Foodliner, Quest Liner: Driving the Industry
Together, Foodliner and Quest Liner make up one of the nation’s leading transportation carriers in North America. While the companies together have been named as one of the nation’s top-100 for-hire transport carriers in the United States consecutively since 2004, individually each company also stands out as a leader in the markets they serve.
Foodliner is recognized as the largest bulk food-grade carrier in the U.S., using a customized transportation system and the latest technology to provide individualized services throughout North America. Foodliner’s customized transportation system has repeatedly resulted in mutually beneficial partnerships with most of the country’s major bulk-food, sugar, sweetener, vegetable-oil, and flour-milling companies. Foodliner has terminal locations in 32 states, as well as multiple locations in Mexico. Recently, Foodliner won the Platform Powerhouse Award, which highlighted the best example of a Trimble Transportation Power User. This was announced at the Insight Ovation Awards hosted by the Trimble corporation.
The Foodliner group utilized Trimble’s TMT, TMW Suite and in-cab solutions plus the Trimble Transportation Cloud, to integrate seamlessly and securely across the supply chain. Foodliner integrated SOTI that incorporated driver applications and utilized TMT’s tank wash monitoring module to maintain compliance with the Food Modernization and Safety Act.
Quest Liner, on the other hand, focuses on serving the transportation needs of the chemical and biofuels industries, and specializes in total transportation management. With locations in the Gulf Coast, Southeast and Midwest, as well as in Mexico, Quest Liner provides services across North America.
Foodliner and Quest Liner are part of the transportation industry leader, McCoy Group, Inc. Tracing its roots back more than 60 years ago to southwestern Wisconsin, the McCoy Group got its start when entrepreneur Robert McCoy started a one-truck milk hauling business to supplement his income to support his growing family.
Today, the McCoy Group is based in Dubuque, Iowa, and is still family-owned, now operated, and led by the third generation of members of the McCoy family.
Foodliner joined the McCoy Group family of businesses in 1982, when the company was purchased from Roy’s Dairy, in Monroe, Wis. The transaction was small, as it involved just 10 units.
In the mid-1980s, Foodliner experienced a huge business boost, when the company landed a contract to deliver corn sweetener produced at a Cargill plant in southern Iowa. As the business expanded and took on additional customers, Foodliner’s sales grew substantially over a two-decade period.
The McCoy Group expanded its business offerings in 2007 with the acquisition of Gless Brothers Trucking. The chemical and alcohol transport company was later rebranded Quest Liner.
At the time, company officials described the acquisition as being an “ideal match and opportunity” of being able to pair Quest Liner with Foodliner and other McCoy Group companies.
In addition to Foodliner and Quest Liner, the McCoy Group’s transportation companies also include W.W. Transport, which was acquired in late 2020 and most recently Bay and Bay Transport based in Eagan, MN. Additionally, one of nation’s largest Freightliner dealership groups, Truck Country, and Stoops Freightliner-Quality Trailer, are also operated by the McCoy Group. With 26 locations, Truck Country and Stoops Freightliner have dealerships in Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin.
In 2018, the McCoy Group expanded into construction and forestry, with the acquisition of McCoy Construction & Forestry, a John Deere construction and forestry dealership group with locations in Minnesota, Wisconsin and the upper peninsula or Michigan. The construction and forestry group later added locations in Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, and Missouri.
As Foodliner and Quest Liner’s business models continue to evolve, so does the companies’ staffing needs. Today, the McCoy Group employs more than 3,500, including approximately 800 Foodliner and Quest Liner drivers. (The businesses are also served by nearly 250 owner-operator drivers.) Both companies continue to look to add to their fleet of drivers, as well as other staff members.
For more information about Foodliner and Quest Liner, please visit their respective websites, Foodliner.com and Questliner.com