Falken Tire Corp., a unit of Sumitomo Rubber Industries Ltd., will phase out the Ohtsu brand name for commercial tires. The company will re-introduce it to the market as an associate brand for its passenger and light truck tire lines.
According to the company, the Ohtsu lines will be phased out and replaced with Falken-brand lines during the rest of 2014.
At Falken’s dealer incentive meeting in May, the company noted that its medium truck side will receive a lot of attention and that the company can’t afford to be uncommitted to the business.
“We virtually disappeared from the truck tire market,” Falken’s Executive Director of Marketing Rick Brennan told Tire Review. “Now we’re coming back with a new brand (Falken) and new products, so we can push ourselves in through the small guys, the one-on-one owner operators, small fleets, P&D – those are the ones that we need to focus on now, and then when we get our distribution up, we can go to larger fleets.”
