Tom Reynolds
Tom Reynolds, president, Reading Truck Group Photo credit - John A. Secoges
Reading Truck Group has reached a deal to buy the service body business from Palfinger Group.
The agreement announced by both companies on Feb. 10 came less than a month after Reading announced it had acquired “substantially all of the assets” of service body manufacturer and Reading distributor Caseco Manufacturing Inc.
Financial details of both agreements weren’t disclosed.
The purchase agreement with Palfinger, expected to close in March, will transfer the company’s “service body distribution and upfitting business” at four PalFleet sites to Reading. Those sites are in Council Bluffs, Iowa; Indianapolis, Ind.; Louisville, Ky.; and Nashville, Tenn.
However, the deal doesn’t include Palfinger’s Pal Pro Mechanics bodies, telescopic service cranes, and lift gates.
As the company’s Omaha Standard LLC subsidiary exits the service body business it will continue to manufacture and market those core products, a Palfinger news release said.
That includes, for now at least, continuing to build the Pal Pro trucks at the Council Bluffs facility where Reading will take over the service body business, said Brittany Alexander, marketing lead for Palfinger North America Group.
The Pal Pro bodies are purpose-built reinforced bodies specifically designed for carrying a crane, she said. They aren’t to be confused with other Palfinger service body lines on which cranes can be mounted.
“The Pal Pro is really designed to handle the forces for the crane from the start. So it’s a little bit heftier,” Alexander said.
Omaha Standard Palfinger
Reading Truck Group will take over the service body distribution and up-fitting business at Omaha Standard Palfinger’s facility in Council Bluffs, Iowa. However, OSP will continue to manufacture its Pal Pro mechanics trucks at the facility.Photo courtesy of Palfinger Group
PalFleet’s future strategic direction “will include a strong focus” on the core products, including the Pal Pro mechanics trucks, “as well as sales, installation and service of articulating cranes and truck-mounted forklifts” at its remaining PalFleet locations, the Palfinger news release said.
Deals add eight facilities
Reading’s acquisition meanwhile of the four PalFleet locations — in Iowa, Indiana, Kentucky, and Tennessee — will increase Reading’s upfitting and distribution sites to 14 facilities in 11 states.
“The acquisition of these PalFleet locations expands chassis pool availability in the Midwest, enhances service accessibility and elevates brand awareness, from which all Reading distributors can benefit,” Reading president Tom Reynolds said in his company’s news release announcing the deal.
Joe Hillard
Joe Hilliard, president of Caseco Truck Body of Claremore, Okla., stands in front of the company’s MM238 master mechanic truck at the Caseco stand during the 2015 Work Truck Show in Indianapolis.
The earlier agreement to acquire the assets of Caseco, a current Reading distributor, added four upfitting facilities in Oklahoma and Missouri.
Reading also takes over Caseco’s manufacturing plant in Claremore, Okla., “where Reading will continue to produce service utility truck bodies and service and crane bodies,” noted a Jan. 13 news release.
Reynolds said in the release that the acquisition “will further Reading’s goal to establish a national organization for growth.”
“This acquisition will enable Reading to better serve its customers located in the Midwest and Western United States,” Reynolds added. “It also complements our product portfolio by adding Caseco’s Master Mechanic series of service and crane bodies to Reading’s current product line.”
The Master Mechanics bodies were founded in 1972 and “represent some of the most rugged, high quality truck bodies on the market,” the release quoted Eric McNally, Reading Equipment and Distribution’s vice-president of sales and business development.
Caseco president and CEO Joe Hilliard said in the release that Caseco and Reading make a “perfect fit” that will benefit Caseco staff and customers. “Reading shares our vision and is focused on providing its customers the highest quality trucks in the nation,” Hilliard said.
Since November 2015, Reading has been owned by J.B. Poindexter & Co. Inc., a privately held manufacturing firm based in Houston, Texas. Among the diversified manufacturer’s other holdings is truck-body maker Morgan Corporation, which like Reading is based in Berks County, Pa.
Founded in Austria in 1932, Palfinger has its North American headquarters in Niagara Falls, Ont. Service bodies had been part of Palfinger’s product portfolio since 2008 when the company acquired Omaha Standard.