Grumman Awarded $1.1-Billion Contract to Build Mail Trucks

mman Corp., which built its reputation and fortune in aerospace technology, won its biggest contract ever Tuesday--to produce aluminum mail trucks for the U.S. Postal Service.

“Grumman is the No. 1 producer of aluminum trucks in the country,” Chairman John C. Bierwirth said proudly as he stood near a prototype of the newest Postal Service vehicle.

Grumman announced that a $1.1-billion contract to provide 99,150 delivery vehicles to the Postal Service in the next eight years was the single largest contract ever awarded to the company.

Tuesday marked the zenith for the company’s custom truck division, which doubled its sales when it committed itself to making one of the postal trucks every eight minutes for the next eight years, Bierwirth said. But he said the new contract does not mark a change in emphasis from the aerospace technology division that has produced the lunar exploration module and the F-14 Tomcat jet fighter plane.