Any updates on Hymer/Roadtrek/Carado future?

[booster]

I think Hammill and the other two worked for Budd wheel Canada for a long time, which is a big company and I think was owned or controlled by GM?

[Marcus]

While I think it is interesting to speculate on what has and will happen, I believe some dealers are offering their own brand of warranty/assistance to Roadtrek/Hymer owners.
My dealer approached me with an offer of $6000 Canadian for a 6 year total coach warranty. I nixed that. He counter offered with $2000 initial payment with a series of $200 post dated monthly cheques. An Ecotrek owner has been offered $550 per year for the same coverage for 6 years. Someone else has been offered repairs at cost.
We seem to be all over the map on offered dealer warranties.
I have a 2018 Roadtrek Simplicity. I would be interested to hear any thoughts or opinions on this subject.
Cheers.

[Bud]

"I would be interested to hear any thoughts or opinions on this subject."

There have been many. I don't think that I could begin to count them on all my fingers and toes. It is almost like there has been and endless supply. Do you mean you want to hear more yet?

Bud

[gregmchugh]

This is a good overview...

https://www.rv-dreams.com/rv-extended-warranties.html

[mumkin]

Originally Posted by Marcus

We seem to be all over the map on offered dealer warranties.
I have a 2018 Roadtrek Simplicity. I would be interested to hear any thoughts or opinions on this subject.

Obviously for the foreseeable this is just a negotiating point between dealers and those who are interested in buying. One of the advantages of the Simplicity is that we don't have so much of the quirky stuff. I plan to just self insure with my 2019. I have always found these extended or 3rd party warranties to be... expensive and not terribly useful.

My one hanging warranty issue, the dead recalled UHG is being dealt with by the Nations company.

[Marcus]

Originally Posted by Bud

"I would be interested to hear any thoughts or opinions on this subject."

There have been many. I don't think that I could begin to count them on all my fingers and toes. It is almost like there has been and endless supply. Do you mean you want to hear more yet?

Bud

Not so much info on dealer offered warranties.
Thanks for your useful input.

[avanti]

Originally Posted by Marcus

Not so much info on dealer offered warranties.

This is a good point. It is important to distinguish between a true dealer-provided warranty and a third-party warranty that is simply being brokered by the dealer.

As I have argued ad nauseam, third-party warranties should be avoided like the plague. But this is not necessarily true of a warranty backed by the dealer. In the latter case, the dealer is somewhat in the same position as an OEM--they are in a position to benefit from the warranty in various ways, and they do not have to pay profit to a third-party for doing the work. This gets us out of the "zero sum" situation that exists with arms-length third-party warranties.

[Bud]

Originally Posted by Marcus

Not so much info on dealer offered warranties.
Thanks for your useful input.

Appreciate the assistance "Not so much info on dealer offered warranties."

[RossWilliams]

Apparently Rapido, the European owner of Westfalia, has agreed to purchase Roadtrek and plans to reopen it.

Rapido's President, Pierre Rousseau, commented that "Roadtrek is a well established leading brand in the B Class segment of the RV market. Our priority will be to re established operations and further develop this famous brand in North America."

The wording of the announcement seems to indicate they bought the "assets". What that means for things like warranty support and other liabilities isn't clear.

https://www.erienewsnow.com/story/40...DeePj2126Jl5rc

As most people probably know, Hymer and Carado are now Thor brands. What that means for their future is still not clear. T

[brianh]

As was discussed earlier, liabilities of the old company - including warranty support - were effectively dead the moment the company went into receivership. That's what that program is all about - relief from debtors. Corner Flag's creditors will now be paid from whatever the sale amount was, according to a priority order. Rapido will have no obligations beyond that to deal with any of those creditors directly, nor any obligations to any current Roadtrek owners. In other words, they don't owe anything to anybody at this point. The article noted that they have stated an intention to assume the lease on one of the manufacturing facilities, meaning that lessors' claim will only amount to the rent they've lost during the interim as opposed to the full remaining value of the lease.

Now, it's possible that as part of reviving the Roadtrek brand Rapido will decide to offer some measure of support to current owners, but that will be entirely up to them to determine whether the cost they'd incur would pay off in repeat sales and brand image.

In any case, it's probably great news for some of the Roadtrek employees that lost their jobs and could be employed by Rapido in short order. It's also potentially exciting news for the Class B market to have a new player, assuming the deal is finalized and Rapido does a better job of entering the US market than Erwin Hymer did. That they played up their ownership of the Westfalia brand in their press release is pretty interesting. Makes you wonder if they have designs on bringing that brand back to America in addition to reviving Roadtrek.

[<<B-Guy>>]

Seems Roadtrek has a buyer - Rapido (from France?) hope it all works out!

Brian.

[RossWilliams]

"Corner Flag's creditors will now be paid from whatever the sale amount was, according to a priority order."

1) Corner Flag is not in receivership and has no creditors. The creditors are Hymer NA's and Corner Flag is both its owner and one of its creditors. As I understand it they have first priority on the assets for the money they loaned Hymer NA to pay employees.

2) Our warranties are one of Hymer NA liabilities and we are creditors that have a claim on its assets. I don't know how Canadian courts determine priority or how they value warranties.

We have no way of knowing the details of this deal and can only speculate on what was included. But if they did intend to honor warranties it would be stupid for them to not include them in the deal with appropriate financial considerations for taking on some of the company's liabilities.

[mumkin]

Since Corner Flag purchased EHGNA, it means assets and liabilities. The receivership was filed by Corner Flag. Not to mention that Corner Flag = Hymer family

It can also be noted that nowhere on the list of liabilities is any mention of warranties. There are some customers on the list who are owed various amounts for warranty work that they had to pay of out pocket... and there are also amounts owed to various dealers for warranty work that they completed before the receivership. They may get a pittance, but none are expecting much of anything.

Our warranties are dead... not mentioned anywhere because they are dead.

[avanti]

Originally Posted by mumkin

Our warranties are dead... not mentioned anywhere because they are dead.

From a strictly legal perspective, this is no doubt correct. But, as Brianh suggested above, the new firm may well decide to buy some goodwill for the brand by offering some kind of warranty relief or at least tech support.

They have a strong vested interest in the brand they just purchased. I would think that they will try hard to project the appearance of continuity into the market. Don't know how deep their pockets are, but if I were a RT owner, I might feel a bit better than I did yesterday.

[tooTallforB?]

I really hope this will bring some much needed euro-inspired juice into Roadtrek designs once the dust settle and Rapido starts production of new vans. Here are some of the brands of the Rapido group and some cool "fitted vans":


https://www.corporate-rapido.com/en/...2-brands.phtml

https://www.dreamer-van.co.uk/
https://www.campereve.fr/fourgons_index.php


and of course Westfalia: https://westfalia-mobil.de/en/

[RossWilliams]

"It can also be noted that nowhere on the list of liabilities is any mention of warranties. "

In fact they are listed at an amount TBD.

"Since Corner Flag purchased EHGNA, it means assets and liabilities."

They bought the company, which is an asset for them. But since EHGNA is its own corporation its owners are not responsible for its liabilities. That's the purpose of organizing as a corporation.

"From a strictly legal perspective, this is no doubt correct."

From a legal perspective it is clearly wrong. Whatever value they have is yet to be determined by the Canadian court when it divvies up the proceeds from the sale. From a practical perspective its probably correct.

[<<B-Guy>>]

Originally Posted by avanti

From a strictly legal perspective, this is no doubt correct. But, as Brianh suggested above, the new firm may well decide to buy some goodwill for the brand by offering some kind of warranty relief or at least tech support.

They have a strong vested interest in the brand they just purchased. I would think that they will try hard to project the appearance of continuity into the market. Don't know how deep their pockets are, but if I were a RT owner, I might feel a bit better than I did yesterday.

That is surely what I would be hoping were I the owner of a new RT which I very nearly was!

Seems to me that a new owner of the RT brand could well want to heal wounds and get off on a good footing by at least offering something in terms of warranty protection for past owners - if maybe not the very attractive 6 years.

I hope this turns out to be a good thing for the future of RT as a brand - as it well might. Could bring some good innovation too.

A shame that seems that no more than 200 max potential of the previous workforce might expect to find employment, but no doubt many of the 1000 from EHGNA have moved on by now in any event.

[mumkin]

Originally Posted by avanti

From a strictly legal perspective, this is no doubt correct. But, as Brianh suggested above, the new firm may well decide to buy some goodwill for the brand by offering some kind of warranty relief or at least tech support.

They have a strong vested interest in the brand they just purchased. I would think that they will try hard to project the appearance of continuity into the market. Don't know how deep their pockets are, but if I were a RT owner, I might feel a bit better than I did yesterday.

I certainly do. It is a benefit on our value just to not be owning an infamous orphan. We discussed changing our rig names and I chose "Little Orphan Vannie"

My expectation is that they will offer us technical support and assistance locating parts. I hope that they will be keeping many of the helpful employees in service and warranty like Sean and Peter... and others like Leo... who understand the systems.

Best case scenario? Maybe give existing owners a one year warranty?? It will be interesting to see what sort of warranty they will provide to new purchasers.

[RossWilliams]

The best case scenario is that Roadtrek, as it was operated, was a successful company. We have no way of knowing whether that is the case. Without the loans from EHG, the company was solvent on paper. We don't really know whether that money from EHG was subsidizing operations at Roadtrek or paid for expansion of the Hymer brands and acquisitions.

If it was successful, then the new owner's goal could be to simply restore the status quo that existed at that time. They would have the same interest in supporting past products as Roadtrek always did. Roadtrek's biggest evangelists have been their owners. The last thing a new owner needs is to create a division between old roadtreks and new roadtreks.

We don't know how expensiive those warranties were or how valuable they are to selling units. They may actually be relatively inexpensive marketing costs. Roadtrek certainly believed that when they created them. There may be no reason for the new owners to second guess that evaluation.

[mumkin]

Originally Posted by RossWilliams

We don't know how expensiive those warranties were or how valuable they are to selling units. They may actually be relatively inexpensive marketing costs. Roadtrek certainly believed that when they created them. There may be no reason for the new owners to second guess that evaluation.

They introduced these hugely generous warranties to help push the sale of their glitchy new tech... the E-Trek, Ecotrek, Voltstart... and the system with large inverter and underhood generator. From following the various owner forums... and discussing it with a few dealers along the way, it was hugely expensive. Service departments hated Roadtrek for good reason. Two of the major liabilities are to the suppliers of some of these parts because of the repetitive need for replacements.

Much depends on how deep Rapido's pockets are and whether they see much value in financially supporting previous buyers. Heaven knows that we are a vocal group on the net... for both good and bad