This article was published December 2006 in RV Business:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> OEM SHOWCASE
Venerable Fifth-wheel Maker Peterson Grows Market Reach
Forty-one Year Old Kansas Firm Taps More U.S. Markets, Offers Lower Priced Excel Fifth-wheel
Bob Ashley
RV Business
Sunday, December 31, 2006
Peterson Industries Inc., based in Smith Center, Kan., is not what you would call a short-term player in the recreational vehicle business. For instance, Dick Dykeman and his son, Jim, owners of Hastings Motor Sales in Hastings, Neb., became the first dealership to sell Excel RVs from fledgling Peterson Industries 41 years ago.
"They are still with us, and they always are one of our top 10 dealers," said Bryan Tillet, president of the long-time regional manufacturer, a company that in the last 18 months has expanded its national dealer network from 33 to 40 stores. The Kansas company plans to add 10 more.
"For years we sold mainly between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountains," Tillett said. "With the advent of better manufacturing technique, we are now able to serve the entire nation. We expanded our facility and built a state-of-the-art frame shop five years ago. We installed CNC routing and cutting equipment, and we've done some innovative things with our processes so that all of our schedules are now optimized."
Peterson Industries was founded in 1966 by Leonard and Blanche Peterson and their son, Vaughn -- currently chairman and CEO -- to manufacturer truck campers. In 1969, Peterson Industries built its first travel trailer, and was somewhat embarrassed by its first efforts. At an RV show where the trailer was sold, we're told, a customer pointed out that it had been designed without closets. The unit was returned to the factory for modification before it was delivered.
Peterson Industries' first major expansion occurred in 1974 with the construction of a frame shop that freed up room for the company to build Class C motorhomes, which it did until 1980. In 1983, a fire destroyed everything but the company's frame shop, which led to the construction of a new factory complex in 1984 that has since been expanded nine times. The company began to devote its full attention to Excel fifth wheels in 1997.
Over the years, Tillett points out, Peterson Industries has laid claim to several industry innovations, including the first ducted air conditioning system and the first one-piece rubber roof. Peterson also builds its own slideout rooms and developed its own "positive pressure" side-wall lamination system. "We've produced 10,000 sidewalls and never had only one delamination -- just one, and that was in August," Tillett said.
Peterson is one of the few RV manufacturers offering units housing as many as five slideouts. Two Excel Limited models feature two kitchen, two living room and one bedroom slideout.
Obviously, Tillett is aware that it might be easier to manufacture recreational vehicles in northern Indiana, where nearly 65% of U.S. RVs are made and key suppliers are geographically clustered. Even though Peterson Industries competes for employees with a major insurance processing center, an ethanol plant and a shingle manufacturer, Tillett feels his northern Kansas workforce is more stable than Northern Indiana's. "The quality of the help we get is better than in Indiana because there is a strong work ethic here," he maintained. "It seems that once we get an employee, they stay with us longer."
Still, Tillet works with Elkhart County's suppliers and contains freight costs by maintaining a small fleet of company-owned semi trucks. "We are on the road all the time picking up our own freight to control costs," he said. "We are back in northern Indiana picking up supplies every week."
With the introduction in 2004 of the Excel RT -- the RT stands for RV Trekking -- Peterson Industries began to offer a less-expensive fifth-wheel. "It took us a couple of years to find a niche for that product," Tillett explained. "We started out trying to build more of a value-priced unit and found that that's not really what our customers were looking for."
In fact, Petersons' brand lineup has evolved into upper mid-priced and high-line Excel fifth-wheels as it finds most of its customers from a growing wave of retirees who intend to spend a lot of time on the road.
In that regard, the company's recent R&D efforts have focused on shorter, amenity-packed units. "A lot of retired people are tired of pulling longer RVs," Tillett said "They still want a quality 30-footer, but there aren't a lot of 30-footers out there with all the bells and whistles that they want. We can give that to them."
Tillett said Peterson Industries' focus on higher-priced products is a market strategy designed to set apart the company's fifth-wheels. "I see that segment of the market being the strength of the towable industry," Tillett said. "There's an over-saturation in the mid- to low-range market right now."
Peterson produces 350 to 400 Excel fifth-wheels a year and, like some companies in the recreational vehicle business, experienced a moderate downturn earlier this year. "Up until mid-summer, things were very slow," Tillett said. "All of a sudden in late July things started picking up for us and it looks like we are going to have a strong finish. Our inventory out there (on dealer lots) is shrinking." </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Company Statistics:
Name: Peterson Industries Inc.
Location: Smith Center, Kan.
Founded: 1966
Key employees: Vaughn Peterson, chairman and CEO; Bryan Tillett, president; Curtis Peterson, vice president; Kelly Lyon, vice president; Jack Yenne, customer service manager
Products: Excel RT, Excel Classic and Excel Limited fifth-wheels
Physical facilities: 140,000-square-feet under roof in three buildings in Smith Center containing the main production facility with frame and sidewall laminations shops, offices and a customer service center with 12 service bays, wireless Internet, laundry and a retail parts and accessories store.
Employees: 150
DETAILS: Each of the three Excel fifth-wheel lines -- RT, Classic and Limited Edition -- is built on Peterson Industries' own "drop Z" box-tube steel frame with a wooden superstructure and laminated gelcoat fiberglass sidewalls. All-weather coach's systems are guaranteed to operate at zero degrees Fahrenheit.
Excel RT: Five floorplans in lengths of 28 to 32 feet with two or three slideouts and base MSRPs of $43,400 to $48,480.
Excel Classic: Seven triple slideout floorplans in lengths of 30 to 33 feet with base MSRPs of $57,783 to $61,408.
Excel Limited Edition: 20 floorplans in lengths of 30 to 36 feet equipped with three and five slideouts -- two in the kitchen, two in the living room and one in the bedroom. Base MSRPs: $65,656 to $81,026. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
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