1. Zachary T. Nabozny
AMGT 493 Section 402
August 15, 2016
Internship Project
The commercial vehicle industry is one of the largest in the automotive field. I have
gained a tremendous amount of knowledge about the commercial vehicle side of the automotive
industry working throughout the years at Riverside Vans. I have also noticed more how
important it is to help out company’s get exactly what they’re looking for the first time. We
experienced a lot of issues the needed to be fixed when companies came to us because of other
upfitting businesses. Unfortunately, more times than not we had to fix another upfitting business
mess up. I took note about this issue that we were experiencing with our smaller businesses that
we deal with throughout the state of Michigan and thought, “How can we limit these comebacks
of from other upfitting companies?” It’s simple, make certain they come to Riverside Vans in the
first place.
During my time at Riverside Vans, Coca-Cola was and continues to slowly giving back
the buying power of work orders for upfits to the fleet managers at the independent bottling
branches. Before Coca-Cola started doing this, the independent branches would have to apply for
a new van and work order and have it finalized and approved at the corporate headquarters in
Atlanta before receiving a commercial van for their fleet. Now Coca-Cola is trying to save time
by giving each branch a certain amount of money each year to purchase new vehicles for their
fleet if they need to.
So Ann and I got together to talk about how we can market Riverside Vans better to show
the fleet managers of the independent bottling companies that we can design and install things
right the first time, and exactly how they expect it. After discussing ideas, we finally came to a
conclusion. My value added project was to design a PowerPoint and Word Document, which I
have attached along with this document in my submission, showing exactly what packages we
offer to our existing Coca-Cola customers. This way it will give the fleet managers an idea of
what other branches utilize in their vans and what would work best for their employees in the
field.
During my internship I had to go through the vans and place the shelving in the
customer’s desired location. From there I got underneath the van to see if the step bit would hit
any wires or the frame from drilling through the floor. The last thing we want to experience is to
have a fleet of vehicles comeback all because of one clipped wire. When placing the steel on the
floor I had to make note of where the ribs were on the floor, because we want to make the
installation as easy as possible for the technicians and drilling on a corner of a rib and have to
install a plus nut sideways is not one of them. This would just cause more issues and cost
Riverside Vans more time and money. I had to make sure the steel would not dent the outside of
the walls from bracing them to the van’s wall. Once I went through and checked all of the items
stated above, I then made a pattern out of luan board. Designing a pattern for the installer save a
large amount of time. All the technicians have to do is put the board in place, mark the
designated holes and drill. If I didn’t make a pattern, the technician would have to put every

2. individual shelf in, place it in the proper spot, check to make sure they weren’t drilling through
anything, and then drill and install.
I had to design three of the four existing packages for our Coca-Cola customer’s and
make sure they met the fleet manager’s needs, fit properly and safely, as well as make sure the
installment is easy enough for our technicians in the service floor. After we finished a new
package for Coca-Cola I then took multiple pictures to show exactly how the upfit looks. If we
got the thumbs up, we put it out in the field for shipment. If we got a no or they were expecting
something else, we would go back to the drawing boards and do the above process again until it
was right.
We try and do every one of our upfits in this exact way. We feel that if we communicate
more in the beginning and get the upfit correct the first time then we can install more efficiently
and ultimately get the vehicle to the customer sooner. Our goal at Riverside Vans is to have a
satisfied customer. The best way to gain a customer base in the commercial vehicle business is
through word of mouth from previous customers.
After the fleet manager approved their package and upfit, I then had to take time to show
our technicians how to properly install the desired package correctly, as well as efficiently. The
one thing that I stress to technicians, is that we have over one hundred vans per package to install
and we what to be as efficient as possible. The less time the technicians have to get out of the
van, the less time they are wasting. Throughout the install I try and tell the technicians the
important things about doing things in steps much like an assembly line. I tell them to mark all
the holes first, that means on the floor, ceiling and walls, then drill and plus nut, and then install.
If this process is done accordingly and install should take no more than two hours with a well
skilled technician.
After analyzing one of our new employees install, I took a mental note on how long he
was taking on each steel installation. I came to the conclusion that it took him the same amount
of time to install the front end of a package (data file, partition, and three door kit) as long as it
took him to install the rest of the package in the van. So I decided to bring on another employee
to the Coca-Cola production line. This technicians job was to build and install the front ends of
the van so our new technician could install just the rear of the package. In doing this we were
able to install an entire van in just four hours instead of five. The only issue that we ran into was
when we had our second technician already working on an existing van and he was unable to
build the front ends of the vans for our other technician. So I felt that we could make building the
front ends even faster and take lest time to install them. I had both of our technicians come in on
Friday’s and build nothing but shelving up for their packages. Increasing our inventory in one
day would save the technicians more time when installing packages. This way throughout the
week the technicians didn’t have to build and then install the shelving. I found out that the
technicians are much more efficient if they do one thing all day and repeat the process, instead of
trying to complete multiple tasks to finish an upfit.
During my time at Riverside Vans we gained three more individual bottling companies
from Coca-Cola and they were from word of mouth from one of our existing customer. Ann
thought that our process of getting a new production line started needed a more efficient way to
market our products and service to potential clients. With a PowerPoint and Word Document in
front of the customer, they can go through at their own speed and see what they like and don’t

3. like and then come to us knowing exactly what they want, or have limited questions about our
products and services. Doing this saved Ann more time to deal with other smaller clients and
dealerships instead of always being on the phone talking to potential customers about future
packaging upfits.
When I was typing up the Word Document about the reasons to consider Riverside Vans,
I learned more about things that other upfitting companies do not take into consideration while
installing steel. The first thing that I recognized was were one of the few companies that preps
and details the interior before shipping the vans off to their final destination. I found it extremely
unprofessional when I heard about other businesses just leaving the interior a mess once they
were done with their installation. We prep each van that comes through Riverside Vans to show
customers that we care about their products just as much as we do. The other thing that I felt was
unprofessional was most upfitting companies do not follow the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety
Standards that is enforced by the Federal Government. When I asked what FMVSS stood for
Ann pulled out this large binder full of regulations that we have to follow while installing
packages. I learned that if Riverside Vans doesn’t meet these standards and the Government
finds out about it, they can shut our business down. Riverside Vans used to build conversion
vans and was heavily regulated while in business. Over the 31 years of dealing with the FMVSS,
Ann knows almost everything she can and cannot doing while building these packages.
All and all my time at Riverside Vans has been a tremendous experience. I felt that my
role of the Coca-Cola project was much needed to help make Riverside Vans and more efficient
business and help them grow into the future for one day I plan to take it over myself. I have
learned more during this summer of working with my internship project than I have in the
previous four summers of working at Riverside Vans. This summer I took on many managing
positions to help take the stress off of Ann and Harold both and make them more efficient with
their job. I feel that my time at Ferris State and the Automotive Management program has made
me a more dynamic employee when it comes to the managing side of the commercial industry.