Randy's: A Growing Presence - Transmission Digest

Randy’s: A Growing Presence

“Over time, Randy [Lyman] built our company to have many different brands,” says RANDYS Worldwide Automotive Marketing Director Neal Hollingsworth. The company, formerly known as Randy’s Ring & Pinion (Transmission Digest December ’09) is headquartered in Everett, Wash., and employs a total of over 200 people in seven different states including distribution centers.

“Over time, Randy [Lyman] built our company to have many different brands,” says RANDYS Worldwide Automotive Marketing Director Neal Hollingsworth. The company, formerly known as Randy’s Ring & Pinion (Transmission Digest December ’09) is headquartered in Everett, Wash., and employs a total of over 200 people in seven different states including distribution centers.

Founded in 1984 by Lyman, Randy’s was acquired in 2015 by the Linsalata Capital Partners headquartered in suburban Cleveland. Linsalata at one time owned Transtar Industries after the founder of that company sold to the capital firm headed by Frank Linsalata.

“Yukon Gear & Axle,” Hollingsworth continues, “is a line of the highest quality aftermarket differential components marketed and widely accepted by installers as a leader in performance brands. Those installers tell us they prefer the premium Yukon brand to less expensive options because it sets up correctly and ‘I’ll never hear from the customer again,’ that is to say it works and won’t be back because an axle or a locker unit broke.

“Secondly, we go to market with the USA Standard Gear Brand, a line of OE replacement components that will be competitive with all the other brands in the marketplace from the standpoint of quality and value.

“From a 2014 jumping off point, when Randy left the company, we were looking for growth opportunities. To really get a bead on how we wanted to grow we looked back at where and what we’d been. We are known for quality differentials technical knowledge, selection and distribution and are very successful in what we do. There were many opportunities to stay in our wheelhouse, – maintaining our market position in undercar was the place.

“Our CEO, Kevin Kaestner, started looking into driveshafts as a growth opportunity, and found that marketplace to be extremely regionalized. Although most shops have a local supplier, the opportunity for RANDYS to catalog and provide replacement, perfect fit, driveshafts has become a reality.

“That said, we’ve been able to create a driveshaft business on the OE side that is exactly what it needs to be: it’s cataloged, it’s cost-competitive and it’s in a box ready to go. While it’s taken us about two years to get that up and running, today we’re very excited about the success and the potential of the program.

“With that being accomplished, it was time to take another step. Keeping with our goals to become axle-to-axle we began thinking about adding transfer case and transmission. We had, at that time, an ongoing business relationship with Zumbrota Bearing and Gear. Zumbrota’s Mark Mangan was a customer of ours and, through that relationship, we opened up communications resulting in the acquisition that was completed in 2017.

“Zumbrota produces the most comprehensive reman transfer case, manual transmission and complete axle units in the aftermarket. It’s similar to what Randys offers for the differential component business in that it’s one-stop shopping!

“Zumbrota’s proprietary cleaning methods allow these units to ship out looking brand new. This separates the brand and helps emphasize the craftmanship that is included on the inside of the unit.

“Zumbrota had built a very solid reman around their Minnesota facility. Rebranded as Zumbrota Drivetrain, our intention is to take their reman expertise and to pair it up with our nationwide marketing and distribution capabilities.”

“It’s a diverse and different business model,” explains Kevin Shakeshaft who splits Zumbrota general manager tasks with Adam Schuster. Zumbrota is located an hour south of Minneapolis and has been a regional supplier of remanufactured manual transmissions and transfer cases for many years.

“Manual transmission has been a declining market overall for some time. We felt, however, that suppliers were leaving the industry more quickly than the business is declining which meant opportunity for those still in the industry. Our business is growing and it’s growing quite a bit.”

“In the past year, we expanded the Minnesota operation by purchasing a former bowling alley to house transfer case operations,” says Shakeshaft. “In doing so, we have created enough capacity so that we are now able to stock and distribute A and B movers there and feed those throughout the distribution network. If a customer needs a transfer case we can ship same day as opposed to the industry average that would be five to seven days.

“There are synergies available to the combined companies as well. As the remanufacturing operation discovers wear issues with the OEM designs, product development engineers at Randys can, and very often do create fixes that can then be manufactured as aftermarket new components that eliminate known OEM issues.”

Carl Schmidt is the engineering manager in the Everett, Wash., facility. He has been working on transfer-case issues with projects that include an improved OEM case half for the New Process 246 found in Chevy and GM.

“The pump wears into case so the fix we found was to replace the magnesium casting with an aluminum casting,” Schmidt explains. “It’s a little stronger material than the OE design but we also increased the amount of material in that crucial area to address the wear issue. We’ve been working on these kinds of transfer-case issues and fixes ever since we acquired the Zumbrota operation.”

Hollingsworth says, “the capability of our engineers is extremely critical to our aftermarket parts. We are not simply asking other companies to re-engineer our parts, but we’re doing that here for all of our brands. Once these parts move from engineering drawing to manufacturers, we continue these quality lines all the way through our labs and then on-the-street testing before these parts ever make to the public.”

Shakeshaft continues to discuss the aftermarket assemblies saying, “One of the things that Randys brought to the table, something that makes us stronger is a very organized marketing effort. Before we had a presence regionally and in the specialty industry. We didn’t do a lot of advertising and let word of mouth keep us in the game.

“Randys has given us a tried and true marketing program that has driven sales. It’s been exciting to watch that happen. We’ve created the Zumbrota Drivetrain brand around the products and it’s one that was created to be recognized. With the broader vision we’ve opened up a lot of doors beyond our traditional region and that’s really fueled our growth.

“With 30-plus builders we have continued to increase our volume and evolved from the original business. We were in some big-box stores, but we were not there nationally. It’s now expanded to the point that we have a good wholesale and reseller presence nationwide considering Randy’s national distribution presence. With the marketing expertise that comes from Randys, Zumbrota has the ability to grow system wide and further expanded to have greater national presence for our product lines.

“We go to market with our quality, our warranty, our brand and our ability to stand behind the product. Our sales reps handle our customers’ needs handling technical questions, warranty claims and anything else a customer might need from us. We’ve maintained that personal approach as we’ve grown our business.”

Hollingsworth considers the progress made since the Zumbrota purchase and observes, “It’s been a lot of work that was finished in a relatively short amount of time. The Zumbrota people are very good at what they do and as a very disciplined, technically savvy company, we’re all in this together.

Wrapping up the Everett facility portion of our visit, Hollingsworth points to a five-bay retail shop facility that’s part of the Randys Worldwide headquarters facility and explains, “We’re one of the best-known differential shops in the Pacific Northwest. You probably look at it as we’re doing retail repairs. We look at it differently. We see it as part of our overall QA effort. We are able to see, first-hand, what problems are developing with OE units. One further advantage is that as we bring people in to work, sales or customer service people or anywhere else in the company, they’ll spend a week working in the service shop to get an idea of what it is that our installation customers do.

“Bringing the growth of a good solid acquisition like Zumbrota absolutely maintained Randys under-the-car focus. We’ve been a one-stop supplier in differential units and components all along. Now, for the entire drivetrain, we’re that one-stop shop!”

You May Also Like

How the Ford engine stop/start system affects transmissions

2018 and later Ford Escape vehicles equipped with a 1.5 L Eco-Boost, 2.0-liter turbocharged engine or the 2L VCTi engines, and the 6F35 transmission, have an engine stop/start system. The stop/start feature can be disabled by the driver and will remain disabled after each key cycle until reactivated by the driver. Some Ford Fusion and

Tech-Talk-May-Figure-1

2018 and later Ford Escape vehicles equipped with a 1.5 L Eco-Boost, 2.0-liter turbocharged engine or the 2L VCTi engines, and the 6F35 transmission, have an engine stop/start system. The stop/start feature can be disabled by the driver and will remain disabled after each key cycle until reactivated by the driver. Some Ford Fusion and Edge models will also have the engine stop/start feature. The reason for this was to improve fuel economy and lower tailpipe emissions.

A mysterious shudder: Locating a problem with no fault codes

It was a dark stormy night… well, not really; it was just an ordinary Tuesday. Related Articles – Chrysler ZF8 generations 1 and 2 identification guide – Photo gallery: TCRA Annual Meeting 2023 – California’s Rohnert Park Transmissions is a multi-generational success story On that ordinary Tuesday, a customer came into our store very distraught.

RRfeature-April-23
Chrysler ZF8 generations 1 and 2 identification guide

In 2019, some Chrysler/Ram/Jeep applications that utilize the ZF8HP transmission moved to a second-generation unit with a new designation and numerous changes for better performance and durability. Gen. 1 units are classified as 8HP45, 8HP70 and 8HP90; while Gen. 2 are classified as 8HP50, 8HP75 and 8HP95. Internally, the Gen. 2 transmission had numerous hard

Tasc-Tip-April-Figure-1-Gen.-1-'B'-Brake-Components-1400
Photo gallery: TCRA Annual Meeting 2023

On April 13-15, one of the transmission industry’s most notable events took place, as members of the Torque Converter Rebuilders Association (TCRA) had their annual meeting. For this year, which was the 25th time this gathering has occurred, the meeting took place in Charlotte, N.C. As always, it served as an occasion for industry friends

California’s Rohnert Park Transmissions is a multi-generational success story

Fernando Gomez’s dad got into the business after being in the Army. “It was what he always wanted to do,” Fernando says. But that wasn’t the case for Fernando at first. Related Articles – Kitting keeps us profitable: Aftermarket kit suppliers listing 2023 – GM 6L series no-movement conditions: Analysis and repair tips – 2023

Other Posts

Powertrain industry directory and buyer’s guide 2023

This is the latest in TD’s annual series of directories for the powertrain industry. Companies that supply products to the powertrain aftermarket are listed in alphabetical order. Because data changes frequently, only organizations that have updated information with Transmission Digest in the recent past are included. Related Articles – ETE Reman, Gauge Capital announce investment

Powertrain-Industry-Directory
Shift Pointers: No ball, no reverse

Yoram Levy from Israel gave us a call with a 2022 Chevrolet Traverse using a 9T65 that suddenly lost reverse. He had found a check ball missing in his valve body which he points out in figure 1 (above). Related Articles – The multi-functional Clutch 1 in Nissan’s CVT, part 1 – The evolution of

Shift-Pointers-March-Figure-1-1400
The multi-functional Clutch 1 in Nissan’s CVT, part 1

Nissan’s Hybrid RE0F02/3H CVT transmission by Jatco (JF019E) can be found in vehicles such as the Nissan Rogue and Pathfinder as well as the Infiniti QX60. It has its traction motor located where the torque converter would normally be (as you can see in Figures 1, at the top of the page, and 2, below).

Tech-Speak-March-Figure-1-FEATURE-1400
The evolution of transmissions

The easiest thing to say would be: The manual transmission was first and the automatic came second. End of article. Well, that’s true… sort of.