News from the tyre wholesale sector
Following a meeting with Olivier Gros, Michelin’s new head of two wheel tyres in UK, Bike Tyrestore is reminding dealers that there is less than a week left to place orders prior to Michelin price increase on 1 October. The French manufacturer’s two-wheel price increase will add 3.5 per cent to product prices. Wholesale representatives report that the Pilot Road and Pilot-Power are selling quickly as a result of buyers trying to beat the increase.
(Akron/Tire Review) Zisser Tire Wholesale presented its Lexani performance tyre line at last week’s China International Tire Expo (CITExpo). The St. Louis-based importer and wholesaler continues to seek dealers worldwide for the Lexani-brand tyre line.
Established in 1986, the last 20 years have seen Summit grow into an established specialist industrial tyre and wheel importer. The company offers a nationwide wholesale service where 72-hour delivery is available as standard using the firm’s own delivery vehicles wherever possible. Overnight and timed deliveries are also available.
Stapleton’s has launched Prestivo, a brand new range of tyres available exclusively in the UK through Stapleton’s. Positioned as a quality mid-range production company representatives say Prestivo is a high performance tyre that allows the driver to enjoy the thrills of driving with a comfortable ride. The range is available in two tread patterns, the Prestivo 2000, available now, and the Prestivo Sport, available later this year.
South African company Tiger Wheels Limited (TIW) reported a 40.4 per cent decline in earnings per share for the year ended June, online news sources have reported. The group reported a 6.7 per cent increase in revenue to 3.3 billion rand while operating income declined by 46.4 per cent. Profit for the year also went down from 157 million rand to just over 79 million.
(Akron/Tire Review) Red Cap Total Car Care, reportedly the largest tyre dealer and service centre dealer in the Middle East, has implemented a point-of-sale (POS) solution from TireWare Inc. across its chain of retail stores. Red Cap, headquartered in Saudi Arabia, is a division of the Tamimi Group.
Hankook Tyre UK Ltd has announced the appointment of three new regional sales managers. Andy Doherty has been appointed as regional sales manager for the North West. He has 18 Years experience in the tyre industry, working for 10 years as a commercial and mobile car tyre technician and eight years as sales manager for a number of national wholesalers.
On 18 July the US Tire Industry Association (TIA) announced its support of House Resolution 5632, after “much deliberation,” TIA has decided to support H. R. 5632. The TIA Government Affairs Committee was able to come to a consensus after weighing the pros and cons of the legislation, the association said in a statement. “We were very pleased to receive feedback and questions from our membership regarding H.R. 5632,” said TIA President, Bob Malerba. “It was extremely helpful to our Government Affairs Committee in making a decision on whether to support the bill.”
Amtel-Vredestein’s (AV) AV-TO retail subsidiary has announced that it is to buy Nizhny Novgorod-based motorfactor, Pigma, and tyre distributor Megashina. With over 10 years in the market, LLC Trade House Pigma (Pigma), is reportedly a dynamic company that sells more than 27,000 auto components from approximately 40 producers to over 1500 customers throughout Russia and CIS. Pigma also built a network of seven tyre service retail centres in Nizhny Novgorod – which it sold to Amtel-Vredestein in March 2006.
It’s been a busy year for STS Stapleton’s as the company overhauled its wholesale business but the fact remains that it is one of the largest wholesale distributors of passenger car tyres in the UK. Through its six distribution centres in Letchworth, Wakefield, Coatbridge, Bristol, Burton and Warrington, Stapleton’s carries a large and diverse stock of tyres.
Chief executive Kenji Murai described the intentions behind recent developments at Stapleton’s: “Everything we do is with our customers in mind and this goes for the whole business including internal communication channels, delivery targets and stock control. As a result we have improved our relationship with our customers over the past twelve months.”
(Akron/Tire Review) American Tire Distributors Inc. has agreed to purchase Minneapolis-based Samaritan Wholesale Tire Co., which covers eastern Minnesota and parts of western Wisconsin. Samaritan co-owner Jay Halvorson will join ATD to help manage the Minneapolis operation.
Online retailing has come of age and UK consumers are leading the way. Conservative calculations suggest UK e-shoppers bought some £6.9 billion worth of products online in 2005. This year IMRG, the professional body representing online retailers, expects sales to increase to around £30 billion because 45 per cent of shoppers are looking to increase their online spending this year. Despite this, government figures suggest that only 15 per cent of tyre related businesses are represented online. And the 2006 NTDA/Trend Tracker Tyre Wholesaler survey found that over half of respondents described the Internet as “not important” when it came to their part of the business. Tyres & Accessories spoke to Internet specialists from both inside and outside of the tyre trade and found out that fresh business is there for the taking.
(Akron/Tire Review) After weeks of review, TIA has decided to support the tyre fuel efficiency program bill (HR 5632) written by the RMA and recently passed by the House Energy Committee. In making the announcement, TIA said, “The TIA Government Affairs Committee was able to come to consensus after weighing the pros and cons of the legislation.” Separately, SEMA announced earlier this month that it would not support the bill, which calls for NHTSA to create a national tyre fuel efficiency consumer information program that would include a fuel efficiency rating system, requirements for providing such information to tire buyers, and a national consumer tire maintenance consumer education program.
Now in its fifth year of online tyre business, Delticom AG continues to grow. Last year the company exceeded the sales goals it set itself, registering about 128 million euros in annual sales. This represents a 60 per cent increase over the previous year, when the company’s sales amounted to 80 million euros.
Wholesale activities accounted for around 20 million of Delticom’s 2005 sales, while online retail sales totalled approximately 108 million euros. Sales growth was said to be “particularly robust” in Germany, France, Switzerland, Sweden and Great Britain. Delticom recently ‘opened’ a new bilingual online store in Canada, which will offer some 60 tyre brands and 10,600 SKUs.
“It has been a meteoric rise for us in Europe”, said the company’s, Tim Mahowald. “We have obviously been helped by the fluctuation in currency between the US dollar and the euro resulting in a consistent annual increase in Export sales since 2002. We are also one of the fastest growing high performance tyre wholesalers in the USA with annual sales exceeding $119 million. Our current inventory of over 150,000 UHP tyres offers a wide range of brand names. For the last four years Zisser has been the exclusive importer of the Wanli brand for the USA”.
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