News articles on the tyre retail business
Falken Tire Corp. has promoted two of its staff to marketing and product planning posts. Andrew Hoit was promoted from division manager of retail sales to director of marketing. Tim Widener was promoted from product engineer to manager of product planning. (Tire Review/Akron)
As a final addendum to the numerous Bridgestone-based restructuring announcements made today, the company has decided to retire the Firestone name from its corporate identity in many territories of the Americas. The manufacturer said that the removal of Firestone, which will come into effect on 1 January, 2009, is designed to reflect the place within Bridgestone of the Japanese giant’s subsidiaries and simplify the brand for the public.
Mark Emkes, chairman and CEO of Bridgestone Americas Holdings in Nashville, TN, said that the Firestone name will be retained “with its own identity as a historic product and service brand” within the new corporate structure. It was also pointed out that in the case of Bridgestone Firestone Diversified Products – the subsidiary making Firestone-branded roofing materials, air springs, textiles and natural rubber – the name to be dropped will be Bridgestone’s. The company will be renamed Firestone Diversified Products at the beginning of next year.
Tyre operations at Bridgestone Americas Holding, Inc. (BSAH) will be restructured, the company has announced, the changes taking effect January 1, 2009. Asahiko “Duke” Nishiyama will lead the new unit, which will be named Bridgestone Americas Tire Operations (BATO). Reporting into this unit will be the company’s Latin American tyre operations, the US and Canadian consumer tyre businesses and the US and Canadian commercial tyre businesses. Nishiyama will continue to report to Mark A. Emkes, chairman, CEO and president, BSAH. Reporting to Nishiyama under this new structure will be:
It’s a contentious issue – price versus established brand reputation and trusted quality. Virtually everyone in the industry holds an opinion on the matter, but according Tyre Bay Direct, when it comes to tyre changers and wheel balancers, an equipment supplier can only properly answer what is best if they offer machines from both camps.
“As one of the only companies that can offer the choice between competitive Chinese tyre equipment and premium specification European models, Tyre Bay Direct believe each option has its merits,” comments company managing director Leigh Stote. “There is no need for us to steer a customer to one make of machinery we offer as we are not limited by one range. We simply listen to what they require, competently advise what each machines’ capabilities and specifications are, the warranty, service and accessory packages available with each, and the customer can then make their own, informed decision to suit their requirements from our advice.”
Renault Retail Group, the sales arm of the French car manufacturer, has partnered with Wolfrace Tuning to offer customers styling products in all of its 22 UK showrooms. Although many models are covered by the new scheme, which will see customers offered the products when they buy new Renaults, the new Clio is particularly well catered for with both the standard and ‘Dynamique’ versions able to be “specced” with items like exhausts and wheels.
In addition to all the parts being made to Renault’s exacting standards, customers can choose to really personalise their car over and above the options list, without infringing their factory warranty.
Paul Alves, formerly one of Yokohama’s regional sales executives (most recently eastern zone manager), has ascended to the position of Tire Alliance Groupe president and CEO, replacing Daniel Beach, due to retire at YE, ending 12 years of stewardship. Beach was also a founder of the company in 1995.
TAG has 15 full member companies, with more than 500 independent retailers and 1,700 North and Central American retail outlets. It is perhaps unsurprising, with this amount of coverage, that Alves possesses an existing business relationship with TAG’s members and is “excited about joining TAG.” He promises to “grow our membership in strategic areas as well as continue to bring additional value to our programmes.”
Motorcycle tyre wholesale is a highly specialised job with relatively few players and only a handful of large operators. One of the leaders in the field is Birmingham-based national wholesaler, Bike Tyrestore, an assertion confirmed by the presentation to the company of the 2008 “Best Trade Service” award from a leading two-wheel trade magazine.
Company MD, Peter Smith, explains that the award recognised the best trade service across the whole of the motorcycle industry, not just amongst tyre suppliers, although, he says, “tyres are all we do.” Smith also explains that, unlike some in the marketplace, BTS is 100 per cent trade dedicated and has no retail arm.
This bike tyre wholesaler has always been at the forefront of the industry with a number of firsts, including a freephone customer service number, “YOUR Online Warehouse” where customers can view live stock and pricing data and place orders directly into the BTS Call Centre computers, and a customer loyalty rewards programme, aptly named “Moto-Vate.”
BTS acknowledges that relationships with leading tyre manufacturers are an important part of the package. The firm was not only the first UK importer of replacement product from the now market leader, Bridgestone – whose major UK trading partner they remain in the two wheel product sector – but has become additionally a crucial part of “Moto-Europe;” a forward-looking new business programme from Michelin.
As the catalyst between manufacturers and motorcycle dealers, BTS knows that it needs to excel in communication, offering a lively and daily-updated website, a weekly e-newsletter, and a field sales force available to call on customers nationwide.
Together with the leading manufacturers, notably Bridgestone, Michelin and Avon to date, BTS arranges free track day events where customers can enjoy the freedom of riding at major circuits, while trying out some of the latest rubber. The French tyre giant recently supplied their Pilot Power 2CT and Power Race free of charge to a group of more than 40 riders at Oulton Park.
Peter Smith told us that, “these days, motorcycle dealers hold very small tyre stocks, for reasons both economic and operational. The reality is that motorcycle tyre buyers plan the event, perhaps to coincide with a service appointment, so there is plenty of time to discuss riding style and tyre expectations beforehand. On the basis that the choice of quality motorcycle rubber is so vast that it’s impossible for a dealer or bike tyre specialist to stock everything, it makes sense to rely on the next day delivery offered by BTS as standard.”
Despatching at least 1,000 tyres every working day, BTS has a fully automated system designed to provide this next day service. Operator input is required to confirm an order, whether received on the freephone number or arriving online. The rest of the job is down to that system, which prompts for labels and picking notes, so that the half-dozen vehicles collecting on behalf of the onward carrier are always full within minutes.
Enthusiastic bikers
On the subject of BTS’s customer base, Smith knows that the vast majority of riders are enthusiasts and, even in difficult times for the economy, they will find a few pounds to spend on their pride and joy. So despite all the economical doom and gloom, BTS sales are well up on last year and never a day passes without a number of new accounts being opened, with most new customers approaching the company following personal recommendation.
One factor which can certainly be explained by economic downturn is the huge expansion in scooter tyre sales, as commuters move from four wheels to two. Rumour has it that in certain parts of the country, notably London, good used scooters cannot be found “for love nor money,” Smith quips.
“We’ve certainly bucked the trend this year”, he states. “With good growth in an otherwise stagnant market the only thing that holds us back is the weather; only farmers and the bike tyre industry are so completely weather-dependant. Ask me about prospects for 2009 and I can say that I am completely optimistic, confident in our relations with the main manufacturers and looking at an expanding customer base. But we do need a warm spring to get bikers out on the road, and a long hot summer to keep them there!”
Important online presence
“YOUR Online Warehouse” is a free of charge service, available to everyone with a BTS Trade
Account and accessed through the company’s website. The, if you will, e-nitiative has – according to the company – been taken up with enthusiasm by a large percentage of the customer base. Working on a number of levels, it allows the dealer or distributor to trade 24/7 at their own convenience and be able to make a sale quickly, with secure information as to what is in stock and how much it costs. In a year when rising costs have forced producers to raise prices several times, paper catalogues tend to become out of date within days of publication. “Not so, online!” states Smith.
He continues, “Our weekly e-newsletter is a powerful tool as is the database it gives us. Anything we need to make our customers aware of can be communicated instantly, and the website at
www.worldofbiketyres.com is a daily news section along with “Features”, including product reviews, pictures of some “World of Bike Tyres” people and events, video entertainment, a special offers area and a zone dedicated to reporting the action within Bridgestone Motorsport.
Popular brands
As for Bridgestone’s market share, Bike Tyrestore reports that Bridgestone continues to exercise domination of the UK two wheel replacement tyre business, but competition is heating up between other premium bands, Michelin having achieved remarkable growth during the last two years. As for more specialist customer interests, BTS says that MotoGP has largely driven the technological development of both these manufacturer’s products with “Transfer Technology” being the philosophy both in Japan and France. Dunlop has a large traditional following to compliment similarly high-tech rubber and, along with Pirelli/Metzeler, is a specific choice for a lot of “hypersports” riders. Avon and Continental are consistent selections, while Sava – the only manufacturer producing scooter tyres exclusively in Europe – has gone from strength to strength since appointing BTS as its sole UK Trade Distributor a couple of years ago. There are newer players too, not least Maxxis, which Smith predicts will be a force to be reckoned with before long.
So, faced with a sometimes confusing range of high performance products, many machine or style-specific, and customers who are knowledgeable and interested in the available products – unlike, Smith notes, the many car-owners for whom a tyre is a “distress purchase” – BTS’ Peter Smith offers a one-stop solution: “A motorcycle tyre wholesaler, which can provide advice and technical support, ideally run by bikers, which carries the stock and delivers the goods, while offering levels of customer service and return value, like “Moto-Vate” and our Track Event programme.”
A new software module developed by Cam Systems for its MIDaS program is designed to help retailers improve the efficiency and accuracy of their online sales. The MIDaS tyre retail and wholesale stock management system now handles somewhere in the region of £140 million worth of product transactions, equating to more than 3 million tyre each year. Using the same system, Cam says it has responded to growing market demand by developing a B2C (business to consumer) solution for website stock, pricing and order processing functions.
Typically, website stock and pricing details are entered manually using a spreadsheet system, which is extremely time intensive, prone to inaccuracies and needs to be repeated on a regular basis as pricing and stock details constantly change. The MIDaS B2C module makes that process redundant as it is fully integrated with the Cameo operating system, which allows it to set up and export product and price data direct to the website. This is a vastly more efficient and accurate process than a paper-based system and gives retailers complete control of data which appears online.
In 14 months of Peter Harries’ leadership, Grouptyre – the UK’s leading independent tyre wholesaler – enjoyed sales growth in excess of 15 per cent. Attempting to continue this period of growth is Grouptyre’s new MD, Karl Naylor (see page XX) who has worked as the company’s director of commercial operations since 2005. He and the company remain committed to supporting manufacturers and meeting the needs of independent retailers, national account customers and franchised dealerships by improving service levels and adding value throughout the supply chain.
Grouptyre, with its network of 13 members in 33 UK locations (including Northern Ireland), is convinced of the key role it plays within the industry, presenting the wholesaler as “a buffer to smooth availability peaks and troughs.” Since manufacturers produce in batches and cannot afford to hold all products in stock at all times for on-demand orders, they require an intermediary to ease stock congestion. In addition, retailers have neither the space nor the financial muscle to carry all suppliers’ products for on-demand orders. However they do require a readily available supply of the tyres they do not stock, along with a fast and frequent delivery service, to secure consumer sales.
As recent statistics released by TyreSafe testify, many motorists are ignoring their own safety and that of other road users by not checking the condition of the tyres on their vehicle. To help reverse this dangerous situation, in support of Tyre Safety Month all 31 Protyre outlets in the UK will be offering motorists a free five-point tyre safety check. This free offer can be taken advantage of during the entire campaign, which runs until October 31.
Internet based tyre management company TyreCheck has announced the launch of its Work Order Management Module, which will effectively reduce the overall cost of tyres on a fleet whilst also improving the fleets’ availability. By implementing this innovative module a tyre fitter will be able to carry out an inspection on a truck’s tyres, correct pressures and replace any damaged tyres. At the same time any tyre that will need re-grooving in the near future can also be recorded. All these tasks can be carried out both swiftly and efficiently without the use of paper and the results can be immediately available online for reference.
In recent years the online tyre market has swollen in size (as observed in other retailer sectors). Whilst the proportion of the total market controlled by this sector remains limited, the fact that the number of different e-tail platforms is continually proliferating means online sales could already account for as much as 3 per cent of the European replacement market. With this in mind, knowing more about how these businesses operate is of interest to everyone in the tyre trade.
The latest insight is that the average tyre offered for sale online costs consumers around £69.14, meaning the myth that ‘virtual’ margins are too thin to make business sense could be evaporating. However, the most commonly offered tyre online is characterised as a mid-range brand costing around £60. It seems making money online is all a question of business model.
Dermot Power, Graham Newton and Matthew Dunham, Business Restructuring partners at BDO Stoy Hayward, were appointed on 25 September as joint Administrators of Motor World Ltd. Motor World Ltd is one of the UK’s largest independent automotive car care retailers, trading from a chain of 237 retail units across the country. The Company also specialises in additional products including cycles and other leisure accessories.
As a result of a significant downturn in retail sales on the high street, 95 of the 237 retail units have been closed immediately with the loss of 300 jobs. The Administrators have however been successful in selling the remaining 142 units of the business to Pacific Retail Limited; a Company funded by the existing investors Bailey Capital Limited. This has resulted in saving approximately 500 jobs. The business trades from a head office in Huddersfield.
Goodyear Dunlop has appointed Robin Sharpe as its director of sales capability management EU – a newly created role based in Brussels. He will work closely with Hans Vrijsen, sales director consumer tires EU, and Jan-Piet Huylebroeck, director sales truck tires EU, as well as with country sales management teams.
Sharpe joined Goodyear Dunlop Tyres UK in 2006 as sales and marketing director truck tyres after a 22-year career with Procter & Gamble in a variety of sales and operational roles. At Goodyear Dunlop he led the team which embarked on the restructuring of the UK truck organisation and in recent months he has acted as interim retail director for the HiQ fast fit centre network.
Goodyear Dunlop’s decision to pursue a franchising programme for a number of HiQ servicing outlets met with so much interest from bidders that the company opted to extend the scheme to all its HiQ sites, split into 15 regional zones. Following this decision, Neil Burrows – the company’s retail director – left the company, while former HiQ retail director, Chris Kisby, successfully bid for the South Midlands, East Midlands and West Midlands zones. The company also announced that St Austell tyre trade expert, Justin Roberton would become the franchise-owner of three fast fit centres in Cornwall.
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