Paccar Financial (PFC) is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. “We’re celebrating a milestone,” says Todd Hubbard, president of Paccar Financial. “The growth of Paccar’s captive finance company has been dramatic. In 1970, PFC had total assets of $87 million in its portfolio compared to $3.6 billion in 2010. The finance group saw a 30 percent jump in business between 2009 and 2010, and it’s looking to grow significantly again in 2011.”
According to Hubbard, PFC has grown to be a primary lender to customers through Peterbilt’s and Kenworth’s network of dealerships. “Our mission is to support our dealers with innovative and attractive lease and finance packages for their customers,” says Hubbard. “And, since we have a vested interest in the transportation industry, we can be more creative and responsive to our dealerships’ customers than other finance sources.”
PFC also offer a used truck trade package program. “In some cases, our customers wanted to purchase new trucks, but trading in their existing used trucks was a problem due to depressed resale values in the used truck market,” says Hubbard. “PFC bridged that gap by taking a portion of the trades and limiting a dealer’s risk of absorbing an entire trade package. The end result was that it helped facilitate new truck purchases, which was good for our customers, good for our dealers, and good for Paccar.”
Through its history, PFC says it has been known for offering comprehensive finance and lease packages to better serve its customers. These include special promotions such as bundling “no-cost” extended warranty offers in the finance package. “That’s something banks can’t offer,” says Hubbard.
“PFC certainly does have innovative programs,” says Bob Gentry, president of Peterbilt of New Hampshire. “In addition to standard finance and more creative lease packages, they do extended terms, skip payments for our construction customers, and on the medium-duty side, they’ve been very aggressive with creative financing. The special Medium Duty Combo program they offer blends a 4.99 percent interest rate with an extended warranty and is extremely helpful. The majority of my business over the past several months was due to that program.”
While providing truck finance packages has been PFC’s mainstay, it has also broadened its scope over the years to include trailer and body upfitting financing. PFC also helps Paccar dealers by lending money for flooring plans, as well as dealership expansion.
“As a captive finance group, they provide wholesale floor plans for us on new and used trucks,” says Cooper Sykes, president of Cooper Kenworth, which has 10 locations in North Carolina. “Along with providing retail financing for our customers, they’ve been absolutely vital to our organization. They have a vested interest in their dealer body in wholesale and retail financing.”
According to Hubbard, PACCAR Financial has come full circle over the past 50 years. “We originally began as a finance source to help customers purchase Kenworth and Peterbilt trucks,” he says. “But as we’ve grown and matured, we’ve come to play an integral role with dealers in their flooring and expansion, plus we’ve continued to support their customers with innovative finance plans and creative approaches to customer needs during the up as well as down cycles of our industry.”
