We live in unprecedented times.
The trucking industry is more important than ever in this pandemic, and drivers
have a unique challenge when it comes to eating on the road. When Mike and
Jamie Williams, owners of Big Mike’s Pork ‘N Wings food truck in Grand Junction
saw this challenge, they knew they had to take action.
The stay-at-home order across the
nation had made it difficult for truckers to find a place to sit down for a hot
meal. With restaurant dining rooms closed and most drive-thrus not
accommodating large trucks, Mike and Jamie knew there was a need that they
could help fill. This sparked Big Mike’s idea. They set up shop at a trucker-friendly
gas station along I-70 in Grand Junction and began serving free barbecue for
big-rig drivers passing through.
After their first night of
feeding these essential truckers, they started getting phone calls from other
truckers looking for a place to get a hot meal on their way through town. The
first night Big Mike’s started “feed the truckers,” they served over 100 hot
meals. The second night they had an even larger showing. Once the community got
involved, they just kept going. “We’re
just trying to do our part and take care of some of the vital folks who are
keeping America running. Small businesses can do great, big things, and at the
end of the day we’re all in this together. We know there’s hope and light at
the end of this tunnel, where we hope to be thriving and not just surviving,”
says Jamie Williams.
Alpine Bank saw what was
happening and wanted to support the movement. “We wanted to support one of our
wonderful small business customers doing a really cool thing,” says Tawni
Kelley, director of Community Outreach for Alpine Bank in Mesa County.
Since the Williams have started
this movement, they have attracted not only local news media stations, but
they’ve received national news coverage from multiple media outlets like USA
Today, The Washington Times and The San Francisco Chronicle, just to name a
few.
“We are getting close to feeding
500 truckers per day,” Jamie says. “We will continue to feed the truckers as
long as we can with the support of our community. We are all in this together!”