By Larry LeMasters
Note: This feature is in the March TT&C 2019 issue.
Note: This feature is in the March TT&C 2019 issue.
 Click to view this electronic issue.  John Esche stands behind some of his semitruck models. | John Esche just completed his fourth year as owner of Toy Trucks & More in Evansville, Ind. For him, the past four years have been more of a journey than a job. “I took over the company from David Beasley, which wasn’t the way I would have liked to get into business,” John said. David, who founded Toy Trucks & More and took it full time in 1991, turned the company over to John after being diagnosed with terminal colon cancer. “I’m still very close to David’s family,” John added. “I miss David’s guidance and friendship. For me, after working with David for nearly 15 years, it seemed like a no-brainer to take over the business. It made a lot of sense taking over such a well-established business rather than trying to build a customer base from scratch. I was able to keep a lot of great customers, who knew I had been involved with Toy Trucks & More for a long time, and they knew what I was capable of doing.” Working with David provided a huge advantage for John that many startup model company owners don’t have. “Through David, I built great friendships with customers and other dealers. I met the guys that now assist me at shows. David taught me more than the ‘ropes’ of the business. He taught me to value people over models,” he said. Even with such a strong beginning, John had difficulty when he took over as owner. “I had a good grasp on how things needed to go,” he added, “but I was still quite overwhelmed at the first show where I set up by myself.” Fortunately for the modeling world, John recovered from his “first show” jitters. And John’s custom building career truly took off. |
 This is a Freightliner Argosy, which started life as a rough resin casting that didn’t even have openings for the windows. John Esche carved out the windows, and bottom bumper, painted it medium blue metallic, mated a random windshield to the casting, mounted it to a DCP frame, then added the antennas, handrails and also mirrors from out of a parts box.  This Kenworth log truck started as a stock DCP W900. John Esche scratch built the frame from a piece of metal sheet with bunks from Moore’s Farm Toys. He used sticks from his trees for logs. The crane is from a DCP stepdeck trailer and the pup trailer is a Tonkin trailer that’s been cut down with bunks added.  A DCP Kenworth W900 that John Esche mated to a modified Penjoy drywall bed.  A GMC Matchbox cab that has been stripped and repainted metallic blue. John Esche added an interior to the cab from a random pickup cab, the horns and lights, stainless stacks, and an old-school Mercury sleeper. The cattle trailer is a Top Shelf Replicas trailer that has been cut down to a flat floor type and the kingpin was moved so it wouldn’t catch on the mudflaps. |  A DCP Peterbilt 379 with a big bunk and stainless parts from Truckin’ Little. John Esche painted the sleeper to match and stretched the frame to accommodate the extra length.  A stock DCP Kenworth W900 cab that John Esche mated to a hard-to-find Winross log bunk bed. He added the stainless stacks, heavy haul front wheels and antennas.  A model of a Kenworth T880 dump truck that John Esche made by splicing a DCP cab to a different truck’s frame. John thought this model would be a good seller, because it has become an extremely popular truck with drivers, and the model is not available from any toy manufacturer.  John Esche added a wrecker boom to this DCP Peterbilt 379.  Four Chevrolet C60 cabs that John Esche mated to Top Shelf Replicas Ford grain truck bodies. |  This is a Peterbilt 379. The frame was painted a metallic red to match the stock stripes and detailed out with a gullwing bumper, antennas, stainless fenders and a Mercury sleeper kit from Damon Montague.  A custom Peterbilt painted candy red over gold with parts from Truckin’ Little and SpecCast, wheels and some pieces from larger scale Hot Wheels, and front fenders from a 1/43 scale Ford model grafted onto the Peterbilt hood.  A pink Peterbilt 379 that John Esche built for a customer’s wife as a Christmas gift to her husband. She sent photos of the truck and John built the model to match the actual truck. The trailer is a container trailer with log bunks added, stainless fenders to match the truck and a log load.  This is a stock DCP Kenworth K100 cab. John Esche stretched the frame, adding a Winross box truck bed with side inserts from a Top Shelf Replicas cattle trailer to build the truck. He cut down another Top Shelf cattle trailer to about half the original length to create the pup trailer. |
RSS Feed
