ABOUT US  l  BACKGROUND  l  TIMELINE

The Early Days

Originally established in 1987 at the height of the clutch rebuilding industry, AMS began operations by supplying clutch rebuilders in North America, Latin America, and the Caribbean with hard-to-rebuild new pressure plate assemblies and disc assemblies. At the time, industry insiders told us “It can’t be done.” “Why would clutch rebuilders buy new products,” they asked?

The answer soon became clear. Shop labor rates began to increase, waste disposal costs were skyrocketing, clutch SKU counts were growing, and component parts used in the rebuilding of clutches were becoming difficult to source. As a result, many rebuilders began looking for an alternative.

AMS new component assemblies offered that alternative. Now rebuilders could supplement their reman line with new units. What’s more, they could also be first to market with an alternative line of entirely new clutches.

Growth

The next few years were marked by dramatic growth at AMS. Our product offering expanded to include release bearings, pilot bearings/bushings, flywheels, friction material, agricultural clutches, and class 6-8 heavy-duty clutches. Rebuilders, large and small, came to rely on AMS as their behind-the-scenes source for top quality products, cataloging expertise, and technical support. Our reputation for value, service, and honesty was now firmly established in the rebuilder segment.

Rebuilt Clutch Decline

By the mid 1990’s, the clutch industry had undergone a dramatic change. Additional channels of distribution had been established beyond the rebuilder base, and clutches were now available from a wide range of sources. New clutches were far outselling rebuilt clutches, causing economies of scale to shift from rebuilders toward manufacturers of new clutches.

Faced with these issues, AMS could no longer rely exclusively on clutch rebuilders to bring our products to market. However, a change in our market direction could prove costly. AMS needed to be cautious not to alienate the customer base that we had worked so hard to service.

Our mandate for change soon became clear. Many of the industry’s best-known clutch rebuilders had fallen into decline. Still others attempted to economize by cutting services and turning to inferior “knock-offs” from China and India. We weren’t leaving our customer base. Instead, it was vanishing, as we had known it.

Introduction of AMS Clutch Kits

In November of 1996, AMS introduced RhinoPac Premium New Clutch Kits to the market at the “Industry Week” Convention in Las Vegas. Comprised of nearly 800 SKU’s, each RhinoPac kit contained the highest available quality pressure plate assembly, disc assembly, and release bearing.

Once again, many of the industry experts told us "It can’t be done." "Clutches are clutches," they said. “Installers don’t care about quality; they’re more interested in buying at the lowest price. What’s more, you’ll never be able to compete with the existing kit suppliers.”

During the Industry Week Convention, the up-hill battle that we faced couldn't have seemed more difficult. Many prospective buyers told us that they had never heard of AMS, despite the fact that we were the major supplier to many of the nationally known programs that were familiar to them. Others told us that the last thing the industry needs is another clutch supplier.

Rather than become dejected, we reminded ourselves that “no reputation” was better than a bad reputation. We also reaffirmed in our minds that it was never our intent to follow the latest trends of the automotive aftermarket. “Trends,” we said, “were for the fashion industry.” We just weren’t interested in a “same as” or “me-too” approach. Our aim was to attract a more discerning clientele, one that valued product quality along with honest and useful services.

Shortly after Industry Week, something interesting happened. We discovered that, once again, many of the industry experts were wrong. Professional technicians didn’t want less...they needed more...more in terms of service, technical support, and product quality. Technicians value time. They realize that time is truly money. To waste time by installing poor quality clutch components a second and third time is to waste money.

Within months, several major program distribution groups signed AMS as an approved new clutch supplier.

Industry Consolidation

Following the successful introduction of RhinoPac, AMS purchased the New Generation clutch program in January 1998 from Westling Manufacturing. Based in Princeton, MN, Westling had been one of our long-time customers, and they were regarded as one of the industry’s largest and finest clutch rebuilders. After purchasing the New Generation program, we also formed a joint-venture agreement with Westling, designed to combine the strengths of our new program with the strengths of their reman programs. In doing so, AMS and Westling were able to provided renewed availability to a nationwide program of new and remanufactured clutch kits.

Later that year, we purchased the new clutch program from another long-time AMS customer, Arrow Automotive. Due to their experience in dealing with AMS, Arrow fully understood our ability to respond quickly to the needs of their customers. Not content to continue the Arrow program “as-is”, we converted their packaging from a conventional corrugated design to our unique SleevePac design, immediately increased order fill-rates to over 99%, quadrupled coverage to nearly 800 kits, and issued new cataloging in just over 60 days. In doing so, we retained the overwhelming majority of Arrow’s new clutch business.

In 2001, AMS entered into a distribution agreement with Standard Flywheels, Inc. of Oceanside, CA. Standard Flywheels was the largest supplier of resurfaced exchange flywheels to the automotive aftermarket. As such, their program of 230 sku’s was a perfect fit with our new clutch kits and hydraulics because we were able to combine cataloging, sales representation, and delivery into one package. This led to the development of our “Sell The System” slogan, in which we encouraged technicians to replace all of the related components during a clutch replacement.

By no means was consolidation over within the industry. In 2004, we entered into negotiations with TRW Automotive to purchase the Autospecialty clutch program. Despite our efforts, TRW sold the clutch, brake, and chassis program to Universal Automotive Industries (UAI) headquartered in Alsip, IL. By April 2005, UAI had filed voluntary petitions for reorganization under Chapter 11. In August 2005, AMS purchased the Autospecialty clutch program from UAI, which consisted of new clutch kits and clutch hydraulics, along with other related products including bushings, bearings, forks and flywheels. All OEM branded products were transferred to our Fenton location, and the remaining products were later auctioned as scrap material.

In yet another sign of further consolidation, AMS acquired PBP, Inc. in August 2006. Headquartered in Industry, California, PBP was an authorized repackager of AP branded clutch kits. Once again, all OEM branded products were transferred to our Fenton location.

Product Diversification

In late 2008, AMS announced a joint venture agreement with SETCO Automotive NA (based in Paris, TN) to market and distribute their lineup of class 6-8 LIPE commercial clutch products.

As a well-established brand dating back to 1934, the LIPE program had been recently purchased by SETCO (from Haldex) in 2007. The LIPE lineup of clutches included over 100 configurations utilizing ceramic or organic friction material, pull or push style actuation, as well as diaphragm or coil spring designs. Coverage included 13” thru 15.5” configurations for Caterpillar, Cummins, Detroit Diesel, Ford, GM, Mack and Navistar engines.

The agreement expanded on our focus of adding value to the aftermarket. By utilizing SETCO’s legendary reputation for quality and innovation at the OE level, AMS offered a proven product line that further complemented our existing lineup of manual transmission products.

Building around our “Sell The System” philosophy, AMS also began producing a comprehensive lineup of class related products including no-core new flywheels, clutch brakes, release bearings, pilot bearings, installation kits and bell housing cover kits.

Until 2008, manual transmission products including clutches, clutch hydraulics, new flywheels and forks/cables were the core of the AMS offering. However, in October 2008, AMS announced a partnership with AVM industries of Marion, SC to distribute gas charged lift supports under the existing AMS brand names

AVM’s position as the first and leading supplier of lift supports into the aftermarket enabled us to offer a proven product line with the right quality and coverage to sell in a competitive environment. Their strength in research, development and manufacturing was further enhanced by the strength of our market presence, sales structure, distribution system, service levels and promotional abilities. These strengths enabled customers to more easily capture the lift support business in their markets while enjoying the benefits of combining lift support orders with their orders for other AMS products.

Today

Today, more than ever, we are reminded of our humble roots and thankful for the support that we received from the very beginning. Despite the recognition and success that AMS has achieved, we are still guided by the same principles and ideals that have served our company from the very beginning…provide top quality products and services at competitive prices.

Oh, we still occasionally hear from industry experts that tell us we should cheapen our product to reach a wider customer base. After all, they say, “All clutches and lift supports are pretty much the same.”

To our loyal customers and those who are truly interested in an honest value for their dollar, don’t worry. We promise not to cut corners.

To those who aren’t happy with their existing supplier, we invite you to try us.