Grouptyre offers Tyres Online

Grouptyre UK Ltd reports that it has decided to capitalise on the increasing numbers of tyres bought online with the creation and launch of Tyres Online. According to the wholesale group, the introduction of Tyres Online enables Grouptyre’s 10 members to offer retailers another tool as part of their customer packages.

Tyres Online allows retailers access to the online market without them having to make any significant investment and gives customers access to a new generation of consumers who prefer to make their purchases online. Tyres Online sits as a button on the retailer’s website, and although it is not an e-commerce website, its displays full stock availability and price allowing the customer to reserve stock and book a suitable appointment in the comfort of their home. This ensures that the consumer knows that when he or she visits the retailer for fitting, the correct tyre will be in stock, giving the retailer the added comfort of a guaranteed sale.

Tyres Online is available for retailers with single or multi-branch sites and the programme is personalised in terms of colours, look and feel, fitting in with retailers own website. With minimal set-up costs and the creation of a professional looking and easy to navigate site for the consumer, Tyres Online will help retailers offer that little bit more for their customers.

“We see the development of Tyres Online as another additional service we can offer to our customers”, says Paul Hollows, Grouptyre’s sales director. “More and more people are buying and reserving products online and they want the reassurance and convenience of knowing that when they go to have a tyre fitted, it will be in stock for them. Tyres Online helps the retailer to offer this to their customers, and offer an all-round improved consumer experience”.

Online development sparks memories of “Good Tyre Guide”

The launch of Tyres Online follows the introduction of the apparently defunct “Good Tyre Guide”, which Grouptyre launched in August 2010 (see “Grouptyre Says New e-Commerce Initiative Benefits Trade”). Its earlier system was similar to Tyres Online inasmuch as it also offered a “plugin” option in order to help retails bolt the system onto their existing websites. Back then Group tyre said that “the major difference between the Good Tyre Guide and other websites that enable consumers to buy tyres online is the benefits it offers the trade.” Grouptyre Says New e-Commerce Initiative Benefits Trade“). Its earlier system was similar to Tyres Online inasmuch as it also offered a “plugin” option in order to help retails bolt the system onto their existing websites. Back then Group tyre said that “the major difference between the Good Tyre Guide and other websites that enable consumers to buy tyres online is the benefits it offers the trade.”

According to Grouptyre, dealers on this platform could “extend their sales territories and because there are three distinct profit opportunities associated with each consumer purchase, they can grow their businesses.” In this respect it appears that Tyres Online is the latest evolution of the principle of offering retailers additional business while allowing them to remain in control of the sales opportunity.

Grouptyre is in a considerably different position now to what it was four years ago. With just the 10 strongest members remaining following a period of consolidation that came as the result of a series of bankruptcies and takeovers amongst members, it is both smaller in terms of the number of members but also leaner. This doesn’t mean it is smaller in terms of volumes as the remaining members appear to have generally grown into the space vacated by those that went before.

Without linking the Good Tyre Guide and these internal fluctuations, what the differing make-up of Grouptyre then and now does serve to illustrate is that such innovations are not without risks, but there are also significant advantages to pushing forward like this (see “Taking the Plunge” Tyres & Accessories October 2010 for more on this).