Daimler to drop Sterling in 2011 - Diesel Forum

unmguy2000 · 10-14-2008, 07:38 AM

I just read in the news this morning that Daimler is dropping the Sterling brand in 2011 due to poor sales. Freightliner and Western Star will produce new models to fill in the gap.

Daimler to drop Sterling truck brand: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance

roofeditor · 10-14-2008, 08:29 AM

About time!

SmokeyWren · 10-14-2008, 10:17 AM

For those that don't keep up with this stuff, the Sterling Brand is what's left of the old Ford class 8 trucks that Ford sold to Freightliner around 10 years ago. Then Diamler (Mercedes Benz) bought Freightliner, so they owned the Sterling (nee Ford) brand of class 8 trucks. Western Star is a Canadian company that was also bought out by Freightliner several years ago. So now the old Ford, Freightliner, and Western Star truck lines are all owned by Diameler. They don't really need the Sterling brand. Freightliner medium duty (class 5 thru 7) trucks have been offered with Mercedes-Benz diesels, as well as the old standby Detroit Diesel, Cat and Cummins engines. They don't really need the Western Star brand either, but a lot of Canadian customers still want that Western Star name on their OTR tractors.