Such willingness to give is eternally laudable. But in recent years, while also managing a comprehensive revolution within their own business, it’s downright astonishing. It’s a commitment that deserves acknowledgment. It deserves adulation.
It’s a commitment that has helped a company dedicated to giving to receive the 2017 Truck Parts & Service Distributor of the Year award.
But Harman’s climb to the top of the aftermarket is about more than just its devotion to the industry. It’s a story 80 years and four generations in the making.
The company is known today as Harman Heavy Vehicle Specialists was first opened as a single-location automotive jobber by Roy Harman in 1938 as Harman Supply Company. The business started in the categories Harman knew well, like brake linings and springs, and grew over time. By the late 1940s, the company’s steady growth facilitated its first of many expansions, and Roy Harman purchased an adjacent lot to build the company’s earliest state-of-the-art location.
The company’s growth period continued into the 1950s, allowing Roy to sell the successful business to employees Gordon Everett and Ralph Johnston when retiring in 1955. It was an ownership transition that defined the business for decades to come.
Under the new duo’s leadership, Harman deepened its commitment to the transportation industry, adding product categories and machine shop services with regularity. Another growth-necessitated expansion followed in 1969, as did the introduction of Gordon and Ralph’s sons, Rob and Jay, in the early 1970s.
