Heavy Duty Aftermarket Week (HDAW) 2009 will be held in Orlando, Fla., February 16 to 19, at the Orange County Convention Center. A combined management structure for the event has been finalized with the announcement of a new agreement between the three conference organizers: Heavy Duty Distribution Association (HDDA), Heavy Duty Manufacturers Association (HDMA) and the Commercial Vehicle Solutions Network (CVSN).
“CVSN is pleased to be an integral part of HDAW. This ownership agreement demonstrates that all of the major players are focused on making our industry stronger,” says Ken Duval, CVSN chair and president of Canadian Wheel. “CVSN remains a distributor-focused association. We believe that we will help make HDAW even better because we bring a strong distributor orientation to the ownership and management of the event.”
“The tremendous success of HDAW 08 was the initial product of a great team effort between the HDAW organizers (HDDA and HDMA), CVSN, and the HDAW Joint Operating Committee,” says Joe McAleese, president and CEO of Bendix CVS and HDMA’s 2008 chairman, “This effective partnership and cooperation has helped to elevate the annual HDAW conference to a new level, and we expect it will continue to improve with each passing year.”
“One of the objectives of HDAW is to have a common platform where distributor issues can be discussed, appropriate plans created, and actions implemented. Having CVSN as an organizer and its members as active participants establishes HDAW as an all industry event where this objective is achieved,” says Dave Scheer, HDDA chair and president of Inland Truck Parts Company.
HDAW is the largest North American gathering of the independent heavy-duty industry. More than 1,800 managers and executives from 17 countries including distributors, manufacturers, service providers, educators and media attended the 2008 conference.
HDAW 09 will include exclusive conference time for: Pre-scheduled, one-on-one meetings between distributors and supplier executives; a comprehensive distributor education, best practices and information program; a product expo; an expanded HDAW annual industry awards program; multiple networking opportunities for distributors and suppliers; and separate schedule periods for individual sponsor and company events.
