About Us

Founded in 2004 by Eric Merchant, Merchant Automotive L.L.C., was built from the ground up through the passion of providing high-quality service and products for the Duramax community. In high school, Eric discovered his passion for anything with a motor, which led to him working in a small shop doing brakes and alignment work in 1993. In 1995, he quickly advanced to a position at a GM dealership where he rose up the ranks over the next 10 years.

While working at the dealership, Eric purchased a Duramax truck and quickly became “the diesel guy” among his coworkers. He took various GM Diesel classes and increased his knowledge on these trucks to the point where he had customers coming from all over the eastern United States to have him work on their trucks. During this time, Eric became very active on the forums and started to amass a following that led to him repairing Allison transmissions on the side. This helped to build his reputation which eventually led to the dealership backing his business and using it as marketing. They would host dyno days and cookouts to attract diesel owners to the dealership.

While Eric was building his reputation, he was approached by someone wanting to purchase products for him and asked for his website. At the time, Eric did not have a website and this potential customer helped Eric build a site where he sold a few products in his spare time. This eventually evolved to Eric getting a larger reputation which allowed him to scale his business to a larger warehouse. With the extra space available in this new warehouse, Eric was able to allow for room for service jobs as well.

After a few years of testing out new business strategies and seeing what worked and what didn’t, Eric has grown Merchant-Automotive to the largest Duramax parts supplier, manufacturer, and service center in the world. The MA team never stops innovating and is creating new products all of the time. With nearly 20 years in business, Merchant Automotive has created Duramax diesel experts who are ready to assist you with your next repair, modification, and build!