Coachbult.com - W.F. Mickey Body Co.



W.F. Mickey Body Co. - 1904-present - High Pointe, North Carolina

W.F. Mickey Body Company Inc. – High Pointe, North Carolina - beverage bodies 1950s. Mickey Truck Bodies, Inc., originally founded as The W.F. Mickey Body Company, has come a long way since founder Will Franklin Mickey opened his first blacksmith shop in the High Point, NC area back in 1904. From its early days as maker of the iron ring for wooden wagon wheels and open wooden bodies for hauling ice, the company has blossomed into a premier manufacturer of state-of-the-art bodies and trailers made entirely of aluminum. Two things have remained constant through the years, however. One is the company's unwavering commitment to quality products and services. The other is ownership – the company is still owned and operated by the Mickey family. It was during the mid to late 1940s that Mickey started making closed steel bodies, a natural evolution for many of the successful blacksmith operations of the era. One of the company's first major customers was National Bohemian, a beer distributor based in Baltimore, MD. Mickey built its first beverage trailer in the early 1970s – a 14 bay unit without a main-beam that was used by a Chicago Coca-Cola bottler to haul product from its main warehouse to a satellite warehouse about 20 miles away. The early Mickey trailers did not use box beams, or I beams, but that changed when the company moved into an all aluminum construction in early '80s. The shift from steel to all-aluminum construction marked a major turning point in the history of Mickey Truck Bodies, and in the beverage distribution industry. The process started with a unit made of a combination of steel and aluminum, and eventually evolved to all aluminum, including the main beam. Throughout its rich history, Mickey Truck Bodies has always prided itself on innovating the delivery equipment marketplace. Its first all aluminum trailer line – the 20/20 series – set a new industry standard for lightweight, maximum payload capacity and durability. And Mickey consistently improved the quality and creativity of its product lines with each new breakthrough, including the modern-day Load Bear series of bodies and trailers.

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www.mickeybody.com

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