CHICAGO RAWHIDE EXPANDS HEAVY DUTY SALES COVERAGE IN CANADA

Chicago Rawhide announces a new long-term sales representation agreement for its heavy-duty bearing and seal aftermarket business in Canada. CR has selected a newly created division of Specialty Sales & Marketing, a sales agency based in Mississauga, Ontario. Bruce Hipkiss, a longtime CR and SKF Canada executive will head the new heavy-duty division of SS&M. Effective July 1, 2001 Hipkiss, along with several key CR fleet specialists, will begin working for the SS&M agency representing SKF bearings and Chicago Rawhide seals and related products.

In making this move Bruce Hipkiss explained " A lot of companies talk about end-user focus, but at the end of the day, costs and geographic coverage issues, especially as we find in Canada, make this difficult. Under this new arrangement we can offer our CR and SKF customers more "feet on the street" for their service needs, supplemented by an experienced group of fleet specialists calling on the key fleets."

The new heavy-duty Division of SS&M will be an expansion of a very successful relationship that CR has had with SS&M since 1997 when they began representing SKF bearings and CR seals for the Canadian automotive aftermarket. Mike McGrath, Vehicle Service Market Sales Director for North America, expressed his optimism for the venture by saying "CR has always placed high value on its Canadian business and we have continually looked at ways to improve our service. We believe this partnership with SS&M allows us to accomplish that goal and we are confident that they can provide the same high levels of specialized service to our heavy-duty customers, as they have done with our automotive customers during the past four years, a period in which we enjoyed substantial growth in our business. "

SS&M is led by John Vanstone, an industry veteran and President of the coast-to-coast Canadian sales agency and partner Ken Coulter, another well known automotive aftermarket veteran. SS&M is entering its 20th year of operation.

Effective with the July 1st startup, the address for the CR Canadian sales office will be:

Specialty Sales & Marketing
6725 Millcreek Drive, Unit #5,
Mississauga, Ontario. L5N 5V3
Ph # 905-816-0011
Fax # 905-816-0411

There will be no other changes to our Canadian Customer Service phone & fax numbers, customer order procedures, payment addresses, or warehousing facilities.

Heavy Duty Products in the Chicago Rawhide offering include SKF tapered and ball bearings, truck hub units, and u-joints, plus Chicago Rawhide grease seals, Scotseals and Scotseal Plus Truck Seals, Heavy Duty Transmission and Differential Repair Kits, and Brakemaster Air Dryers.

Chicago Rawhide is a brand of the Seals Division of SKF, and part of SKF USA, Inc., a subsidiary of AB SKF, the world’s largest producer of rolling bearings. A worldwide supplier of radial shaft seals and precision-engineered elastomeric products, the SKF Seal Division serves the aerospace, agricultural, automotive, heavy-duty/off-highway, industrial and marine markets. For more information visit our web site: www.vsm.skf.com.