Today we’re celebrating Roland Poirier’s time with St.Claude Autobody.
In 2020, Roland was presented with a 10 year service award at St. Claude Autobody. He started working as the Production Manager in 2010 - but that is far from the beginning of his involvement with St.Claude Autobody.
Roland attended Red River Community College in 1984 to pursue his passion for collision repair. Over the next four years, he completed the apprenticeship program working at a repair facility in Warren and then later in Elie. Once completed, in January of 1988, and now an Interprovincial Red Seal Technician, Roland wasted no time and purchased St. Claude Autobody in May of 1988.
St.Claude Autobody in the 90’s - Owned by Roland Poirier
Roland successfully ran St Claude Autobody into the 90’s and expanded the existing shop in 1994, doubling it’s square footage, to keep up with customer demand. This growth trend continued into the late 90’s and early 2000’s. Over that time, Roland and the team at St Claude Autobody became well known for their attention to detail and quality work. Even though MPI collision repair made up the large majority of the work mix, that didn’t stop Roland from stretching his imagination in the customization side of autobody. Roland was not only very well known for his beautifully restored 1972 Mercury Cougar which inspired the original “St Claude Autobody” sign, but also his customized vehicles.
The first of many being his regular cab 1985 GMC square body truck that he stretched into a custom extended cab/ short box. Of course GMC never offered an extended cab truck with dual suicide doors back then but that didn’t stop Roland from building one himself. The iconic big yellow truck known around the community as “old Yeller” quickly became the mascot for St Claude Autobody.
Up next was the Limo Truck which was also created using a 1986 square body GMC truck. For this build, Roland stretched an already lengthy crew cab into a spacious 8 seater with an oak table centerpiece, a flip front end and a 5.9L Cummins engine.
It was during the limo truck build (late 99, early 2000) that Roland had hired a young worker by the name of Norm Bruneau. Norm worked at St Claude Autobody from age 14 until he was 18 at which point he left St Claude to further is skill and knowledge of the autobody trade at Red River College. Little did either of them know that this 4 year journey would change both of their lives forever. Norm went on to purchase St Claude Autobody in 2006 while Roland moved on to pursue another career opportunity. But as fate would have it, Roland returned to St Claude Autobody in 2010 where he took on the role of production manager.
Norm Bruneau working on Roland’s Limo truck frame
Production Managers with Roland’s experience don’t come along every day, especially when they are so well known in the community. His customer service skills and knowledge of the repair process made him the perfect fit. Over the next 10 years, Roland would go on to use his business experience to help St Claude Autobody grow into it’s new building in 2015 and increase its throughput by 8x. Roland’s hands on skills and ability to adapt to the quickly changing vehicle repair process also make him the perfect mentor for the young techs learning the skills of the trade.
When discussing this write-up, Norm mentioned that Roland has been in the industry for almost 40 years, and for perspective, Norm said that he hasn’t had his 40th birthday yet. I’m not sure if that was a jab at Roland’s age, or whether it was a testament to Roland’s WEALTH of knowledge pertaining to the industry and everything relating to it.
Roland’s knowledge and experience has been a key factor in so many facets of St. Claude Autobody, and was paramount to the professional development of the teenager who started working with him over 20 years ago.
Roland continues to follow his passion for custom cars. His latest project is a 1947 Dodge truck ‘Rat Rod’ which has been stretched, widened and dropped on a Durango powertrain. In the summertime, Roland can often be found at different car shows across the province, or trying to organize a group ride. Some things never change.