What is your background?
My name is Lee Shaffer. Following a house fire during my childhood, I became a member of the Orlando Fire Department Explorers Program for several years. During this time, I determined that making a transition to pursuing engineering in college was the right career path forward. I interned several years with the City of Orlando Fleet/Facilities Department, as well as for a year with Pierce Manufacturing. This second internship led me to my first career position out of college as a quality engineer with Pierce Manufacturing. I now work with fire departments all over the country to light their fire apparatus in the best possible ways!
Uniquely, I own an antique fire engine of my own, and take much pride in restoring it to working condition and making people smile around town.
What do you do at HiViz?
Job Title: Technical Sales Engineer
Start Date: July 2020
Describe your work/day-to-day: My primary role is liaison between engineering knowledge of our products and assisting our sales team and customers with specification and technical data of our products. I most enjoy meeting with fire departments around the country to develop ideas for lighting based around their specific rig’s design. Demos, online marketing content, and trouble-shooting are also very prevalent parts of my role here at FireTech.
What drew you to HiViz?
Anyone that knows me will know that I have a tremendous knowledge of fire apparatus around the country. When I originally was considering a move to HiViz, I was drawn to the unique role in which I would work with different fire departments and fire apparatus manufacturers from all over the country to build the very best apparatus lighting specs possible. After all, one of the biggest differences between a regular truck and a fire truck is the lights. I very much enjoy being a part of the spec’ing process for fire departments, and assisting them in coming up with ideas on the design of their rigs.
Where are you from originally?
I grew up in Orlando, FL.
What is your favorite product?
I really like the FireTech Guardian. It’s awesome for lighting up the side of a fire truck on many different scenes, and the asymmetric optics allow for a large amount of usable light both far away from the truck for address spotting and overall scene lighting, as well as close to the truck with usable light on the ground under the fixture.
What is a food combination people eat frequently that you can’t get behind?
Banana and mayonnaise sandwiches…. Nasty sounding.
What is the best advice you were given?
Don’t give up.
