JEGS History / Heritage
Inside
Story of Racing's Fastest Family
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the JEGS Timeline
See what "JEGS is..."
Past to Present
JEGS
began life as one of those neat little speed shops. Back
in 1960, Jeg Coughlin Sr. opened JEGS High Performance
in Columbus, Ohio. Jeg was a speed freak, but was limited
by his Midwest location that made it difficult to find
the parts he wanted. As he slowly found the stuff he was
looking for, his buddies came to him to build their engines,
and before long he had opened the doors to a full-on retail
business. It was the heyday of the speed shop, and JEGS
was the place to go in Central Ohio. Fast-forward to 1988,
when Jegs four sons, John, Troy, Mike and Jeg, Jr., purchased
the operation with the assistance of their father. The
wheels were set in motion and the company dove headfirst
into the mail order business as a team. After several
expansions
at the original location, what started out as a 4000 square-foot
speed shop now encompasses a 100,000 square-foot warehouse
a chassis shop, a call center and the original retail
store. Two other stores and two additional call centers
are also located in the metropolitan Columbus area. In
the fall of 1999 a newly built state-of-the-art distribution
center and headquarters opened. There are now over 300
associates. But it all started as a small family-run speed
shop, and that founding company culture remains strong.
The business continues to maintain the one-on-one relationship
with their customers.
Knowing your product
The
parts that JEGS sells are not only used by their associates,
but also by the owners of the company, who all race. TThe
most obvious success is Jeg, Jr’s three NHRA Pro Stock
championships (2000, 2002 & 2007) and he also won
the ’92 NHRA Super Gas title competing in the sportsman
ranks. All four brothers are deeply involved in drag racing,
and the JEGS team invades every NHRA national event and
a lot of divisional events with the familiar yellow and
black paint scheme on their rigs. Inside the transporters
you will find their respective race vehicles and a host
spare parts. All of the parts on the race cars are available
through JEGS, and while there’s not a lot of experimentation
in the name of product sales development on the Pro Stock
cars, the Sportsman-level and bracket racing vehicles
of John, Troy, Mike and Jeg, Jr. are frequent test beds
for new parts under evaluation. JEGS also carry’s a line
of Jegster suspension parts that are designed, developed,
and manufactured at the original 11th Avenue shop.
Getting the product to the valued customer
JEGS
has several retail stores throughout Columbus, but the
bulk of the business is done at their state-of-the-art
headquarters in the Columbus suburb of Delaware, Ohio.
There is over 200,000 square-feet to the main building,
which is divided between the offices in front and the
enormous automated warehouse in back. The office area
also includes all of the administrative offices and a
bank of sales people, as well as a cafeteria that looks
like it would make a great racing-themed restaurant. As
impressive as the offices are, the warehouse and order-processing
layout is extremely efficient and effective.
The
“hardware” portion of the headquarters is enormous, with
a fully automated shipping department to parts racks that
run the length of the warehouse and stretch to the top
of the 50-foot ceiling. All of the parts are stored in
very specific places throughout the warehouse to ease
shipping, and the computer-automated retrieval system,
packaging, and shipping assembly lines are what modern
computer technology.
Placing
an order
Once you make an order, either online or over the phone,
the order is processed and the computers go to work sending
instructions to pick parts off of the shelves in the three-level
flow rack system, the automated retrieval system and to
the large VNA racking area. Everything funnels down onto
a conveyor so that all the parts for one order end up
at the same place at the same time. Then they are boxed,
weighed to make sure everything is accounted for, labeled,
and finally sent to the out-bound shipping area and is
loaded onto the trailer of the assigned logistics carrier.
Information regarding JEGS Mail Order can be found at
www.jegs.com and for media/fan resources check out www.teamjegs.com.
Media Contact:
Scott "Woody" Woodruff
JEGS, Director of Media & Motorsports
Office: 800.345.4545 (3.412)
Mobile: 614.595.1820
Fax: 740.362.4385
Email: jegspr@aol.com -or- scott.woodruff@jegs.com
