Page 8 - BusinessWest May 15, 2023

Material Growth
LiftTruck Marks 35 Years of Handling Change, Opportunity
BY GEORGE O’BRIEN
[email protected]
As LiftTruck celebrates 35 years, Kara Sotolotto
says, its focus is on continuing to grow its many business operations and building on an already-solid foundation.
Kara Sotolotto says she essentially grew up in her family’s business, LiftTruck Parts & Ser- vice Inc. in West Springfield.
She remembers doing a little bit of everything for this company — founded by her father, Mario C. Sotolotto, which specializes in forklift and lift- truck sales, maintenance, parts, rentals, and more — but especially the vast amounts of paperwork that have long since been replaced by computer files. This included handling work orders, parts inventory (something that is still done by hand), calling customers, and much more. It seemed there was something new every day, and, collec- tively, those various assignments have prepared her for her current and somewhat new role, as the company’s vice president, a title she shares with her brother, Mario A. Sotolotto.
She was still waiting for her new business cards when she talked with BusinessWest, but she has already eased into the role, which will see her work with other family members (and there are many of them) and other employees to chart
a course for future growth for this venture, which this year celebrates 35 years in business.
It is marking this milestone in a mostly quiet fashion — but also with charitable donations each quarter, including one recently to Baystate Chil-
dren’s Hospital — and by essentially doing what
it has been doing from the start, Kara Sotolotto said — taking care of the many different needs of its clients, mostly manufacturers and distributors located across the Bay State, but also in Connecti- cut and Rhode Island.
Over the years, the company has expanded well beyond its West Springfield roots, opening
an office in Brockton to better serve customers in the eastern part of the state, including Cape Cod and the islands, as well as Rhode Island. Looking forward, she said the company is looking at pos- sible additional expansion in the Worcester area, with a location to house what she called a ‘green division,’ dedicated to sales and service of battery- powered BYD material-handling equipment (more on that later).
Overall, though, the business plan calls for shifting more of the day-to-day responsibilities of managing the company to the second generation, Sotolotto explained, as well as simply building
on the solid foundation created over the past 35 years, one that has enabled the company to thrive in a sector with many competitors.
Indeed, when asked how LiftTruck manages to stand out in such a crowded field, she said simply, “our service and our mechanics; these are
8 MAY 15, 2023
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