By Amy Antenora
The Week in Review offers a snapshot of the most highly read stories of the week as seen on aftermarketNews. To access the complete stories, simply click on the highlighted links. If you missed reading one of our daily news emails, just click on the link that says "News Archives" at the bottom of the page to begin catching up on the latest industry news.
Big news in the brake parts world broke this week, when on Wednesday Bosch announced that it is acquiring the brake friction business of the Morse Automotive Corp. The Morse Group develops, manufactures and markets pads for disc brakes and linings for drum brakes, as well as brake calipers, predominantly for the North American market. Bosch plans to parlay the acquisition into a new business unit, which will be called Braking Systems, and will be a part of the Bosch Automotive Aftermarket division.
Within the parts distribution segment, AMN readers showed a high level of interest in the news that NAPA stores will begin distributing an innovative GPS Tracking Key from LandAirSea Systems Inc. NAPA hopes the GPS Tracking Key, which records detailed travel activities such as times of departure, routes traveled, speed of vehicle and duration of stops, will appeal to the growing number of consumers who are parents of driving-age teenagers.
Another popular news item this week announced the addition of two veteran aftermarket execs to the sales staff of Deeza Chassis Parts. Richard “Dick” Niemi and Richard “Rich” Shackelford have joined the company as sales development managers. In this capacity, Niemi and Shackelford will support the company’s efforts to implement its newly developed import strategy at the customer level.
Details of the latest consumer promotion from Wagner Brakes made it into our top-viewed articles this week as well. Consumers who choose Wagner ThermoQuiet or Wagner EDGE brake pads and/or shoes for their next brake job can qualify for up to $50 in cash back through a new Web-based promotion from Federal-Mogul Corp. The promotion runs through Oct. 18.
The final news item in our weekly round-up of most popular stories comes from Genuine Parts Co.’s (GPC) Industrial Parts Group, which has acquired Drago Supply Co., a regional industrial supplies distributor headquartered in Port Arthur, Texas. Drago Supply was founded in 1931 and has eight locations in Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana. This is the second acquisition GPC has made in recent weeks. On Aug. 18, GPC announced that its Office Products Group, S.P. Richards Co., signed a definitive agreement to purchase the Midwestern U.S. business assets of ActionEmco, a regional office products wholesale distributor.
To view all of the news from the past week, simply click here to view our News Archives.
