Tyres & Accessories October 2009
October's Tyres & Accessories issue contains features on the online tyre business and wholesaling. Subscribers, click more to read the e-magazine online.
News from the tyre wholesale sector
October's Tyres & Accessories issue contains features on the online tyre business and wholesaling. Subscribers, click more to read the e-magazine online.
“Brilliant, awesome, it was a trip you could never pay to organise for yourself,” was how Martin Thomas, owner of Halesworth Tyre and Exhaust in Halesworth, Suffolk, described a recent trip to the World Rally Championships. Thomas and his wife Lisa were VIP guests at the Rally of Spain (October 1-3) after winning the top prize in a national promotion organised by Grouptyre, the UK’s leading independent wholesaler, and premium tyre manufacturer Pirelli. The Grouptyre/Pirelli incentive ran from 1 May to 30 June. For every Pirelli car, van and 4×4 tyre that independent tyre retailers bought during the promotion period, they were credited with an entry into a draw, the top prize of which was the Spanish rally excursion.
Micheldever Tyres has appointed logistics services provider Wincanton Plc to set up a direct import and trunking solution for the business. This arrangement will see a portion of an existing Wincanton site in Kettering, Northamptonshire set aside as a ‘direct import centre’ for Micheldever. From here more than 50,000 tyres will be shipped to wholesale distribution centres throughout the UK, which in turn will supply 22 per cent of the national tyre market. According to Wincanton, the new solution will reduce lead-times onto site following arrival at the port plus reduce product movement and handling across the network.
Ever since the Aufine Group owned factory in Dongying, Shandong Province entered operation in 1986, it has specialised in truck tyres. Nevertheless, the company has considered broadening its range. As general manager David Sun explained during the CITExpo exhibition, Aufine – whose name was chosen due to its phonic similarity to the words “all fine” – has recently mulled over the idea of a passenger car tyre factory. According to Sun, Aufine calculates an RMB 700 million investment (£63.6 million) is required to establish a planned factory capable of producing five million passenger car tyres per year. These plans, admittedly, have been laid on ice indefinitely due to the global recession. If and when the Aufine Group finally presses ahead is a decision heavily dependent upon the future development of global markets, not least the US market. Should the decision be made to press ahead with the new factory, the company’s aim is to produce “high quality tyres in China,” David Sun emphasises.
After achieving sales of £43 million in full-year 2008 results, North Eastern Tyre & Exhausts (NETE) is on track to achieve a £52 million turnover in 2009. A significant part of this growth can be put down the company’s purchase of 15 HiQ centres late last year in a move that saw the company’s retail footprint grow from eight to 23 depots overnight.
The NETE-owned HiQ stores are now benefiting from a two-year programme of investment, refurbishment and development, with a £2 million rebuild of the Leeds store. Local news reports said the Leeds HiQ store will now “set the new industry standard for Fast Fit centres with a state of the art workshop and customer waiting environment” when it opens its doors to the public on 1 December.
Stapleton’s says that, despite the current economic climate, sales have been “performing well” over the past twelve months, reaching levels similar to those in 2008, and that it feels well-placed to take advantage of the current growth in the replacement tyre market. That the wholesaler has seen its private and exclusive brands – which include Primewell, Matador, Prestivo and Nexen – growing is perhaps unsurprising due to current market conditions, though Stapleton’s is keen to show that the programmes available alongside these labels are to some extent also responsible for their rise. “All of these ranges are offered with attractive dealer support packages to reward valued loyalty,” the company states. It also stocks all the major names.
Tyrespot has announced that al all of the company’s drivers “sailed through their level two NVQ” qualifications. Each member of staff successfully passed the seven modules on topics including contributing to effective working relationships; maintaining the safety and the security of the load, self and property; contributing to the provision of customer services; completing pre-journey and post-journey procedures; planning the route and timings for the delivery and collection of loads; transport goods and materials; and handling goods and materials. Congratulating them on their success, Tyrespot wholesale director Alan Tippin said he is “proud of every member of staff for passing these seven points.”
(Tire Review) TBC Corp. is taking on a 1.1 million-square-foot distribution near Charleston, South Carolina. Construction of the new DC, located in the Rockefeller Group Foreign Trade Zone/Charleston in Berkeley County, is expected to start by the end of this year, and is slated to open in 2010. “We are excited about the opportunity to consolidate a portion of our distribution network to a new and larger facility in the Charleston area,” said Erik Olsen, president and CEO of TBC Wholesale Group. “The infrastructure and location of the Port of Charleston complements our growth and will allow us to meet the growing demands of our customers.” TBC expects to bring “thousands of containers” through the Port of Charleston, according to reports. The new DC will reportedly add 100 jobs to the region.
Continued growth at Micheldever Group means the group has jumped to 109th place in the prestigious Sunday Times Top Track 250 list of the most successful mid-market companies. In the past two years the group has jumped by almost 100 places in the Sunday Times list with group sales reaching £259.3 million, up 16 per cent over the previous year. Annual turnover for 2009/10 is forecast to be over £283 million.
The league table, which is co-sponsored by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, ranks Britain’s biggest mid-market private companies by their latest sales figures, which range from £592 million to £153 million. In addition to retailers in the automotive business, companies span a wide range of industries from construction to IT and property. Micheldever Group is the only tyre industry player to be placed in this illustrious listing.
Commenting on the group’s performance Paul Fox chief executive said: “We are absolutely delighted to have accelerated up the Sunday Times Top Track 250 list. It is a reflection of the tremendous hard work of our dedicated team of people here at Micheldever set against a very difficult and challenging market. The investment we have made in warehousing, new retail outlets together with systems and procedures have put us at the top of the tyre distribution business.”
While the economic events of late-2008, carrying on to the present day saw the UK, along with most of the world, assume the default attitude of Dad’s Army’s Private Fraser (NB exclaiming, with wide, fatalistic eyes, “we’re all doomed!”), RH Claydon says that it has seen “healthy advances” in some segments, including agricultural products and tyres required for the Open Space Management Sector, sports complexes, golf courses, parks departments and local authority needs. The company has also announced that it is the sole UK supplier of Matador light and heavy truck tyres.
Less than 12 months ago NDI UK was operating as a regional wholesaler around its base in the West Midlands, but now its Danish headquarters – one of Scandinavia’s largest tyre and wheel distribution groups, Nordisk Daek Import A-S – has its eyes on a larger goal. Managing Director, Ian Smith states, “we are now concentrating on working even closer with our headquarter base in Denmark in order to encompass all market sectors ranging from small implement tyres up to larger earthmover designs offering a nationwide service throughout the UK.”
Kings Road Tyres has a newly-opened Liverpool (Widnes) location, offering customers better service in the North West of England. The company, one of the UK and Ireland’s largest independent tyre distributors, can offer the majority of its customers, either next day/two day delivery throughout the countries using its own fleet of vehicles, from its eight strategically located sales and distribution centres.
Based in Florida, Lucy's Tire Inc began life in 1985, specialising in the sale of industrial and OTR tyres to Central and South America and the Caribbean, but has now expanded its range to include truck, agricultural and high performance tyres and wheels, the last of which it distributes through its Falcon Tire tyre centres throughout its home state.
Family-owned tyre retail group, BA Bush & Son and its wholesale arm B.A.B. Distribution – a member of Grouptyre – has invested in a new, purpose-built retail centre in Spalding, South Lincolnshire. The fifteenth Bush Tyres retail outlet is located off the Peterborough to Boston road and is just a minute from Spalding town centre. The site is opposite the Springfields Shopping Outlet and Festival Gardens, which is one of Lincolnshire’s busiest shopping centres, incorporating over 60 stores selling famous fashion and homewares brands at discounted prices all year round and attracting in excess of 30,000 visitors a day. The store was opened on 21 September.
With a five acre site close to Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport in the UK and two warehouse facilities in Ireland, Kirkby Tyres and Wheels’ business is still growing in the aftermarket. The company says that, “we are finding that more and more customers are using mid-range brands such as Double Coin, which we are seeing strong demand for.” Kirkby offers a wide range of brands within this segment, such as Alliance, Malhotra, Protector and Petlas. The growth in the market for these brands has been such that the company has been able to employ an additional two sales people to cover East Anglia and North of England. The wholesaler is ISO 9001 accredited and can, in most areas, deliver products the next day.
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