found this here but ill paste it below: http://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/699040-re-donahoe-racing-aka-icon-vehicle-dynamics.html
Loyalty, Honor, and Concern for Fellow Man
As many of you must have noticed, I have been very cautious to not comment on the scandal that has surrounded
Donahoe Racing over the last couple of months. I supported the company since its inception and over the years have spent incalculable hours promoting their product. It could be argued that much of the success of this product was due in no small
part to a select few dealers like myself who shared this loyalty. Over the last six months the ability for DR to keep up with demand increasingly suffered. Never the less our support for the company never waned even when this had a significant adverse affect on our income. This situation continued to worsen until product ceased to flow completely around October 2007.
At this point due to concern for the company I offered to prepay for product in order to assist DR though their cash flow issue. As a result of this and after some discussion I was presented with a proposal to purchase 50% ownership of the company. Due to the amount of money involved I carefully considered my options which boiled down to A: Allow everyone at the company to lose their jobs and let the company go into bankruptcy, or B: Take a sizable risk and invest heavily into a company which had clearly been mismanaged and was in considerable debt. After careful consideration I reached the conclusion that I simply could not allow the company to go quietly into the night. I consulted with a close friend and together we decided to invest in the salvation of the company and its personnel.
Negotiations commenced to establish where the company truly stood financially. It was during these negotiations that Kreg Donahoe went “missing”. Shortly after this the staff at DR contacted me and informed me that Kreg was dealing with “personal issues” and that they would be acting on his behalf. Understanding the financial strain which he must have been under I chose not to ask any questions regarding his personal situation. Negotiations continued for another couple of weeks all the while under pressure and urgency to close the deal. Over time as more information was obtained serious concern arose over the management of the company. As such and with the urging of the personnel we eventually came to the conclusion that an outright purchase of the company would be the most beneficial alternative for all parties involved. Negotiations in this regard went on for another few weeks as undisclosed financial issues continued to surface which supported the conclusion that the only real value of the company was the brand name and the personnel involved.
As we finally approached an agreement ‘the bomb’ was dropped. Facts surrounding Kregs “personal issue” were finally revealed to us just days prior to them surfacing on the internet. Up until this point we had been kept completely in the dark about the issue even though these facts were known to the personnel who were doing the negotiations on his behalf. Shock would be a considerable understatement regarding our reaction.
Nevertheless once we got past the initial disgust with the entire situation, we began to consider the ramifications for the innocent victims some of which we considered friends and whose lives were being toppled in the wake. Kreg’s wife was half way through her second pregnancy and the employees who had spent years building the company were going to be displaced without pay already owed to them. We somehow felt obligated to do whatever was in our
power to take care of these individuals.
A new directive was taken to both distance ourselves from the DR brand while at the same time continuing the employment of the personnel. It was a delicate situation. How could we salvage the heart and soul of the company without benefitting or being connected in any way with the ownership? We intrusted a few friends with some of this information to consider their perspective of the situation. Fortunately everyone was very encouraging and I am sincerely grateful to them for both their support and their discretion with the information. So with a new direction preparations were made to structure the new company which included an offer of a percentage of the ownership to key personnel. Others were asked to submit salary requests which were ultimately not only met but exceeded, along with generous signing bonuses to allow them to make ends meet while the deal was completed. A name was chosen, articles of incorporation were filed, and a course of action was being structured. As a sign of good will we decided that in order to fulfil the prior obligation to the public we would honor the lifetime
warranty offered by DR.
By this point I had personally invested two and a half months of sleepless nights including flights to and from New York to structure this deal and insure that all parties involved were entirely happy. It was a real roller coaster ride but last week a verbal agreement was finally reached and our attorney wrote up the sales and employment contracts which were to be closed within days.
Monday morning (Jan. 21, 2008) I received a call from the ownership stating that an offer was made by another party and that they had decided to take it. Just like that. No counter offers. No explanation other than they felt that our deal had progressed too slowly. Never mind that nearly 2 months were wasted due to the fact that crucial information had been withheld from us, that we had been clearly deceived, that in the middle of all of this one of the parties had chosen to take a week long vacation overseas, and that we were meticulously structuring the deal to live up to our word to take care of our friends.
To state that I am disgusted again would be an understatement. We were completely betrayed by the very people we were trying to help. As it turns out my “friends” had been working both sides of the table to maximize their own personal gain at the expense of the company as a whole. Like the saying goes, with friends like these who needs enemies?
Where the new party stepped in at the last minute simply because he saw an opportunity to capitalize on the situation, we started this project with the best of intentions. It is quite unfortunate that our loyalty, honor, and concern for fellow man was repaid with deceit, treachery and greed.
I apologize for the long post but I felt that I owned my friends and customers an honest explanation. Thanks for your time.
__________________
Marty G.
Truck Toyz Performance
FTE Sponsor
www.TruckToyzPerformance.com
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