54suds wrote: As usual your information isnt accurate I just left the Bigfoot factory several days ago they are on a reduced work week and and developing several new products .
hence the reason I asked for someone to confirm....
Don't worry suds...I won't bash your favorite company too bad...
On the CBC news on Friday;
Bigfoot announced that they were laying off 1/2 of their work force, and the remaining ones would be on a 3 day workweek.
With the economy and gas prices the way they are..........who will be next?
This was posted on another forum on June 29th. Hhmmm, don't know why someone would lie about something they saw on the news....
54suds wrote: As usual your information isnt accurate I just left the Bigfoot factory several days ago they are on a reduced work week and and developing several new products .
Big Foot is working on a new model motorhome.
Their smaller motorhomes models have not much space behind the steering wheel.
They are working on changing the "basement layout" in order to make it possible to move the drivers seat more to the back. I have seen some paperwork on it. It looks good.
Some dealers have seen a proto type.
I'm not sure what the other new products would be.
Are you talking Big Foot truck campers?
54suds wrote: As usual your information isnt accurate I just left the Bigfoot factory several days ago they are on a reduced work week and and developing several new products .
Actually if you read his post, he was stating the place he bought his truck camper in Mesa Arizona was out of business, not Bigfoot. He just asked about how the manufacters where doing. I think people need to read the posts a little more carefully before jumping to conclusions. I think the dealer he was refering to was Eagle Mountain Rv or something like that.
2005xFord King Ranch F250SB Diesel
2006 Bigfoot 25C9.4SB
Firestone Airbags
KVH inmotion Satellite
Vision 81's and 19.5 Bridgestones
Stable Lift
Gary3 wrote: When we left AZ at the end of March Eagle Mountain was still there but I never seen anyone shopping the few times I looked around the place.
Just drove by about 2hrs ago...gate shut, guys working on the sign (possibly taking it down) and the phone number on the sign... disconnected. I'm always surfing on RV Trader just to see what's out there, and their ads were up just this last week or so and now they're down. All the signs point to "out of business".
Penticton RV plant faces shutdown
JOHN MOORHOUSE
07/18/200
The hammer of a slumping economy has just hit another Penticton manufacturing firm.
West Coast Leisure Homes will be closing production Sept. 12 affecting some 40 workers. A small administrative staff will remain. The company produces Okanagan RVs and campers at a 60,000 square foot plant on Dawson Avenue.
Company president Chris Epp said Thursday although production operations will be shut down, the company remains in business.
“This is not a bankruptcy. This is a plant closing,” he said. “It‘s a big difference. The suppliers aren‘t going to be left high and dry.”
The remaining staff will be able to look after warranty issues and retailers will be serviced, he said.
Epp said West Coast Leisure has been gradually reducing its workforce over the past eight months from a peak of about 150 people on staff a year ago.
Although the plant is closing, Epp said the door remains open to a possible reopening when the economy turns around.
“We‘re going to shut the doors here and discontinue production for the time being until such time as market conditions improve – or otherwise – we‘ll see how things go,” he said.
Epp noted the entire North American RV industry is going through a downturn, with several other manufacturers in Canada and the U.S. closing down.
Although B.C. and Alberta are the company‘s main markets, Canadian sales have gone flat in tandem with the slumping U.S. economy. The strong Canadian dollar has also had a significant impact -- about 20 per cent of West Coast‘s sales are to the U.S.
“In the past year we‘ve seen our dollar go from 85 cents to parity. That‘s when it seemed like someone was turning off the faucet,” he said. “With an 85 cent dollar we were still fully busy. We were booking six months out, but once the dollar got to parity our business dried up.”
The Okanagan brand in the RV industry was started in the late 1960s and went through at least two ownership changes before West Coast Leisure bought the production rights in 1991 when it was operating at Travel-Mate Industries.
“I personally have been involved in this company for 24 years and a number of the employees date back beyond that. It‘s been around for a long-time,” he said. “It‘s been a hard personal decision as well as a hard business decision.”
West Coast Leisure joins a growing list of Penticton area manufacturing firms which have closed or announced closures in recent months.
Canwood Furniture saw its last day of full production last Friday, while Hyak Specialty Wood Products will shut down its construction stake plant at the end of July. Last fall, Weyerhaeuser Canada closed its Okanagan Falls mill, followed by TSW Laminating and Oldcastle Glass.
While it's not a TC maker, Weekend Warrior had its assets seized and the doors (at least temporarily) closed last Friday. They also make the Rage'N brand of toy haulers.
2007 F350,SC,LB,4x4,6.0/Auto,35" tires,16.5 Warn,Buckstop bumpers
2007 Outfitter Apex9.5,270W solar,SolarBoost2000e,2 H2K's,2KW inverter,2 20lb LP on slide out tray,4 Lifeline AGM bats,Tundra fridge
95 Bounder 28' ClassA sold
91 Jamboree 21' ClassC sold
Okanagan vs. Lance and their recent business decisions --
I think its interesting to contemplate the different decisions these two companies made in their recent product line announcements. Okanagan introduced a new model recently that would not ride on much less than a 5500 series truck. Lance introduced their "European" look-alike to attract the 1/2T truck owner.
Similar business decisions will be made throughout the RV industry. Some of them may result in companies hanging on through this difficult market. Others will be their death knoll.
Dealerships will need to be as cautious about where to invest their capital and how to survive the next couple of years. One of our larger dealers here is now pushing their new parts store. Seems to me that this is a good decision.
Just got back from a weekend trip (great trip by the way). The thing that blew my mind was the number of VW vans and the number of tents & tent trailers. In the camp site that we were at (it was an over flow, no services site) we had two truck campers, one 5th wheel, a dozen tent trailers, a couple of trailers, 7 VW vans and a couple dozen sites with tents. I have not seen that many VW's in a long time, if ever. My son was counting the VW's as that is what my Dad drives and in the three days we were gone saw 14.
Went to the main campground and yes they had a number of the masive rigs (MH and 5th wheels) but I was very surprised by all the tents, even in the serviced sites! Even saw a Smart Car (2 seater Very small car) towing a little pop up trailer.
To me I think that people are being careful, but some are still dropping the bucks. This will weed out a lot of the manufactures. Saw a very nice Bigfoot TC that if I was looking I would go with, but overall I will be sticking with my unit for a long time.
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