Peterbilt Retailer Named Top Dealer

George F. Grask, president of Quad City Peterbilt of Davenport, Iowa, knows the value of loyalty in business.

He says he is proud that the first five people he hired to work at Quad City and his first customer are still with him today.

His success as a businessman and his loyalty — both to the industry and the community — earned Grask the ATD Truck Dealer of the Year award for 1999.

He began working in the truck dealership business in 1973 as a parts counter and service writer for La Beau Brothers in Kankakee, Ill. In 1974, he got a job as a sales engineer for GMC’s truck division in Pontiac, Mich.

Grask moved to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, in 1975, and became operations manager of a GMC truck dealership. He eventually became its owner. In 1983, he and his father opened a full-service dealership in Davenport.

For the past four years, Grask has served on the national Peterbilt Dealer Council and last year was elected its chairman. In 1997 and 1998, he was on the Eaton Dealer Advisory Board, and since 1985, he has participated in the American Truck Dealer’s Peterbilt 20 Group.

Grask has served for nearly 20 years as treasurer of the Kirkwood Foundation Board of Directors. He helped establish a truck driver program that provides new trucks for students to train on. He has also assisted Kirkwood in fund-raising campaigns, one of which brought in more than $10.8 million.

Grask and his wife, Marianne, live in Cedar Rapids.

As dealer of the year, Grask will serve as a spokesman for truck dealers across the country and will be an honorary member of the ATD Committee, a policy-making panel of representatives of dealers of major truck manufacturers.

He and three other finalists were honored by the American Truck Dealers division of the National Automobile Dealers Association on April 10 during its annual convention in San Diego.

For the full story, see the April 12 print edition of Transport Topics. Subscribe today.