Our recap of the week’s top news begins with our exclusive Executive Interview with Bob Larson, president of FRAM Filtration. Larson brings us up to speed on the changes at FRAM since the company was acquired as part of the sale of Honeywell’s Consumer Products Group last year. Honeywell sold the Consumer Products Group, of which FRAM was a division, to New Zealand’s Rank Group. In 2010, Rank Group also acquired UCI, parent company of the Champ Labs filtration brand. Both brands now go to market under the FRAM name. Click here to learn more.
In other top news this week, Aftermarket Auto Parts Alliance announced the promotion of longtime employee Miriam "Micki" Kahn. Kahn, a 10-year employee of The Alliance has been promoted to accounting manager. She holds a degree in finance and economics (cum laude) from the University of Texas at Dallas, and joined The Alliance in 2002. Kahn is credited with playing an instrumental role in migrating The Alliance to a new business management/accounting system and also led multiple process improvement initiatives and technology upgrades within the finance department.
Also in the distribution segment this week, National Pronto Association welcomed two new shareholder members as of Aug. 1. Jack Young Co./Central Automotive Warehouse feature nationally branded products, and trade actively throughout the six New England states from single, separate locations. Cerma Automotriz SA DE CV, headquartered in Veracruz, Mexico, has 16 company-owned stores that service the states of Veracruz, Tabasco and Chiapas.
Longtime proponents of Right to Repair legislation celebrated a major victory in Massachusetts this week. On Tuesday night, the Massachusetts Legislature unanimously passed the Right to Repair bill (H.B. 4362) after the car companies, new car dealers and the Massachusetts Right to Repair Coalition reached a last-minute agreement. Now that the bill has passed the legislature, Gov. Deval Patrick has 10 days to sign the bill. Gov. Patrick has promised to sign the bill, according to the Coalition.
Last in our look back at the top industry news of the week is a report from Advance Auto Parts on the kick-off of a new series of events for its commercial customers across the country. The program includes sessions on leadership training, best practices in customer service and retention and introductions to Advance eServices, offered exclusively by Advance Auto Parts Professional to help increase shop productivity.
COMING NEXT WEEK:
Stay tuned for our upcoming Executive Interview with Russell Evans, Experian Automotive’s senior vice president of marketing and product management, as well as news from Pep Boys, Mevotech and more.
