Viking Range, despite recently sluggish sales, should emerge a stronger, more diversified company going into next year, according to company executives.
“Viking will become No. 1 again,” said Selim Bassoul, CEO of Middleby Corp., the Elgin, Illinois-based company that purchased Viking in late 2012.
Bassoul and Tim Fitzgerald, Middleby’s chief financial officer, spoke during a telephone conference call with investors and analysts Thursday, a day after releasing the company’s latest earnings report. It showed, excluding recent acquisitions, a 14 percent drop for the second quarter in its residential division dominated by Viking.
As Bassoul has said on a number of previous occasions, the Greenwood-based manufacturer came with numerous challenges when it was purchased 2½ years ago for $380 million by Middleby.
“We had to completely change our dealership program. We had to eliminate dealers and take back inventory. We had new products that were coming out, and we had to put them on display,” he said.
In addition, the company redesigned its entire refrigeration line to be compliant with stricter energy regulations in the United States and Europe.
Still, Bassoul said, “I am extremely pleased with the results of Viking.”
He said the company has lost about a third of its previous dealer network. It is also still dealing with a recall of products and “legacy issues” made prior to Middleby assuming ownership.
Bassoul said new products, such as a French door oven, already “are flying off the shelves.”
Bassoul, who visits Lebanon regularly, was in touch with the country’s sole Viking distributor. In that rugged country, where homes are powered by private generators, the new products are proving to be a hit.
“When he first received the first truckload, 70 percent of that container sold within seven days,” Bassoul said.
Other new products are in the works, he said.
“At this moment, orders have picked up. Our No. 1 objective is to re-establish the high-end brand.”
Bassoul said Viking’s refrigeration operation has been simplified.
“When we acquired the business, the refrigeration engineering and R&D was in Iowa. Every time they had a prototype, it had to be shipped down” to Greenwood and then back to Iowa, he said.
Bassoul said the desire to centralize refrigeration engineering and R&D in Greenwood was the logical choice, although there was some resistance internally to the move.
The Iowa engineers, he said, did not want to relocate to Greenwood. “I think the Iowa engineers had figured this out and had already put their resumés out there.”
He said the company has continued its marketing to larger chain stores, such as New York-based P.C. Richard. Viking, he said, is an iconic brand in the high-end appliance market.
“People buy Viking because of its looks. It is very different from Sub-Zero or Wolf. Our core customers want that look,” Bassoul said.
He said Viking has received several honors this year.
Good Housekeeping magazine rated the company’s gas range as No. 1, and USA Today gave the company’s redesigned gas cooktop the Editor’s Choice Award.
In the past, several Viking products were plagued with quality issues, but those have been corrected, according to Bassoul.
“For somebody who bought a Viking in the last six or seven years, they’ve had a bad experience. Our new products, they won’t break down,” he said.
•Contact Bob Darden at 581-7239 or bdarden@gwcommonwealth.com.
