https://archive.triblive.com/news/larusse-distributing-in-tarentum-sold-to-fuhrer/
LaRusse Distributing in Tarentum sold to Fuhrer
Valley News Dispatch
Exterior of LaRusse Distributing in West Tarentum on Tuesday, Sept. 4, 2012. The company recently was sold to Frank B. Fuhrer Wholesale Co. Eric Felack | Valley News Dispatch
After more than 70 years in Tarentum, LaRusse Distributing is no more.
Frank Fuhrer, owner of Frank Fuhrer Wholesale, confirmed Tuesday that his company had bought the business.
“We bought them because we're looking to expand and grow,” Fuhrer said. LaRusse was an Anheuser-Busch master distributor, something Fuhrer said he's trying to acquire.
“We have a 10-and-a-half county area,” he said. “I've been trying to buy Anheuser-Busch distributors as they come up for sale. This was just a great fit for us.”
Phil LaRusse Jr., the former owner of LaRusse Distributing, did not return calls for comment on this story. Fuhrer declined to reveal the purchase price.
Fuhrer said he bought only LaRusse Distributing and not the distributor's former home, located at 100 W. Sixth Ave.
He said he will move the company to his location on East Carson Street in Pittsburgh's South Side.
“It's a shame because they've been in this town for so long,” said Mayor Carl Magnetta. “I knew Phil's dad when he started the business.
“It's just a terrible loss of jobs for people, not only in Tarentum, but in the whole Valley.”
Magnetta said the borough doesn't know what LaRusse plans to do with the building.
“I'm sure it will be vacant for a while until he can figure out what he's going to do with it,” the mayor said. “We've heard so many rumors about what might happen down there. I really have no idea,” Magnetta said.
Fuhrer said that some of LaRusse's employees will work at the Pittsburgh location, but said he wasn't sure of the exact number.
Fuhrer, who became an Anheuser-Busch distributor in 1982, won a coveted bidding war to be Western Pennsylvania's only distributor of Coors products in 1987.
Fuhrer said the purchase of LaRusse gives his company the rights to distribute Anhueser-Busch in almost all of Western Pennsylvania and makes it one of the 12 largest Anhueser-Busch distributors in the country.
“It'll add about eight percent growth to our business,” Fuhrer said. “We'll be selling about 16.6 million cases a year now.”
R.A. Monti is a freelance writer for Trib Total Media.
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