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Judge OKs sale of $4.4M of Denman Tire’s assets
By GRACE WYLER
youngstown
A bankruptcy judge has approved the $4.4 million sale of a portion of Denman Tire’s assets, despite an eleventh-hour attempt by a local investment group to save the Leavittsburg- based tire company.
Judge Kay Woods authorized the sale of Denman Tire’s intellectual property — including brand names and product recipes — to Titan Tire, a Des Moines, Iowa-based subsidiary of Titan International, Inc.
The 91-year-old tire manufacturer filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in March, which involves the liquidation of a company’s assets. Around 230 Denman Tire employees lost their jobs in the wake of the bankruptcy.
The Garden Club Angels, a group of local investors formed through a collaborative effort between the Youngstown Business Incubator and Youngstown State University, made a last-ditch effort to buy Denman Tire last week.
The group formed a company, GCA Tire, and filed an objection to the proposed sale of the company. GCA announced its intention to buy all of the company’s assets — including equipment — with the aim of restarting the Denman plants in Leavittsburg and Austintown. GCA offered to buy all of the company’s assets for $2.4 million, but Woods told GCA’s counsel, Joseph Bishara, that the court would proceed with auctioning Denman’s assets piecemeal.
GCA’s total offer exceeded Titan’s initial bid of $1.4 million, as well as bids from other tire companies, Balkrishna Industries and Coker Tire Co.
GCA was outbid by Titan in the auction process, however, and withdrew their objection to the sale, said GCA attorney Elizabeth Farbman.
The sale to Titan makes it unlikely the Denman Tire plants will ever reopen.