The round-up of this week’s top news has a little something for everyone. Leading off our most popular stories of the week is ImportCar Editor Mary DellaValle’s coverage of WORLDPAC’s first ever Supplier & Training Expo held Oct. 23-25 at Disney’s Coronado Springs Resort in Orlando, Fla. More than 500 shop owners and technicians, representing 423 shops from 43 states and Canada, attended the three-day event that provided a customized lineup of technical and business training, conducted by the industry’s most respected training instructors, including some from the WORLDPAC Training Institute. Click here to read our coverage and view a slide show of photos from the event.
From import parts distributors to import parts suppliers, AMN readers were also interested this week to hear more about the introduction of Standard Motor Products’ (SMP) Intermotor brand in the U.S. market. In our exclusive Executive Interview series, SMP Vice President of Marketing Mike Fitzgerald talks about the strategy behind bringing the popular import brand to the U.S. He also gives us his thoughts on the future of the import parts segment.
In the retail segment, O’Reilly Automotive this week reported increased sales for the third quarter of 2009. Sales for the three months ended Sept. 30 totaled $1.26 billion, up 13 percent from $1.11 billion for the same period a year ago. Gross profit for the third quarter of 2009 increased to $611 million (or 48.5 percent of sales) from $507 million (or 45.6 percent of sales) for the third quarter of 2008, representing an increase of 20 percent. Sales for the first nine months of 2009 totaled $3.67 billion, up 49 percent from $2.46 billion for the same period a year ago. Also this week, O’Reilly announced that it will use Experian’s AutoCount Vehicles in Operation offering to help its business make stronger inventory decisions for each of its more than 3,400 U.S. locations. By utilizing the insight AutoCount Vehicles in Operation offers on more than 240 million vehicles in the United States, O’Reilly will be able to better anticipate the needs of its customers in each market and inventory products accordingly.
Also this week, Raybestos announced that it is continuing its aggressive expansion in the chassis category. Through the first 10 months of 2009, the Raybestos brand has already unveiled more than 176 new tie rod numbers, more than 148 control arms and more than 82 sway bar links among the 596 new chassis products. New Raybestos coverage offerings are updated monthly and available to technicians in a variety of formats.
The final item in our list of the week’s most popular news comes from Melling Engine Parts, which today announced that it has entered into an exclusive agreement to purchase majority equity ownership in Hytec DeBartolo LLC (dba Hytec Automotive). Hytec Automotive is an engineering and manufacturing-based supplier of new water pumps to the North American aftermarket. Melling said its due-diligence process is on-going and the company expects to have the transaction completed by year’s end.
