Craftsmen Industries Builds a Mobile Disaster Relief Command Center for Hy-Vee

After a natural disaster, the organizations that show up to help need a place to organize before they can do anything else. Hy-Vee wanted that place to travel with its relief team. Craftsmen Industries built a mobile disaster relief command center that gives the team office-style workspace, shared displays and an exterior no one can mistake.

Craftsmen Industries builds mobile disaster relief command centers for Hy-Vee. Craftsmen Industries built the Hy-Vee command center on a semi-trailer platform. The Hy-Vee command center supports communication and coordination after natural disasters. The Hy-Vee trailer includes counter workstations, multiple displays and a shared whiteboard.

The Challenge: A Prompt Mobile Base for Relief Work

Craftsmen Industries built the Hy-Vee trailer around disaster relief coordination.

Hy-Vee wanted a prompt solution for a mobile command center that would support clear communication and coordination with its team after natural disasters. The brief set out three needs:

• A mobile command center for disaster relief
• Interior work counters and multiple displays
• A clearly identified Hy-Vee exterior

Counters, Seating and Shared Displays

Craftsmen Industries fitted the Hy-Vee command center with an office-style interior.

Long work counters run along the white interior walls, with flat-panel monitors mounted above them and rolling office chairs positioned nearby. A larger display occupies the end wall alongside a whiteboard, while recessed lights brighten the room above wood-look flooring.

Individual Positions and Shared Information

The interior puts individual workstations and shared information surfaces in the same room. Team members can work their own tasks at the counters while the end-wall display and whiteboard keep everyone looking at the same picture, which reflects the brief's emphasis on communication.

An Exterior Built to Be Recognized

Craftsmen Industries branded the Hy-Vee trailer as a disaster relief command center.

The red trailer carries large white Hy-Vee logos and clear disaster-relief command-center lettering. An entry door, exterior step and open side hatch run along the body, a tall mast rises at the rear and a dome camera sits at an upper corner. Disaster relief graphics continue on the rear of the trailer.

• Red trailer body with white Hy-Vee logos
• Disaster relief command center lettering
• Entry door, exterior step and side hatch
• Rear mast and dome camera

Why a Mobile Command Center Fits Disaster Relief

Craftsmen Industries designs disaster response command centers that operate without a permanent office.

Relief work happens where the damage is. The Hy-Vee trailer provides a purpose-specific setting for the team's work without relying on a permanent office at each location. When the trailer arrives, the workspace, displays and identity arrive with it, and the team can begin coordinating immediately instead of searching for a building to work from. The clear exterior lettering also tells people in an affected area where the relief team is based.

Craftsmen's Wider Command Center Experience

Craftsmen Industries has delivered mobile command centers for Hy-Vee, Ameren and Liberty Oil.

Craftsmen builds command centers for fire and emergency management, law enforcement, utilities and disaster response teams on trailers, trucks, vans and coaches. Its in-house teams can integrate communications, generator and UPS power, climate control and secure IT racks to each mission, and every command center is quoted to its own specification.

About Craftsmen Industries

Craftsmen Industries has been a custom fabricator of mission-ready specialty vehicles since 1982. Its in-house teams design, engineer, fabricate and brand each build under one roof at a 127,000 sq. ft. manufacturing facility in St. Charles, Missouri, with more than 225 skilled craftspeople on staff. The facility holds AS9100D and ISO 9001:2015 quality management certifications. For Hy-Vee, Craftsmen Industries delivered a mobile disaster relief command center that gives the relief team a dedicated, recognizable workspace wherever it is needed.