Toy’s Auto Parts celebrates 70 years
Angela Woodruff tears up as she considers the years of service and dedication her family has had in the many small towns in Southern Indiana through the family business that began in Loogootee.
The business traces its origins to her grandfather, Robert “Bob” Toy, who recognized an opportunity while working at his father, Gilbert’s, auto repair shop in Loogootee. Parts were shipped up to the shop from Evansville.
“My grandpa was just kind of in charge of getting the parts and stuff and finding them,” Angela, owner of Part City Auto Parts in Huntingburg, explained.
To help customers get their parts faster, he began stocking more commonly needed parts.
“That was the beginning of the idea of Toy’s Auto Parts,” she said.
Angela has posted the story of her family’s business on the company’s Facebook page this week.
The early days required creative logistics.
“Parts were actually delivered to the parts store on a Greyhound bus,” Angela said. “The bus would actually pull into the parking lot of the parts store and drop the parts off and then go on its way.”
Bob officially established Toy’s Auto Parts on Aug. 1, 1955, purchasing the business from his mother, Rose, after his father, Gilbert, passed away.
The venture began during challenging financial times for the young family with four children. There were times when Bob had to tell his wife, Virginia, she couldn’t go grocery shopping until he sold more parts.
But they persevered, building the business on fair pricing, a large inventory, including those hard-to-get parts, and knowledgeable advice from him and his employees.
Virginia served as bookkeeper and even operated a cake-decorating business in the Loogootee building for several years. “Yes, she had her own little business in the same building,” Angela laughed.
The parts business expanded steadily under Bob’s leadership. His sons, Mike, Dan, and Bill, joined the operation, leading to new locations in Odin in 1974, Dale in 1977, Ferdinand in 1984, Huntingburg in 1986, and Washington in 1990.
In 1983, Bob stepped back from daily operations, transferring leadership to his three sons under the Toy Brothers partnership. The brothers operated together for nearly two decades before amicably dividing the stores in 2000, with each taking two locations.
“The boys decided they were going to split the six stores at that particular point,” Angela explained. Each brother took two locations, with Dan operating the Odin and Huntingburg stores.
Dan’s role proved crucial in establishing the business model that emphasized personal customer relationships and community service. He maintained the tradition of opening stores on Sundays and holidays to serve customers with urgent needs, often meeting people at the store during family time.
“There were many trips of just kind of doing that as a family, or sometimes he would do that on his own,” Angela recalled. “People would call and say, ‘Hey, Dan, I need this,’ and he’d say, ‘Okay, I’ll meet you down at the store.'”
Angela remembers growing up around the store. She laughed at the times her dad would set her and her sister, Amy, up running the floor scrubber on the concrete floors next to the long exhaust pipes.
“He thought it was funny to start us up right beside it every time. So, we’d ‘clang, clang, clang’ along the exhaust pipes,” she recalled the scrubber oscillating into the long metal tubes.
She also remembers her dad coming home smelling like the autoparts store. She and her sister would tell him he smelled “weird.”
These days, she doesn’t really notice.
She decided to come work with her dad in 2011.
“At the time, my dad was working seven days a week, and he was working long hours. My initial concern was just for his health,” she explained.
Angela had worked at Kimball International, but found office work didn’t suit her. She began helping at the parts store, gradually taking on more responsibility and eventually purchasing it in 2015.
“I chuckle now because some of the customers said to me, ‘When I saw you in the store the first time, I kind of thought, oh, what’s a girl in a parts store,'” she said. “Of all the cousins and stuff, I am the only female that has ventured into the parts store business.”
She’s been busy wearing multiple hats in the small business ever since.
“You go home with motor oil, hydraulic fluid, whatever, on you. Sometimes you don’t want to ask,” Angela laughed.
The business model focuses on serving small communities where residents would otherwise need to drive to larger towns for automotive parts. According to Angela, as her grandfather was ordering parts from Evansville for the repair shop, he recognized the need to bring those services into these smaller communities.
Their decisions about where to expand over the years reflected that commitment.
“A lot of the locations were centralized around little small communities to save people the time of having to drive to a bigger town,” Angela explained.
The stores serve diverse customers, from professional mechanics who call with specific part numbers to weekend do-it-yourselfers who describe problems in general terms.
Those services extend beyond parts sales to include hydraulic hose manufacturing for farmers and industrial uses, as well as installing batteries and replacing headlights in the store parking lot. The business also delivers parts to customers who cannot reach the store, particularly elderly residents with transportation challenges.
This all highlights the store’s dedication to its customers. Customer relationships remain central to the business philosophy.
“We’re not just selling parts, you’re getting to know people’s lives,” she explained. “They talk to you and they come in here and you know who they are.”
They become part of their lives. There is a little girl who comes by the parts store with her dad on occasion. Angela remembers the day she came home from the hospital. Her dad had stopped in to pick up parts and mentioned he was heading to the hospital to pick up his wife and their newborn daughter.
“When they came home, he stopped back by the store so I could meet his daughter,” Angela said through happy tears.
Now, Angela’s son, Garrett, works alongside her, representing the potential fourth generation of family involvement. He also owns the car wash next door, which Dan Toy previously operated. Her husband, Jerry, also works at the store.
The business faces modern challenges, including increased competition from corporate chains and vehicles that are more difficult for individuals to repair. However, the focus on personal service and community involvement continues to differentiate the independent stores.
“Our tagline, specific to my location, is ‘The best part of our business is you,'” Angel said.
