The last time Tyres & Accessories interviewed online tyre entrepreneur, Mike Welch, his latest venture Tirescanner was making in-roads in the US tyre retail market. Such was the concept’s growth that Welch had been pitching the business to investors in a bid to move onto phase two of Tirescanner’s development. Roughly a year later, T&A asked how things are progressing:
On 3 September Amazon said it will create an extra 7,000 UK jobs this year to meet growing demand. Prior to this, the online retail giant had already added 3,000 roles in 2020. So, by the end of the year, it will have created a total of 10,000 new jobs. At the same time, the company has increased its involvement with the tyre market. While online tyre retail is about far more than Amazon, the news reflects increased demand both for online ordering in general and for online tyre sales in particular. But it is not just Amazon that has noticed this trend. Speaking during a webinar in June, GfK analysts highlighted how online tyre buying is increasing as a function of lockdown and the increased take-up of online shopping in general. Their thesis? More tyres will be sold online and the budget tyre sector will be the beneficiary.
This article, including three charts support the analysis, appears in full in the October edition of Tyres & Accessories. Not yet a subscriber? You can change that here.
Martins Industries released a new website in early September. The company now hopes to attract more first-time buyers on it so they can experience purchasing their tyre equipment online.
Bridgestone will be using GoCardless to facilitate the recurring payment function necessary for its Mobox tyre subscription service. Already available in France, Germany, Italy and Spain, Mobox customers in the UK can pay via GoCardless for a “frictionless payment experience.” Furthermore, because of the end-to-end integration of the GoCardless API, Bridgestone will have access to real-time information on the status of mandates and payments – in turn, reducing costs and time spent on administration.
As Tyres & Accessories annual global social media ranking enters its seventh edition, this year there is a new winner. Last year’s champion, Pirelli, has fallen two places to third position. At the same time, in a reflection of what has taken place in the UK-only ranking, the top 10 has a new entry, with previously 10th-ranked MRF being overtaken by another large Indian tyremaker.
For the fourth year in a row, Michelin can be found at the top of Tyres & Accessories’ 2020 UK social media ranking. Indeed, such is Michelin’s dominance in the annual table, only Goodyear (in 2012) and Dunlop (in 2016) have done enough to overtake the UK arm of the French tyre brand since our research began in 2011. In both cases, Michelin still managed to take second place.
Snap-on launched its latest diagnostic scan tool – the Apollo-d8 – back in July. Now, the well-known garage equipment supplier has also released free training modules for it too.
GKN Structures, the Telford-based industrial wheel manufacturer, has launched a new website. The site’s new URL – www.gknstructures.com – is designed to help with google searches.
DriveRightData is partnering with Bridgestone, providing tyre identification and product matching capabilities data for the tyre manufacturer’s recently-launched Mobox monthly tyre and car maintenance subscription service. DriveRightData information supplied includes brand name, product name, description, tyre and tread images, tyre size, pressure, rim size, load and speed index, run-flat capability, EU required labelling information and barcodes.
TyreSafe has launched its 2020 Tyre Safety Month campaign with its first online briefing. Following the success of its previous ‘Get Into The Groove’ campaign, TyreSafe has prepared a fresh batch of cultural parodies with which to publicise its ACT acronym – standing for Air pressure, Condition, Tread. A range of movie poster parodies, including ‘Judge Tread’, ‘The Good, The Bad, and The Under Inflated’, and ‘Done in 60 Seconds’, are available for garages, businesses and other organisations to encourage motorists to take better care of their tyres. The distribution of the materials will reflect the digitalisation trend of this year, driven by the necessity of adapting to Covid-19 Crisis conditions; a wide variety of banners formatted for each of the major social media networks will be available. The briefing featured a panel discussion with Stuart Lovatt, Highways England strategic road safety lead; Tony Crook, National Fire Chief Council lead officer road safety; Simon Turner, Driving for Better Business campaign manager; and James Luckhurst, Project EDWARD founder.
The Independent Garage Association (IGA) is releasing a Garage Guide to Online Presence to help independent garages promote their own image and online presence without relying on third-parties.
The 68-page guide contains step-by-step instructions on how to develop company branding, set up a website and social media pages, create Google Business and Maps listings, learn about online marketing methods, collect analytics and respond to reviews.
GRI has upgraded its website (www.gritires.com). Now, according to the company, it features “streamlined navigation and recognizes the farmers, construction workers and forklift operators who move the world.”
TyreSafe has named the speakers for its first fully online briefing on Thursday 17 September at 14:00.
Online tyre and wheel retailer Delticom AG has appointed Dr Harald Blania to its Management Board. He became a board member on 14 August and will serve a fixed-term that expires at the end of 28 February 2021.
UK motorists are some of the fastest adopters of online car buying, something that is rapidly becoming the new normal in Britain, Germany and Spain, according to research conducted by online car retailer carwow. A survey of over 1000 consumers who bought a car through carwow since dealerships were allowed to reopen found 54 per cent of recent the company’s customers in the UK said they would continue to do the bulk of their car buying online from now on. In Spain it was 45 per cent and it was 38 per cent in Germany.
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TireScanner
Peter Linforth; Pixabay
Martins Industries
Gerd Altman; Pixabay
Photo Mix; Pixabay
Snap-on
GKN Structures
Bridgestone
TyreSafe
377053; Pixabay
GRI
TyreSafe
Carwow