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Along with the former Allied Specialty Vehicles Inc. (ASV) towable RV-manufacturing plant that it just purchased on Indiana 19 on the south side of Elkhart, Ind., Thor Industries Inc. also acquired a host of towable brand names once marketed by ASV and its predecessor, Monaco RV, from whom they were purchased last year.

Included are a host of legendary nameplates like Presidential, Aluma-Lite, Alumascape, Trail-Lite, R-Vision, Trail Cruiser and Trail Sport, Thor President and CEO Bob Martin confirms.

“We didn’t put it all in a press release because it was more than a mouthful and at the end of the day, right now, our biggest priority was that we needed production for motorized,” Martin said of Tuesday’s (Feb. 18) announcement that Elkhart-based Thor had acquired ASV’s 220,000-square-foot towable plant which served for a number of years prior to that as Monaco Coach Corp.’s motorized chassis plant.

And while Martin indicated that the newly acquired ASV plant will facilitate the continued expansion of his company’s Thor Motor Coach division, plans for those towable brands are still quite preliminary.

“I have a long list of brands that we now have at our disposal and basically I’ve opened them up to Keystone and to all of our companies (Thor divisions) that might have an interest in them,” said Martin. “You know, some of these are iconic brand names that we just don’t yet know how they’re going to be used, but we did get the names.”

Meanwhile, as part of the agreement to purchase the Indiana 19 plant, Thor is working with a variety of dealers – including its own Thor retailers – to unload some of the finished inventory on hand at the former ASV plant.

“So, we’re taking on that burden,” said Martin. “Dealers will be contacted by some people working for us through ASV and I’m trying to make sure that the dealers that need inventory are the ones that are getting it. You know, we’ve had dealers that weren’t even Monaco dealers call and say, ‘I’ll buy them all,’ just trying to get a deal. And we’re trying to do the right thing and make sure that retails are taken care of first and foremost and also dealers that need inventory, dealers that don’t have a line right away, So, I’m kind of behind the scenes helping with that.”