E-One Is For Sale

[x635 4,066]

Federal Signal talking with prospective buyers for E-One

BY RICK CUNDIFF

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(Updated at 10 a.m.) OCALA - Fire truck manufacturer E-One is up for sale.

E-One's parent company, Federal Signal Corp., announced Wednesday that it has hired a banker to "evaluate strategic alternatives" and is in discussion with prospective buyers.

The announcement comes on the heels of a relatively strong quarter for E-One.

FULL STORY: http://www.ocala.com/article/20080227/BREA...731/1001/NEWS01

[Dondestro 9]

Whats up with all these Fire Truck manufacturers they are hittin the ****. My question is whats makeing this happen. E-one i keep seeing more and more. American la france ive seen a number of new deliveries recently also. are they not building quality trucks? or are the parent companies the problem?

Edited February 28, 2008 by Dondestro

[RWC130 594]

I heard a rumor that E-One will soon change it's name to EMTBravo-One!

Seth, you know anything about this?

lol

[IzzyEng4 427]

Whats up with all these Fire Truck manufacturers they are hittin the ****. My question is whats makeing this happen. E-one i keep seeing more and more. American la france ive seen a number of new deliveries recently also. are they not building quality trucks? or are the parent companies the problem?

Its the business end of things. When Freightliner (Dailmer-Benz) sold ALF to thier new owners, a lot of the record for inventory to say the least was "closed out" and "unaccessable" to say the least. That is why hey are in such a hole right now. The transition was not smooth at all.

As for E-One, I don't have the foggiest idea why they are hurting so much. Has to be with Federal Signal really not paying much attention to them (speculation only).

I hate to say it I think we are head back to what was happening during the mid 80s to early nineties when all those great companies Like Mack stopped producing full trucks and those closing up forever Like Hahn, Maxim, Ward LaFrance, ect...........

[Reliance 29]

Its the business end of things. When Freightliner (Dailmer-Benz) sold ALF to thier new owners, a lot of the record for inventory to say the least was "closed out" and "unaccessable" to say the least. That is why hey are in such a hole right now. The transition was not smooth at all.

As for E-One, I don't have the foggiest idea why they are hurting so much. Has to be with Federal Signal really not paying much attention to them (speculation only).

I hate to say it I think we are head back to what was happening during the mid 80s to early nineties when all those great companies Like Mack stopped producing full trucks and those closing up forever Like Hahn, Maxim, Ward LaFrance, ect...........

I heard a rumor the Federal Signal corporate headquarters told the honchos in Florida how to build the trucks and not the way that the departments wanted them built. It's our way or no way.

They did not want the plant listening to dealers just listen to financial people at Federal headquarters.

[IzzyEng4 427]

Your know Reliance, that doesn't surprise me one bit.

[Guest]

I think you have management companies coming in trying to run the place like a big truck or car company, at most truck or car companies you can get the models they have on offer, in the specs they have on offer, and in any colour so long as it white (so it seems), they don't seem to understand that the fire service has such wide and varied environments to cover ,and needs to meet that not 3 or 4 standard models will suffice. What works in New York City isn't gonna work in the mountains of Colorado. It seems as though at the moment , the mum and dad operations are the only one's that can offer what the fire service wants.

Another issue I see is to many fire departments get caught up in the bright lights of certain names and don't want to look outside the box for fear of not being "cool". I witnessed this in my last visit to the states, it seemed a lot of people were going with a certain brand starting with P just because everyone else had one, and boy were they paying out the nose for it. I didn't see what for, as another place I went was running a Toyne pumper and it was the best designed and engineered piece I had ever seen, everything on it had a purpose for that department, not what the builder thought they should have. Even Seagrave which I would consider one of the larger companies still seems to have the ability to listen, but my fear is they will go the same way as the others, and bow to the pressure of the shareholders and not the customer, lets hope they manage to fight this, as they make a good product from what I have seen.

I feel I am in a good position to look at the American market unbiased, as being from Australia I have no chance of seeing these trucks here so I am not influenced by what others think, or the latest bright lights builder. I think the fire appliance manafacturing sector is in for some tough and interesting times, like has been mentioned, we may see the demise of some big names, due to no other reason then being screwed by corporate take overs, and trying to be something they are not, at the end of the day, there are only so many fire trucks to be built, its not a high volume industry like the car industry, maybe some of these companies should realise that, and act accordingly.

That the end of my rant,

Darren