The story
Garford Motor Truck Company (1909–1925)
In 1909, the Garford Motor Truck Company was established in Elyria, Ohio, a small town 30 miles outside Cleveland.
By June 1912, the company was awarded a lucrative contract with the United States Post Office. The first order called for 11 trucks, the following for 20 trucks, for a total of 31 trucks. "This is very significant of the practical efficiency of this most advanced commercial car." The post office had experimented for two years "with practically every truck made." They tried not only all the leading American trucks, but the foreign trucks, as well. The test resulted in the Garford being awarded first honors. The Garford proved to be the most practical truck under all conditions.
Superior Body Company (1925–1940)
During the early 1920s, Garford moved its operations to Lima, Ohio. In 1925, Garford Motor Truck changed its name to the Superior Body Company and opened a new plant housing a large manufacturing facility and administrative offices. The company diversified, introducing a line of hearse and ambulance bodies (known as professional cars) and becoming a major producer of school bus bodies for the U.S. and Canada, as well as export markets.
For its professional-car platforms, Superior signed an agreement with Studebaker, thus gaining instant access to some 3000 dealers and Studebaker's chassis engineering. The company had continuing success for several years, and on the strength of this arrangement, rose to a prominent position in the professional-car business. By 1930, Superior and Studebaker had the only complete line of professional cars in the North American market.
In 1938, having achieved success and having established a dealer network of its own, Superior left the partnership with Studebaker and began building bodies on General Motors platforms.
Superior Coach Company (1940–1980)
In 1940 the company changed its name again, to Superior Coach Company. School bus bodies were built primarily on Chevrolet/GMC, Dodge, Ford, and International Harvester truck chassis. In 1951 the Lima facility was expanded and a new facility in Kosciusko, Mississippi was opened.
Sheller-Globe Corporation
In 1969 Superior was acquired by the Sheller-Globe Corporation, an industrial conglomerate and auto parts maker based in Toledo, Ohio.
The 1977 model year saw a major downsizing in the Cadillac automobile chassis used for the professional car business. In addition to being smaller, Cadillac's commercial chassis was significantly more expensive. Superior and other ambulance and funeral car manufacturers had to design new bodies and retool their factories, resulting in much higher consumer costs. The ambulance sector switched to larger van-based vehicles or and truck chassis. 1977 also brought new Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards for school buses built after 1 April, which increased both costs and engineering challenges. At the same time, a downturn in North American school bus purchase volumes began as the children of the Baby Boom generation completed their elementary and secondary educations.
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By 1980, Superior was one of the six major school bus body manufacturing companies in the United States, competing with Blue Bird, Carpenter, Thomas, Ward, and Wayne, as well as Gillig and Crown whose buses were primarily sold on the West Coast. Bidding competition for reduced volumes became devastating to profits and even liquidity; in 1979, Ward declared bankruptcy, reorganizing as AmTran the following year, which later became IC Bus.
Faced with these challenges, school bus industry overcapacity, the loss of ambulance business in the professional car sector, and decreased sales of funeral coaches due to higher production and sales costs, Sheller-Globe liquidated its Superior Coach-related investments in late 1980, and portions of its assets were sold.
From Wikipedia’s article on Superior Coach Company, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4