WeatherTech is an American manufacturer of

automobile A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with Wheel, wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, Car seat, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport private transport#Personal transport, pe ...

accessories headquartered in

Bolingbrook The village of Bolingbrook is a southwest suburb of Chicago in Will and DuPage counties in the U.S. state of Illinois. Per the 2020 census, the population was 73,922. As of 2010, it is the 17th largest incorporated place in Illinois and the sta ...

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

History

WeatherTech was founded in 1989 by current

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

David MacNeil, who did not appreciate the quality of vehicle floor mats as they did not well-contain dirt and were not easy to clean. At the time, MacNeil was the vice president of sales at high-performance vehicle company AMG, now a subsidiary of

Mercedes-Benz Mercedes-Benz (), commonly referred to as Mercedes and sometimes as Benz, is a German luxury and commercial vehicle automotive brand established in 1926. Mercedes-Benz AG (a Mercedes-Benz Group subsidiary established in 2019) is headquartere ...

. His company began importing accessories made in

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

and selling them in the United States when in 1994 he found a

contract manufacturer A contract manufacturer (CM) is a manufacturer that contracts with a firm for components or products (in which case it is a turnkey supplier). It is a form of outsourcing. A contract manufacturer performing packaging operations is called copacker ...

and then opened his first plants in the

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

suburbs.

Products

Among its other products, WeatherTech is primarily known for its FloorLiner brand of heavy-duty rubber floor mats, which it also manufactures for companies such as

Volkswagen Volkswagen (),English: , . abbreviated as VW (), is a German Automotive industry, motor vehicle manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1937 by the German Labour Front under the Nazi Party and revived into a ...

and

Kia Kia Corporation, commonly known as Kia (, ; formerly known as Kyungsung Precision Industry and Kia Motors Corporation), is a South Korean multinational automobile manufacturer headquartered in Seoul, South Korea. It is South Korea's second lar ...

. Other products made by the company include other heavy-duty floor mats, trunk liners,

windshield sun shade Windshield sun shades (also known as sun-screen shades, sunscreens, sun car shades, sun shields, heat shields, or UV shields) are protective shields attached to a car's windshield or side window to keep the sun from reaching the interior and help re ...

s, and

mudflap A mudflap or mud guard is used in combination with the vehicle fender to protect the vehicle, passengers, other vehicles, and pedestrians from mud and other flying debris thrown into the air by the rotating tire. A mudflap is typically made fro ...

s. WeatherTech claims over 95% of its products are manufactured in the United States at its plants in Illinois.

Sponsorships

IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship

WeatherTech is the title sponsor of the

International Motor Sports Association The International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) is a North American sports car racing sanctioning body based in Daytona Beach, Florida under the jurisdiction of the ACCUS arm of the FIA. It was started by John Bishop, a former executive direc ...

(IMSA) SportsCar Championship, currently officially known as the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship through the sponsorship. The sponsorship was announced on August 8, 2015 with the official renaming taking place on November 1 for the 2016 season.

WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca

On March 20, 2018, it was announced that the new title sponsor of the Laguna Seca Raceway would be WeatherTech, replacing

Mazda , commonly referred to as simply Mazda, is a Japanese multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Fuchū, Hiroshima, Japan. In 2015, Mazda produced 1.5 million vehicles for global sales, the majority of which (nearly one m ...

. The track was officially renamed to WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca soon after on April 1.

References

{{reflist Companies based in DuPage County, Illinois American companies established in 1989 Privately held companies based in Illinois Manufacturing companies based in Illinois 1989 establishments in Illinois