BANDAG MILESTONES
December 1957: Roy Carver gains North American rights to
the Bandag system from Bernard Anton Nowak in Darmstadt, Germany. The name
Bandag comes from Nowak's initials (BAN); D is for Darmstadt, and AG is German
for incorporated.
June 1958: Barely six months after acquiring the North American
rights, Carver establishes his first dealer franchise.
June 1959: Ambrosiani Brothers, San Juan, Puerto Rico, is our
first international franchised dealership.
June 1959: Bandag signs on its first European dealer, A.B.
Stockholm, Stockholm, Sweden.
January 1961: Our first tread press is installed at Plant 2.
Tread is pressed in 30-foot lengths, 6 pieces at a time. This new process
requires more capital; Carver flies to dealerships and raises $50,000. The
first tread designs were Highway, Cross Bar, and HiSpeed.
January 1963: Roy Carver develops the idea of a rubber curing
envelope, the first key idea introduced by Bandag. It solves many curing
problems and eliminates heavy, expensive metal curing bands.
January 1968: Bandag stock is first offered to public at $12
per share.
January 1971: The R&D Center and warehouse in Progress Park
is completed.
January 1972: The company is listed on the New York Stock
Exchange.
January 1973: Bob Seivert and Bill Loughran put Bandag retreads
to test at the Baja 500. This is the first time Bandag retreads are used for
off-road racing; the spare tire never touches the ground.
January 1974: For the first time in company history, Bandag is
listed on the 1974 Fortune magazine list of top 1,000 U.S. industrial
corporations. 1973 sales of $95 million places Bandag at 909th on the list.
May 1975: Groundbreaking ceremony for the Bandag World
Headquarters in Muscatine, Iowa.
December 1978: Bandag has 859 dealerships and is franchised in
51 countries.
April 1979: Bandag introduces the NDI (Non-Destructive
Inspection) Tire Casing Analyzer, which uses ultrasonic sound waves to detect
hidden flaws in tire casings.
June 1981: Roy J. Carver dies in Marbella, Spain, after
suffering a sudden heart attack. Martin G. Carver is named Chairman of the
Board, Bandag, Inc.
May 1982: Martin G. Carver is named Chairman of the Board and
CEO.
December 1983: The seven-year-old, 100,000-square-foot Griffin
tread plant is destroyed by fire, with more than $13 million in damages. The
plant was then rebuilt and resumed production in October 1984.
February 1989: Bandag is recognized as one of the "Great
Companies of the '90's" by Financial World magazine, which
reviewed the strategies and tactics of more than 3,000 companies before
choosing the 30 firms it believed most likely to thrive and prosper in the
coming decade. The listing puts Bandag in the company of Ford, Chrysler, IBM,
AT&T, MCI, Johnson & Johnson, Apple and American Express.
May 1991: Bandag is placed on the Fortune 500 annual list of
the largest industrial companies in the United States.
January 1994: Bandag is granted a 17-year U.S. product patent
for the Eclipse System tread. The patent award is the culmination of a project
that began nearly six years ago.
August 1995: The August issue of The Environmental Benchmarker
lists Bandag as one of the top-performing environmental stocks. "It is an
established and substantial, internally diversified firm which recycles and
retreads tires, thus extending life and minimizing the increasingly significant
problem of waste tires. The company has the distinction of being the number one
performer in our first attempt to rate environmental companies."
August 1996: Bandag introduces application-specific tire
products, which provide truckers the best of both worlds: best-in-class tire
performance plus the economics of retreading.
April 1999: Bandag opens its new Learning Center in Muscatine,
Iowa.
February 2002: Bandag creates a Fleet Executive Symposium to
explore leading-edge business concepts with transportation executives.
February 2004: Bandag acquires Speedco, the leading provider of
on-highway PM services for trucks.
January 2005: Bandag creates new Vision for company. Vision:
"We will be the leading provider of premium tire management and vehicle
maintenance solutions to the transportation industry."
Bandag launches new product line called Continuum to offer procured retreading
materials for off-the-road (OTR) market.
May 2005: Bandag opens a vehicle services development center
and begins to increase its lineup of services, making it a vehicle-centric
service provider to its fleet customers.
July 2005: Bandag Bullet, world's fastest truck from Australia,
sets world record for conventionally powered truck, achieving average speed of
182.14 kph over one kilometer from standing start.
October 2005: Bandag acquires Maintenance IO, consulting firm
specializing in showing fleets how to create maintenance processes that improve
efficiency and cost management abilities.
December 2005: Bandag's sales: $914,640,000.
March 2006: Speedco sponsors tribute to American Trucker at the
Mid America Truck Show in Kentucky and unveils Speedco Chopper built by Orange
County Choppers.
April 2006: Bandag acquires Trucklube 1, a leading provider of
truck repair and maintenance services.
John McErlane named vice president of North America Operations and Mark Winkler
named vice president of Vehicle Services reporting to Marty Carver, chairman
and CEO.
June 2006: Bandag closes Shawinigan Plant in Quebec; this plant
was opened in 1967 and was company's first tread rubber plant outside
Muscatine.
December 2006: Bandag and tire maker Bridgestone Americas
Holding, Inc., jointly announce that they have entered a merger agreement by
which Bridgestone will buy Bandag for $1.05 billion in cash, making Bandag a
wholly owned subsidiary. Bridgestone Americas, a subsidiary of Japan-based
Bridgestone Corp., will pay $50.75 per share for Bandag, a 13 percent premium
to the company's closing stock price on the day of the announcement. The Bandag
board of directors unanimously approves the sale, which is expected to close by
the second quarter of 2007. The deal is subject to regulatory and shareholder
approval.
April 2007: Bandag shareholders approve the sale of Bandag,
Incorporated to Bridgestone Americas Holding, Inc.
June 2007: Bandag begins operating as Bridgestone Bandag, LLC,
but continues to operate as "Bandag" in the marketplace. A big "Day One"
celebration takes place in Muscatine, Iowa, attended by all local Bandag
employees, plus executives from Bridgestone Americas including Mark Emkes,
chairman and CEO of BSA. Despite a terrible tornado that struck Muscatine
during the festivities, the celebration proceeded as planned, culminating with
Martin Carver turning over the key to the Bandag Bandit to new President,
chairman and CEO, Saul Solomon.
Speedco observes grand opening of its 50th store, in Whiteland, Indiana.