Viking International Continues Growth

After 30 years of experience in the tyre business, Viking continues to improve its service. In the last year the company has made significant operational changes to improve customer service levels including a complete restructure of Viking’s van runs to increase delivery frequency for customers. The large-scale wholesale operation runs eight warehouses and a fleet of over 100 specialist delivery vehicles, Viking provides a flexible and responsive daily delivery capability throughout the country.

Viking’s popular online ordering system provides customers with real time access to tyre stock, tyre pricing and account management information. The facility has been enhanced with the addition of Viking’s entire exhaust range and has been promoted in the trade press throughout the year.

Viking offers a full product range including premium and private branded tyres ranging from economy to ultra high performance. In response to customer demand, Viking has significantly increased its range of both premium high performance and 4×4 tyres over the last couple of years. To satisfy demand at the opposite end of the market, Viking has recently introduced an ultra budget range of fast moving sizes at extremely competitive prices.

Private brand development is constantly evolving and in January 2006, Viking introduced the new Millennium Ultra High Performance range to its extensive portfolio. Backed by a huge marketing campaign the Millennium brand covers the popular 15 to 19-inch sizes and was designed to compete directly with the premium brand’s dominance of the sector with the additional benefit of offering retailers a much greater profit potential. Customer support includes a fantastic range of point of sale materials such as branded clothing, outdoor signage, posters and leaflets.

As part of its focus on private brand development, a striking new brand identity was launched for Viking Tyres. The campaign focuses on Viking Tyres major product benefits; reliable tyres, designed to perform in all weather conditions.

During 2006 Viking moved to enhance its customer support package for all its private brands including branded clothing, an increased range of point of sale materials, dealer and consumer incentives and dedicated brand websites.

Back by popular demand, Viking re-ran its hugely successful battery promotion again in autumn 2006 with impressive results, according to the company.

Viking representatives say they are constantly striving to develop market-leading initiatives to add value to its business proposition, ensuring that their customers receive the very best levels of service and support available in the industry. In a static market, Viking’s sales in key product areas have reportedly surpassed expectations and more activity is planned in 2007 to support new product and service initiatives.

The company also supplies a wide range of exhausts and catalytic converters: Timax, Powerex, MetalCat and EuroCat. Timax represents the premium option. Manufactured by Arvin Meritor, the leading manufacturer of exhausts in the UK these products are said to cover 95 per cent of the market. Powerex Exhausts are also available online and are marketed as the economy choice. Exclusively available from Viking International they are all fully aluminised and manufactured in the UK.

MetalCat is described as a quality catalytic converter with robust metallic monolith. This product is also produced by Arvin Meritor, has a four-year warranty and comes with its own fitting kit. The EuroCat is an economy catalytic converter with a standard ceramic monolith. The EuroCat is also manufactured by Arvin Meritor.