Big deal. Big Gun. Big cheese. Heavyweight Superstar Truck. Famous. That’s what you are.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (16m 39s):

She’s truck famous.

Sean P. Holman (16m 41s):

Well she, she’s definitely part of Truck Famous because she is with Iowa 80, the world’s largest truck stop. And I have been there on multiple occasions and I’ve gotten lost. I actually had to ask for directions on how to get back out.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (16m 56s):

Wait a minute, you were at Iowa

2 (16m 58s):

80 80,

3 (17m 5s):

Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (17m 6s):

Yes I was So Delia. You don’t know this but we always like to get a wide variety of guests and we have talked about Iowa 80 on the podcast before and I thought, I wonder if there’s anyone there who would be willing to talk to us about how it came to be, what’s so special about it? What you guys do today? ’cause I still remember my very first time crossing the country and a friend of mine said, which, which route are you taking? And I told him and he says, oh dude, you have to stop at Iowa 80. And I was like, okay, what is it? He goes, it’s the world’s biggest truck stop. I’m like, yeah, but I’m not a trucker. He goes, it doesn’t matter. You have to stop there. So

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (17m 43s):

That’s interesting how, how you were introduced to them. I was introduced via the catalog when I built the Rock Crusher for the radio station all those years ago, 2014 or So I was looking for a couple of accessories and Iowa eighty.com came up and I actually bought some LEDs and then I’m like, I did the deep dive and I go, what is this Iowa 80 place? What is happening here? So Delia Can, you bring us up to speed, kinda rewind the clock a little bit and take us back to 1964.

Delia (18m 11s):

You bet. So I am second generation. It was started by my parents. My dad worked for ammo for Standard Oil at the time. And as they were building the interstate system in the late in the mid sixties, he was putting truck stops all over the Midwest. And so the Wallcot one he built, put an operator in there, that person didn’t wanna stay. And so my parents, they knew they wanted to work for themselves and run their own business. So they sold the house and everything they had and, and moved to Walcott and took over the truck staff and you know, it was very small and they just kept investing in it.

Delia (18m 52s):

Everything they made, they put right back into it. And well this year is our 60th Anniversary. So congrats 60 years of putting everything back into it. You end up with the world’s largest truck staff.

Sean P. Holman (19m 2s):

That’s amazing. Now you guys are right off Interstate 80 80 and West of I guess would be Davenport. Would that be the, the nearest sort of bigger city?

Delia (19m 12s):

Yeah, east of us is Davenport. So we’re between Davenport and Iowa City on Interstate 80.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (19m 19s):

When you look back at some of the historic photos, it It is just a dot on a map basically. ’cause that original location doesn’t even resemble what It is today. It was just a gas station. Basically

Sean P. Holman (19m 33s):

When you look on the map And, it shows you like the outline of towns, right? It’s like the, if the map is green and then the city is like dark gray Wallcot, which is just south of Iowa 80 Iowa Eighty’s footprint is like 50% of the town of Walcott. It’s huge.

Delia (19m 51s):

That’s about true. And the fact is, you know, I think there’s 1800 people live in Walcott and we get about 5,000 people a day through our site. So, you know, we’re twice the size of Walcott every single day. Different people though. That’s, and

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (20m 7s):

That’s amazing.

Delia (20m 9s):

When my parents moved to Walcott, Walcott wasn’t even on the Rand McNally Atlas. And so they had to petition, ran McNally and you know, write them letters every couple months, you know, saying you gotta put, put us on the map, put us on the map, put us on the map.

Sean P. Holman (20m 26s):

How did they find the location? What, what was the draw to Walcott? Was it proximity? Was it to a town? Was it I 80 was being built? And, it just happened to be between two cities. Why that particular location?

Delia (20m 41s):

Well, that’s a great question. Who knows

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (20m 44s):

If you dunno, we dunno. Come on. Delia.

Delia (20m 47s):

The, the interstate was coming through. He knew he wanted a site in Eastern Iowa and I guess maybe the land was cheap or, you know, I, I don’t exactly know, but they wanted Eastern Iowa and anyway, he, he, my father selected this site and built it. Yeah. He said he knew it was the perfect spot when he was there, but to me it looked like every other corner, you know, it was, it was just corn at that point.

Sean P. Holman (21m 14s):

But Well, when you’re driving through Interstate 80 through there, it looks the same for a while. Well,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (21m 20s):

It’s almost like he just looked, well, I would say he, he looked at a map, but there was no maps at that point, you know, of the area. But like, it looks like you just looked at a map and said right here and put a pin in it. Maybe

Sean P. Holman (21m 29s):

It is playing darts, right?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (21m 32s):

It’s possible. When you look at what they’ve created Holman, look at some, some of the quick facts. They serve 5,000 customers a day. How many eggs do you think they’ve served in their, almost you said 60. 60 years, right? It’s a lot of eggs, right? How many eggs do you think? How many? How many you guess

Sean P. Holman (21m 51s):

I’m gonna say how many eggs? 10 billion.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (21m 53s):

No I mean that’s ridiculous.

Sean P. Holman (21m 54s):

I don’t know. I don’t know.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (21m 55s):

19 million. 19 million. That’s a lot of eggs. How many of this is a funny one I like How many rolls of toilet paper do you think they go through per month?

Sean P. Holman (22m 3s):

More than 19 million.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (22m 5s):

I i 775 rolls of toilet paper in a month.

Sean P. Holman (22m 10s):

Sounds like my

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (22m 11s):

House. There’s 900 parking spots and they’ve gone through 28 expansions and remodels, which is mind blowing. I feel like ideally It is like, could you stop repainting already?

Sean P. Holman (22m 23s):

No, there’s always something going on there. Like, so the, from the first time I went through to the last time I went through it, it was completely different. There’s like this newer entry, like it’s, it’s like your truck stop convenience area, right? And it’s, it’s right. Awesome. It’s gorgeous. Everything. Lots of space. Nothing’s cramped in well lit, really nice. Just everything looks really nice. and then you wander down a little bit more and you’re like, oh, okay, I I’m heading toward the restaurant, for example. and then you head along a little more and there’s the, the person doing like T-shirts and vinyl cutting and then you head down a little bit more and then there’s a big giant yellow, yellow long nose peat sitting next to glass in this giant room full of every trucker accessory that you could imagine.

Sean P. Holman (23m 4s):

And I’m not a truck driver and I spent an hour, I’m, listen, I’m going cross country, I have to get home. I spent an hour just looking at like horns and LED mud flaps.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (23m 14s):

Now wait a minute, is that the same room where the truck is on a turntable? Yes.

Sean P. Holman (23m 20s):

There’s so much chrome in there that on a sunny day you have to wear sunglasses inside. It’s true.

Delia (23m 26s):

Right?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (23m 27s):

So take us through some of those permutations over the many years Delia.

Delia (23m 32s):

Sure. Generally it was what we could afford. so we would do rather small additions and then, you know, make that in the store or we would, you know, make the restaurant a little, little bit bigger or the restroom’s a little bit bigger or just, just keep on adding up. I remember when I was in, in college and we were taking out the truck base to do service work and we put in a, you know, a mezzanine, a second level and we put private showers in. Before that it was just a open shower. They could rent towels and go in and take a shower like we, you know, you did in high school gym class, you know, thinking about that now who in The World what, what kind of adult would get into a, you know, open room full of showers and take a shower.

Delia (24m 19s):

But you know, that’s the way it was. So. Those were some of the very expensive things, you know, sometimes they were taking the money and buying a wrecker and expanding the wrecker service And. it was everything we could think of. And now people are starting to notice the later ones we’ve been doing because they’re, they’re huge. You know, that addition in front like you’re talking about? Yeah, that was a major, major, major addition and a lot of square footage all at once. The way it got that big was a bunch of little ideas. You know, wouldn’t it be neat if we could add, you know, if we could make these restrooms bigger and, and before we knew it, we had a huge project on our hands.

Sean P. Holman (24m 57s):

I was amazed that just, you know, obviously when you cross the country, you’re every, you know, if you’re a trucker, maybe it’s every thousand miles. If you’re in a passenger vehicle, it’s maybe every, you know, 300 to 500 miles you’re stopping to refuel. And you know, I’ve always been impressed with the amenities at I 80. It’s even better now. Like I said, I just went through, my last trip was probably a year and a half ago and I was amazed at the expansion. It was the first time that I actually had a chance to go through the Trucking Museum, which in and of itself, if you had nothing else left at Iowa 80, if you were just a gas pump and a little kiosk taking your money for the pump and the Museum was there, it would be worth it to stop everything from a 1890 triple wagon on up I mean there’s all these great old 1900 turns turn of the centuries trucks, gasoline, electric tractors, ramblers, max sours, diamond tea, all sorts of really cool stuff.

Sean P. Holman (25m 55s):

And then you get into the twenties and you get to see some of the really cool trucks that start looking like, you know, what the future might be with a medium duty. They get, they get bigger and they’re up higher and they’re purpose-built, whether it’s a, the Rockaway two and a half ton or the 24 white wreckers model 40. and then you get into the pre-war stuff and there’s some awesome pre-war stuff there. Everything from a paddy wagon, from a local police department. and then you get into the post-war. There’s just so much stuff to see there. You can’t possibly take it in with a quick stop. And I, I being a a lover of anything, automotive I mean you had a 63 Mercedes Unimog, you’ve got a F 600, you’ve got 84 4, 900 if you remember is the cab overs that really became, not undesirable, but they fell out of favor in the North American market for, for big rigs.

Sean P. Holman (26m 50s):

And so you’ve got some really cool cab over stuff there too. And of course Long Nose Petes and Ken Ws and even a 79 Jeep J 10 Col Golden Eagle Edition, which is super rad. So I just, I I don’t need anything else. don don’t need your shower. Maybe your bathroom. I don’t need your, your Dr. Pepper from the soda fountain. Well, don’t either. Hold on others, do others. I get it. Just not you. Just not me. Because I will spend all day and all night if I have the time walking around the Museum. ’cause it’s that. Awesome. Now Delia, do

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (27m 17s):

You have like a procurement department or how are you finding all these historic vehicles?

Delia (27m 22s):

So that’s a collection that goes back 50 at least 50 years. Our first one was a 1919 International that my dad bought I. mean I was just a little kid, you know, he would take us out in parades and, you know, 4th of July parade and different stuff. We’d just, you know, load all our friends in the back and you know, he’d drive it through town and, you know, and so then he was just collecting different things that he thought were interesting and you just did a great summary of a lot of the trucks there. And it’s a Museum where people could go and spend days there, you know, depends on how much you like it or you know, if you just kinda like it. It’s a, it’s a hour break of walking around and looking at trucks and just the design on them.

Delia (28m 7s):

It doesn’t really matter who you are. If you’re a gearhead, you’re gonna love that Museum. But if you like design, you’re gonna love that Museum. If you appreciate amazing paint jobs, you’re gonna love our Museum. If you just wanna stretch your legs, you’re gonna love the Museum. I appreciate that. You love it. And I wish I, you know, you’d call me and if we would’ve given you a tour of some of the highlights, but it looks like you picked out your own

Sean P. Holman (28m 32s):

My my my next, my next trip. I would, I would love to be able to let you know I’m coming and, and maybe even walk around with a recorder and have somebody talk about the vehicles and we can just make it a, a segment on the show because it special sounds like a,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (28m 45s):

Do you have a, a Museum curator that can speak to us?

Delia (28m 48s):

We do. My husband Dave is the curator. You know, he knows all about all the trucks. He can remember where we bought ’em and who we bought ’em from and what the story is. What I really think is cool about Truck I mean, one of the things I think is, is that they all had a purpose. And you mentioned that when you were talking about ’em, every truck was built with a purpose and you know, And it was work until it fell apart and then somebody like us found it or maybe we found it and put it back together. And so we have a fabrication mechanic shop just for the antiques as well where we’re always, you know, have five or six that we’re working on and trying to fix up and get back together.

Delia (29m 29s):

You know, we have this amazing stainless steel diamond tea truck that Dave said he wanted. He wanted it for 20 years and finally found one. They’re very, very rare. That’s awesome. You know, it was just dense. Like you can’t believe, well you can’t fill those with putty and paint them on a stainless steel truck, you know, it’s shiny. And our guy, you know, he worked and worked and worked And it entire winter of pounding out these holes carefully, you know, the man, the dent and he got it looking beautiful and you just, you know, I’m sure not that many people appreciate how much work went into making this truck look like that

Sean P. Holman (30m 6s):

Again. Well you think about it too. You, you can’t actually heat up, you know, with regular steel panels you can kind of give a little bit of heat and help pound ’em out. Well if you do that on a stainless steel truck that’s not painted it discolor as it basically heat treats the metal, you end it with polka dots, right? That’s right. And so the, the, the labor of love that has to go into that. and then you guys, for all you Coca-Cola fans out there, there’s a 1945 white WA one 14 that’s fully restored as a Coke delivery truck that is phenomenal. It’s, it’s so gorgeous. And then one of my favorite trucks, you guys have a 45 Chevrolet Master and it’s in the United Van Lines livery.

Sean P. Holman (30m 48s):

So that yellow and white truck with the Blue United on the side. Oh yeah. But it’s, it’s 1945 and you look at it and you’re like, oh yeah, I I recognize the logo, United Van Lines. and then you look at it and you go, oh my gosh, this since 1945 It is so cool in that old livery and it’s basically a a, a dually truck that has no bed or anything and it’s, it’s like a big rig with a, with a, a moving van trailer from that era. It, and I could go on, I you guys have a power wagon, a 48 power wagon, which I love those and he like, he will go on I’ll, I just, I can’t

Delia (31m 22s):

That’s okay. I love it.

Sean P. Holman (31m 23s):

If you guys wanna check this out. You

Delia (31m 24s):

Said it looks like it was a, you said it was a labor of love. Yes, and that’s exactly right. I would say when you’re looking at, at Iowa 80, but you know, particularly at the Museum, it’s a labor of love. My father, he was always going to build a Museum and putter around it in his retirement, you know, and, and he got cancer and died at 59. So that never happened for him. But, you know, we spent the next 30 years making it happen and you know, we’re not puttering around it in our retirement ’cause we’re still working. But It is it, It is a labor of love. We are, you know, we built it to honor my parents and honor the Trucking industry and say it by saving their history and telling people about it.

Delia (32m 8s):

And, you know, it’s fun. We’ve met so many great people.

Sean P. Holman (32m 12s):

IIII think that,

Delia (32m 13s):

You know, Trucking is fun.

Sean P. Holman (32m 15s):

I think that he’s looking down fondly knowing all the, the love that you guys put into it. It really is like a, a love letter to the Trucking industry. And if you’re a gearhead of, of any kind, go to Iowa 80 Trucking Museum dot com, which is the other website and you can look at the collection and click on the photos And. it gives you a little description of each one. You can get lost on the website, let alone being lost at the Museum And. it, it’s just so cool. And I’m, I’m glad that there’s something like that out there. Yeah.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (32m 42s):

Delia, is there a fee to go through the Museum?

Delia (32m 46s):

No, it’s free Wheel donation.

Sean P. Holman (32m 48s):

Oh

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (32m 48s):

Wow. That’s super cool. It is very cool. And then this kind of dovetails into this 2024 Walcott truckers jamboree that you’ve got coming up in July, I think it’s the 11th through 13th. This? Yes. Tell me about this event and then we’ll circle back to the truck stop because this is kind of an extension of the Museum now you have your customers vehicles coming in, you’ve got famous vehicles coming in. It looked like I look back at the 23 and 22 events and they look massive.

Delia (33m 19s):

They were, it’s so fun The Jamboree. We’re gonna celebrate our 45th Anniversary of the Jamboree. So, you know, I’ve been to all 45 of them and we’ll continue from there. There’s a bunch of us that have have been to all of them, but it, it, you know, it really started that it was a thank you to truckers And. it started small and just kept growing. Again, same thing, reinvesting and trying to make it better. You know, it was to show off my dad’s antique trucks and some of other collectors antique trucks. We do a pork chop cookout and you know, a country western van. And that was how it started. And then it just kept growing and, and actually it’s a jamboree and our appreciation of our customers that really have led to also plays a part in the world’s largest truck stop story is that we were always paving more parking lot to accommodate as the jamboree got bigger and bigger.

Delia (34m 18s):

And so if you think about how in The World did we get to 900 truck parking spots? Well I needed the room for the jamboree. Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (34m 27s):

How do you, how do you have, how do you have a jamboree when you haven’t closed since what, 19 64, 3, 5 days a year. 365 days a year. 24 7. You never closed. So while you’re doing the jamboree, obviously you have a business to run and there’s regular truck traffic coming in. How do you accommodate everybody? That’s

Delia (34m 46s):

How we got all the parking. so we do have to close off about, you know, 300 truck parking spots, but you know, we still have over 500 truck parking spots. So it’s, you know, it’s a tight few days tight week while we close it off and set the jamboree up. But we still are providing more than any other truck stop.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (35m 6s):

I wanna be her asphalt contractor. Contractor is like, you sure you don’t need to work?

Delia (35m 12s):

You know, like we’re in Iowa so it’s all cement, it’s all 12 inches.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (35m 16s):

Oh it’s cement. Okay, gotcha. All. right. So

Sean P. Holman (35m 18s):

How did you become the world’s largest truck stop and when did you market yourself as such? What, what was the period of time where you said, Hey, this thing is actually more than just a truck stop. It’s starting to become in fact a local legend and, and national treasure if you will. When did you decide You know what I think we’re the biggest, let’s let’s brand this so that we stand out amongst all the other hundreds and thousands of truck stops throughout the country.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (35m 43s):

And what qualifies it as the largest, is it acreage? Is it number of stall parking spots?

Delia (35m 49s):

Yep. You Can you can we, I feel like we’ve got that title for lots of different things. But we first started Amaco, we were the world’s largest amaco and in the eighties and so we started marketing on our billboards that we were the world’s largest amaco Well people were reading that sign the Billboard and they were thinking it said world’s largest truck staff. Oh, interesting. And So I was in high school. I was in high school then and I was working in the store and people kept coming in and we were small. Then And it kept saying, I want something that said world’s largest truck stop on it.

Delia (36m 29s):

And you know, I, it just kept happening and I was like, we’re the world’s largest amaco. And they’d be like, I want something that says that. And, but, but the customers were reading world’s largest amaco but saying world’s largest truck staff. And so when I graduated from college and I started working here full time, you know, was when we really started talking about, I’m like, people think it’s the world’s largest truck stop. And my dad said, we probably are the world’s largest truck staff. ’cause he traveled everywhere and looking at truck stops. And that was just our life knowing it’s a small industry. Anyway, so we started thinking about, you know, why don’t we be the world’s largest truck stop?

Delia (37m 12s):

And so we traveled around to make sure that we were the world’s largest truck stop. And we built a couple additions and then we were clearly the world’s largest truck stop and started marketing. So that was back in the nineties.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (37m 24s):

Can you imagine

Delia (37m 25s):

When we started Marketing

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (37m 26s):

Can, you imagine Deli entered with her father and a family in the car looking out the window going whatever with That one. Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (37m 32s):

Yeah. You just told nice truck stops starters. It is like, try look at that new truck stop with training wheels on it.

Delia (37m 42s):

You know? Yeah. Sometimes it was like that and, but you know, my father insisted that we always had to find something good about every single place we ever went. So we’d be like, you know, oh that was awesome. Did you see the, you know, something in the restaurant or that hamburger was awesome or, you know, everything, everything had to end on a high note.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (38m 1s):

Is there any significance to the monument that is outside Iowa 80? It’s a giant rock with some stencils on it that, that say world’s largest truck stop. But it’s, it can’t be random. I can’t accept the fact that there’s a little flower bed around it. And. it looks very purposeful, but it’s a randomly shaped stone. Looks like it’s about six feet tall. Yes. What’s the story behind that monument?

Delia (38m 26s):

Yeah. So I had that made to celebrate our 50th to memorialize our 50th Anniversary. So it’s actually almost 10 years old. And we unveiled it at the Jamboree And. it has our old logos on it, our current logo. And you know, it says serving, serving you has been our world, signed the Moon family, we signed it, you know, for my family. And it, it It is a, a note to our customers that you know. Thank you. You’ve been our world.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (38m 59s):

That’s awesome. No, but it’s a rock. That’s that’s what I’m trying to, there has to be, there’s a story behind

Sean P. Holman (39m 4s):

The rocks. It’s a monument. It’s not permanent.

Delia (39m 6s):

It’s permanent. Yes.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 8s):

Okay. Then it says you wanted something that wouldn’t erode over time. I gotcha. It’s

Sean P. Holman (39m 13s):

Also the world’s largest truck stop. Rock Lightning. Okay. See

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 16s):

It’s like, oh, that’s right. She did some research on its, that’s right. She’s like, call Guinness. I got a big rock over here with a stencil on

Sean P. Holman (39m 23s):

It and make sure you bring me the big one to the quarry. Yes.

Delia (39m 27s):

Deal. Yes. And. It’s by the, by the trucker’s entrance. So they see it every day. And

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 32s):

Couple more questions for you. You are so big and you, you pump so much gas and Diesel, Can, you sway the price. Can you like I mean you, you are ’cause you’re, you’re not, you’re not standard anymore. Right? What are you pumping?

Delia (39m 48s):

It’s bp.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 49s):

Bp, okay. bp. So you’re pumping so much. Like if you stopped buying, would it screw BP up? I mean It is like you, you gotta be

Sean P. Holman (39m 56s):

Pumping. You think they went through a lot of toilet paper rolls and a lot of eggs. Millions

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 59s):

Of gallons. Like I I mean how

Sean P. Holman (40m 0s):

Often do you have a, a fuel

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (40m 2s):

Delivery? I’m saying she’s a heavyweight. Like she can sweat. You gotta be able to move the needle with that company.

Delia (40m 10s):

No,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (40m 11s):

No.

Sean P. Holman (40m 14s):

We always wondered how that worked. I guess we got our answer.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (40m 16s):

No,

Delia (40m 17s):

That’s it. That’s the answer they gave me.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (40m 22s):

That’s funny. But we

Delia (40m 23s):

Did try that. You know, we have to, we have to be a big customer and they were like, Nope. Oh. Oh, okay.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (40m 30s):

Oh, that’s funny. That’s funny. Have you ever been tempted to get your class a license or do you have one?

Delia (40m 36s):

I don’t. My husband does and no I don’t. But I think I’d be afraid. It looks dangerous to me, but it’s fun.

Sean P. Holman (40m 44s):

So, so you don’t sneak into the Museum at night to the key box and pick out one of the ones you like and look around and go for a little joy ride around the complex? ’cause I would,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (40m 53s):

And be careful because Holman will, you know.

Delia (40m 56s):

Yes. Right. No, I think Dave would kill me if I erect anything. But this is kind of a funny story. We, you know, there’s been a lot of people worked at the truck stop over the years and we had this maintenance guy and he worked there until he passed away. And his name was Bill. So he worked with the antique trucks a lot and he would get ’em started, you know, help us with whatever needed to be done. He was just a jack of all trades and they would run ’em into stuff. ’cause the breaks are never good and when they take off, you know, you’re not expecting them. And all of a sudden they, you know, when you let the clutch out, they jump ahead 10 or 15 feet, you know, you just wanna make sure nobody’s standing in front of you or behind you because when it, when it takes off, it takes off that first thing.

Delia (41m 45s):

All of these antiques are like that. So anyway, they run into stuff all the time and he would whip out a, you know, a marker and write the date on it and who did it and he would even do it for himself. So if he ran into something, you know, so there’s all these, so some of the sheds that are on the property that, you know, people aren’t in but there are, you know, storing all of our equipment and stuff. There’s just like marker all over the place, you know. Well 1 1 19 80 bill 1, 1 19 80, you

Sean P. Holman (42m 17s):

Know, makes you feel part of the team. I didn’t want

Delia (42m 19s):

Anything in there, you know? Yeah. Alright.

Sean P. Holman (42m 21s):

I, I guess the, the first time, a first time a new employee does that, they probably feel real bad until they get outside to survey the damage and there’s 27 other Sharpie marks on there and they go, oh, okay. All. right. I’m just part of the team. I’m just so, just part of the team.

Delia (42m 35s):

Yep. This happens. Right.

Sean P. Holman (42m 36s):

That’s funny. Now you guys have, as you’ve grown and as you’ve scaled up, the services and amenities there are are pretty incredible. Including you have Tesla fast charging now available, you have a green initiative to make sure that you’re energy efficient, but you also have a lot of things that you would expect at a, at a truck stop, such as a cat scale, which those of us love to weigh. I, I am an off roader and overland and we all put about 2000 pounds more of whatever on our vehicles and then are shocked when we go to the cat scales. But we need you guys for that. And I was looking at some of the other stuff. So dental, you have a dog wash, which is awesome.

Sean P. Holman (43m 19s):

A chiropractor by the way. It’s a doggo mat. A doggo mat. That’s right. A barber shop. That’s right. And in a movie theater where it looks like we, I i it must have 30 or 40 seats in it or something like that. It’s looks pretty nice. Is that something where you guys regularly play or is it something where a trucker can decide to put in a movie and and watch it in hiss downtime?

Delia (43m 40s):

So it’s actually 70 seats. Wow. A movie theater. So it’s big. Yeah. You know, we just run cd DVDs in it and you know, so, or when there’s a football game on, we’ll run the football game.

Sean P. Holman (43m 53s):

Oh, there you go. Yep.

Delia (43m 54s):

You know, so people can come and watch And. it was a really big deal, you know, now everybody can watch a movie on their phone, so it’s not quite as big a deal as it Dude,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (44m 3s):

I’m going, there was, you know, for Super Bowl Sunday,

Sean P. Holman (44m 5s):

Well think about it. You don you don’t have to go and, and get all your like, you know, beers and sodas and all just go down the, to the front, grab all your goodies and then go up and then you got a comfortable chair. Yep. And you can eat to your heart’s content while you’re watching the game. And then when you’re done, you can go up and take a private shower. Meanwhile your dog is getting washed and then you realize that you sat in the chair too long and so you got a crick in your neck and then you head over to the chiropractor and then he tells you that you got hair on the back of your neck or something. Says go to the barbershop haircut

Delia (44m 35s):

Cut.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (44m 35s):

Right. Just tell me about the barber. Is he kind of is, is he or she like old school? Is this, do they have regulars

Sean P. Holman (44m 40s):

Like straight razors? Yeah,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (44m 42s):

Straight razors is like a barber barber with the, you know,

Delia (44m 44s):

Not as, not a straight razor, but they are trained barbers and actually they’re on third generation. So which I

Sean P. Holman (44m 51s):

Oh? no, same for

Delia (44m 52s):

The shop and family. Yeah. Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (44m 54s):

Oh wow. They

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (44m 55s):

They’ve got regulars

Delia (44m 56s):

Still to get

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (44m 57s):

To. Yeah. They know that’s a first name basis with their customers. Now

Sean P. Holman (44m 60s):

Do the locals from Walcott come up to you guys? For, for dental and, and for dog grooming and for chiropractic services.

Delia (45m 10s):

Of course.

Sean P. Holman (45m 11s):

That’s amazing.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (45m 12s):

Wow. She’s built a freaking city. And.

Sean P. Holman (45m 15s):

She has a city. I told you it’s half the size of the actual city.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (45m 18s):

Do you guys have like your own sewage system and, and, and water filtration pond out in the back? Like are you doing, are you doing every, all the this the municipal

Sean P. Holman (45m 28s):

Lightning’s trying to ask in a really Yeah. Polite way. What happens to all the black water coming outta the tank?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (45m 34s):

No, I, I’m just wondering if she’s doing the job of an actual city. Like it seems like it what a municipality would do.

Delia (45m 39s):

We are on city sewer, we are on city sewer, but we have our own water and our own water tower there.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (45m 46s):

So Holman touched on something very briefly and then glossed right over it. I want to step back to the Tesla superchargers. What’s the vibe there among truckers? You are surrounded by truckers all day, every day. What’s, what’s the vibe about electrification? Is it just a passing fad to them? Are they concerned? You’ve gotta have these conversations with guys over a cup of coffee?

Delia (46m 10s):

You know, I don’t think electricity for class eight trucks is in the near future if ever. And I think they know that, you know, they just rolled their eyes and I think there are probably bigger threats to Trucking and truckers than electric. But the downtime on electricity, you know, for a class eight truck it’s gonna be 12 hour charge. If we sell the same amount of BTUs that we do in Diesel Fuel, I’m gonna need my own power plant.

Sean P. Holman (46m 45s):

There’s a company in Joliet, Illinois who went and wanted to do that with a 30 truck distribution center where they said we want to be able to charge 30 bigger rigs at once. And the city utility came back and laughed at them and said, that’s more than the entire town takes. And we talk about this, oh, I think there’s a lot of benefit to ev vehicles for maybe last mile delivery or your around town car, but over the road truckers, you’re not replacing Diesel anytime soon. It’s just the, the the ability to, you know, fill up and 15 minutes and get back on the road and go another a thousand miles. That type of efficiency until that can be matched, I, I don’t think that, you know, it’s gonna be replaced and as much as people are gonna try to do it, but it’s interesting, you know, you guys are basically a small CI city with all the amenities.

Sean P. Holman (47m 30s):

And it would make sense to me that you would have ev charging as, as part of the, the nation’s infrastructure because there are people who have their, their Teslas and their EVs and you’re getting more customers out of it. Maybe those are folks that never would’ve stopped ’cause it’s a truck stop and they need to stop for a charger and all of a sudden they go, Oh

8 (47m 46s):

My God, this place is amazing.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (47m 50s):

Yeah, the cloud part,

Sean P. Holman (47m 51s):

The angel sing. Yeah. So So I. I definitely get

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (47m 54s):

That part of it.

Delia (47m 55s):

Right. You know, we’ve always said it doesn’t really matter what customers are running on. You know, if they’re cars run on peanut butter, that’s fine. I’ll sell peanut butter. The thing is, and I do sell peanut butter, but not, not by the gallon, that’s for sure. But you know, it, it, it doesn’t matter. We’re there to serve customers that are on the interstate. And and that’s what we try and focus on.

Sean P. Holman (48m 18s):

Well, before we let you go, I I was perusing your, your websites. It’s Iowa 80 truck stop.com. How

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (48m 24s):

Much did you buy since we’ve been doing this

Sean P. Holman (48m 26s):

Interview? All of it. All of it.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (48m 28s):

Well now, oh, I’m looking at a shopping cart in the upper right hand corner. You realize there’s 31 items in your

Sean P. Holman (48m 33s):

Shopping cart. You realize that she offered to do a tour. Now, sometime this year I’m going to go back to Iowa 80. Even if that’s my destination, I’m just gonna go, I’m road trip there and then I’m gonna a road trip back and I’m gonna go time it So I can, I can see them and see the Museum. But I was reading the testimonials on here and it’s, we, we do a thing on our show where we’ve got, you know, a thousand reviews on, you know, apple podcasts and things like that. And so we always read our reviews. So I thought, well maybe we would turn, you know, flip the script a little bit. Our reviews

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (49m 1s):

Though are, are funny ’cause they make fun of us because we ask for it.

Sean P. Holman (49m 4s):

But these are, these are just some of the, the, the people we’ve been through. It reminds me of the good old days when you can get everything under one roof. Not to mention the restaurant with awesome food I’ve eaten there and It is awesome. This place that is run and taken care of with pride, which I I thought was awesome and one of my favorite ever since the first time I stepped in and I was in awe. I look forward to stopping every time I’m out that way. I will literally make sure that, you know, because when you are, you’re in the interstate system. I get bored of differences. Sometimes I’ll take the northern route and sometimes I’ll take the Southern route and sometimes I’ll take the middle of the country, but a lot of times don don’t go north or south until after I’ve passed Iowa 80. ’cause I have to stop there. And I I I mean it’s, it’s literally a destination in the middle of the country.

Sean P. Holman (49m 46s):

And this person said, we love that we can find everything we need in one place. And the doggo mat is awesome. We get to wash both our girls and blow dry them. So. It’s fun to read the comments. They’re

Delia (49m 55s):

Joking about dogs.

Sean P. Holman (49m 57s):

It’s, it’s awesome. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s great to see. It’s, it’s fun to learn your, your story and your history. Like I said, it’s a place that I’ve been to. I’ve been personally odd going there and Lightning, I think you and I need to take a road trip and maybe do a interview onsite at the Museum. I would

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (50m 13s):

Love it. I will though not be satisfied until Delia,

Sean P. Holman (50m 18s):

Until you can put your signature on a bumper from hitting something in

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (50m 21s):

The parking lot. No, no, I’m either, no. That, that would be funny. I either wanna, I wanna sign the, the weird rock out in front or No, here’s what I want. I’m not gonna be happy until she names an omelet after us. I want someone to open up the menu in her 300 seat restaurant and get The Truck Show Podcast. Yeah. Spanish omelet or something.

Sean P. Holman (50m 40s):

What’s gonna happen is if it’s as bad as our show is, nobody will order it. She’ll will take it off

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (50m 44s):

Immediate. No, no, no, no. Because her, her chef will come up with it. So you and I will just co-sign it. That’s what I want. I want, I want a, a Lightning and Holman omelet or skillet something.

Sean P. Holman (50m 55s):

So, so to that point, there’s a,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (50m 56s):

She’s ignoring us. You see what I mean?

Sean P. Holman (50m 58s):

There’s a, to that point, there’s a review here, And. it says all the staff here are helpful. I just stopped two, two days ago. Great food. Even better people. And I feel like if you and I were to have our own omelet on there, it would change that review to mediocre food and even better people. No,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (51m 13s):

Again, it’s great food. The name would be, would suck. Yes. But the food would be wonderful. Right. Well, listen, you are a, a, a tremendous sport for hanging out with us for, for all this time. And congratulations on the continued success. And the family business is amazing. The entrepreneurialship is, is amazing. The fact that you’re giving back to the community is, is wonderful. And we love trucks

Sean P. Holman (51m 36s):

And, and preserving history, you know, I, I I think that’s, that’s a huge, if you guys want to check ’em out also on Facebook, Iowa 80 WLT and on Instagram, their world’s largest truck stop, check out their social pages. There’s all sorts of, of, of cool pictures and great stuff. And I’m looking at one from Instagram from a week ago when you guys had a storm and you were clearing all these snow outta the parking lot. And I can imagine right now it’s probably pretty cold there.

Delia (52m 5s):

Oh, it’s terrible. We’re ready for a break.

Sean P. Holman (52m 8s):

Oh,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (52m 8s):

I bet we were freezing today. It was 52 degrees Fahrenheit.

Sean P. Holman (52m 12s):

But we, we live at the beach. Oh. So yeah, exactly.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (52m 15s):

She’s like, cry us a river. Cry me a river.

Sean P. Holman (52m 18s):

She, she’s like, we were heating the building to 52 today.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (52m 21s):

Yeah,

Delia (52m 22s):

You’re about right on that.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (52m 24s):

Oh, well it’s been awesome to talk to you and we will get out there. We’re

Sean P. Holman (52m 29s):

Excited. Yeah. If it’s okay with you, I would love to email you maybe later this year when we can get out there and, and take a tour of the Museum. ’cause I, I think it’s a special place and I’d love to share that with our audience also.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (52m 40s):

Thank you so much. Delia, Moon Meier for checking in with us World’s

Sean P. Holman (52m 44s):

Largest truck stop.

Delia (52m 45s):

Thank you.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (52m 57s):

All. right. Holman, it’s time for shot, shot, shot, shot, shot shot, shot shot, shot shot.

Sean P. Holman (53m 2s):

We’re gonna go from one of my favorite places to one of my other favorite places. So got a few interviews, just saw some cool truck and off-Road stuff there. And I thought, you know what? Well I’m here. I’ll, I’ll do the Lord’s work and get a few interviews for the podcast. So here we go. Alright. Lightning, I’m at one of my favorite places, my favorite shows of the year. This is the SHOT Show and I’m at Industry Range Day. And you can just listen to all the Freedom Seeds out there and if you listen closely, you can even hear Freedom Ring. Yes.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (53m 36s):

I’ve never heard Freedom Seeds before.

Sean P. Holman (53m 38s):

Now those are those little things that go pew, pew Freedom

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (53m 41s):

Seeds. Okay.

Sean P. Holman (53m 50s):

I mean it almost sounds better than any V eight,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (53m 52s):

Almost

Sean P. Holman (53m 54s):

All. right? I’m gonna walk around, we’re gonna have some fun checking out some new products and I’m gonna walk the SHOT Show as well. And if I find anything cool and truck related, I’m gonna bring that interview to you here on the Show

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (54m 6s):

Podcast. Where is this shooting happening? Is this at the convention center? There’s no way they got a permit to shoot there, right? Where were you?

Sean P. Holman (54m 14s):

Nope. They take a, a rent, a big range out in Boulder. And so if you think about it, there’s like over a hundred different companies, 150, I don’t know, something like that. And probably 50 Bays. And you just go from easy up to easy up and they hand you, they, they have a lineup of guns and they go, which one would you like to shoot? I’m like, all those. And they hand you a Magazine for each one. And are you serious? Just go to town. It’s amazing. Do you

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (54m 38s):

Know special? Do you have to sign your life away and Oh

Sean P. Holman (54m 41s):

It’s, yeah, it’s invite only. You have to be on a list. Oh, okay. And know people. It and it, yeah. It’s not just anybody can walk in there. Even people who go to the SHOT Show can’t just go there. You have to be a, a part of a, an invite or something’s, you know, special or weasel your way, And it or or whatever you do. But plenty of YouTubers and saw a lot of people.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (55m 1s):

Did you what? Stop. Oh did you shoot anything? That was incredibly impressive.

Sean P. Holman (55m 6s):

Yeah, there’s always stuff there. Matrix Arms has this amazing all aluminum. They take the Glock and terminals and then change the shape of the gun to fit more like a 1911 ergonomics So. it feels better in the hand. And it’s basically all the reliability of a Glock but with the feel of a better gun. Sorry I’m not really a Glock guy. And then there’s there, there’s shotguns over unders. Automatics. There’s, we shot a AK 47 ar 15 base shotguns at skeet in the air at sporting clays, which is freaking awesome there this year. There’s a big thing on thermal optics. So you would, if you used to optic on a gun that has a red dot, there’d be a thermal for heat signatures of things that you’re aiming at.

Sean P. Holman (55m 47s):

Lots of binary triggers. Not as many fully automatic guns.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (55m 50s):

What what’s a binary trigger?

Sean P. Holman (55m 52s):

It’s where it shoots both in the forward and back position. Oh my lord, really? So he goes some crazy cool shotguns, big caliber stuff. They have a long range where you can shoot, I don’t even know what the biggest caliber there I don Dunno, 50 or something like that. It’s, it’s pretty awesome. And you basically just walk around and waiting like, sound

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (56m 11s):

Like warfare’s going on there.