AKRON—When Goodyear recently restructured its Commercial Tire Business Unit, the company had one overriding mission in mind: increase market share for its Goodyear, Kelly and Dunlop brands.
In order to accomplish that, the tire maker said Rick Howell, the newly appointed marketing director for Commercial Tire Systems, has made "significant changes" to the unit's organizational structure and appointed new managers.
According to Goodyear, Mr. Howell has established a new team of general managers, including:
Dave Beasley, who has been named general marketing manager for the commercial group. Formerly, he was manager of Goodyear's government sales and marketing;
Mike Simon, previously the sales and operations manager for retread systems, who now is general manager of sales;
Bob O'Donnell, named general manager of channel marketing for national accounts;
Al Matson, appointed manager of operations for the commercial group; and
Jason Mitchell, systems manager.
The company said the recent changes were, in part, precipitated by the creation of Wingfoot Commercial Tire Systems, a joint venture between Goodyear and Treadco Inc. Wingfoot took over control of the Goodyear-owned commercial truck tire centers and, in doing so, created the largest independent customer for Goodyear's commercial tire business unit.