Reifen 2008: New Vredestein Winter Tyres, Maloya Rebranded

Dutch manufacturer Vredestein utilised the opportunity of Reifen 2008 to exhibit their newest addition to Vredestein winter range, the Snowtrac 3. The tyre is the company’s follow-up to their highly-rated, award winning bestseller – the Snowtrac 2 – and uses a different tread compound to its predecessor that the company says will provide greater levels of grip in winter conditions. Additionally, the company officially launched its new studded winter tyre: the Arctrac, which Vredestein claims will “come into its own in heavy frost.” The company also announced the rebranding of its Swiss Vredestein Group member, Maloya, a move that aims to appeal to “a young, modern and dynamic target group.”

Vredestein state that the Snowtrac 3 is a “step forward on all fronts”, with the company challenging the idea that its being a winter tyre implies that it must produce more noise or steer less accurately. In terms of safety, the tyre boasts a tapering transverse groove and a rounded footprint, which optimise the tyre’s dispersion capacity – vital in terms of a winter tyre’s necessary self-cleaning abilities. Environmentally speaking, the company says the Snowtrac 3 produces less noise pollution, possesses a rubber composition free from oils containing polycyclic aromatics (PCAs) – and therefore less chemically pollutant – and has lower rolling resistance. The manufacturer also claims that the tyre is more durable; it has added an additional shoulder groove to ensure the consistency of the wear pattern throughout the tyre’s life.

Vredestein also launched the Arctrac, a studded winter tyre, from the company’s Essen show platform. Specifically developed with the snows of Scandinavia, Canada and Russia in mind, the Arctrac possesses graduated lateral grooves to deliver greater grip on different types of snow. Additional stability is promised through the inclusion of angular shoulders, while Vredestein says that the tyre has maximum braking capacity and optimum tracking, even on particularly dense snow and ice. The studs, meanwhile, are firmly anchored into the rubber as a result of the tread structure, minimising stud loss. Like the Snowtrac 3, the Arctrac has been developed to self-clean efficiently and with reduced noise – when used without the studs – and PCA-related pollution.

Maloya Rebranded

Swiss Vredestein Group subsidiary Maloya’s rebranding pivots on the company’s central concept of “Modern Grip”: the former standing for synonymous terms such as new, up-to-date and contemporary; the latter referring to the high-level of performance the brand promises and – as Maloya themselves suggest – to “the control members of our target group expect to have over their lives and experiences.”

Maloya clearly hopes to appeal to the adventurous, youthful market depicted in its new promotional materials, aligning itself with trends in fashion, holiday destinations and exciting events. The company is positioning itself within tyres’ natural home in terms of imagery: at the heart of all that is dynamic. It will be interesting to see whether they can indeed exert a marketing grip on the minds of their self-consciously modern target market.