From the tire buyer’s perspective

What you can do to sell more tires to broke, busy or beleaguered customers

By: Kymberli Hagelberg

People may be driving around on them longer and longer these days, but at some point, it’s certain that every driver in your city will buy a set of new tires — from someone. The market has become so competitive, however, that need alone does not guarantee customers will show up at your door with their wallets open.

You’ve got competition in strange places. Tires of virtually every brand and technical specification are available beyond your shelves at the local superstore, right along with the tube socks and the rutabagas. Buyers also shop the Web, and often come away with price breaks steeper than you can offer.

The economy isn’t cooperating either. Since the 2007 recession, the United States Department of Commerce says your customers are spending 16% less on auto parts, tires included.

It’s a fairly dismal reality check, but Modern Tire Dealer estimates that this year, Americans will spend somewhere around $20 billion replacing their tires. So market share is there for the taking.

I’ve spent the last week checking out what you’ve got to offer, and I’ve come away with a few observations that may help you make or save the next sale.

Because here’s the thing: Buying tires is nothing like buying tube socks or rutabagas. It’s a considerable expense for a highly technical product. Customers who trust their rush hour battle and children’s welfare to tires will happily pay a little extra for what only you can offer them: the benefit of your expertise and the value of your reputation for trust.

In my opinion, there are plenty of things most of you are doing well — and some things that could use a little tweaking. Good examples will be identified and credited. Horrible examples will remain nameless.

Maybe your customer spends every weekend tracking his or her Toyota Sequoia through the muck and yuck at the nearest trail or camp site. On the other hand, maybe she’s a mild-mannered motorist who chose her Lincoln Navigator because it made her feel safe to drive something taller than the average NBA guard — but it’s the same SUV her son uses to break land speed records and impress his high school friends with hairpin turns.

It’s possible the guy driving the Subaru Outback has a lead foot and a short attention span. What he needs for his daily commute is a set of tires that will stop somewhere short of a four-car pileup.

The point of all this is simple: You really can’t judge an off-roader by her manicure, or the needs of a commuter by his tie.

Karen Miles is co-owner of Barberton Tire and Auto Service Inc., a small independent dealer that caters to local businesses and blue-collar customers hit hard by layoffs and plant closings. Miles and her husband, Butch, took over the business in 2006.

He’s a technician; she is the tire expert and minds the front of the store. When it comes to customers, Karen Miles diagnoses them like the Navy medical corpsman she was for four years.

“Anymore, what rolls in here has been driven right down to the wear indicator,” Miles says. “The first thing I always ask is what brand and what type of mileage they’re looking to get out of the tire. Even if an economy tire is what they are looking for, I try to steer them away from low mileage tires. Most of the time, I can get them a higher rated tire for just a few dollars more.

“If a tire is rated for a specific mileage, I usually explain that those ratings are under perfect driving conditions, tire pressure, alignment, etc., and not to expect that exact amount. In the long run, there are more affordable deals, and it’s my job to find them for you.”

Miles says tire sales represent almost 30% of her business. Her biggest selling brands are Cooper, Uniroyal and BFGoodrich. Turnaround time for installation is typically next day.

The tires she stocks are the result of her own matter-of-fact, marketing research. “I keep track of what brands have resulted in the fewest complaints with the highest of praises,” she says. “That’s what I sell.”

Technical bells and whistles

Asymmetric or directional tread? Winter or all-season? A hard or soft rubber compound?

There’s another catch here. The time when you could just tell a customer what to buy is long gone. They want your recommendations, but they’ll expect you to tell them why they need what you’re selling.

That can be a tall order. Over the last few years, most independent tire dealers see fewer factory reps who visit them less often, and, according to the dealers with whom I talked, they receive fewer point-of-purchase materials from manufacturers. At exactly the same time that your brands are cutting back on marketing support, your customers have become more educated.

None of this matters. You still have to explain the science of tires to prospective buyers who have just enough knowledge to be dangerous.

Some of you are falling down on the job.

Here’s the answer I got three times (from three different dealers) when I asked which asymmetrical tread design would be best for my driver in the Lincoln Navigator and why. (Remember, she’s the woman tenuously driving a sky scraper on wheels, the same vehicle her son likes to hot rod with his friends):

“Most people only know tires are black and round. They buy what we tell them they need.”

It’s hard to know why some of you aren’t bothering to explain why the technology works, even when you’re asked. As a reporter, that’s a missed opportunity — and it gives me a fairly sensational detail to report for my story. As a customer potentially ready to fork over $500 to$1,200 for a new set of tires, it would just annoy me, and I’d move on to the next store.

As you would expect, company-owned tire stores have the most resources. The Goodyear company-owned store inside Summit Mall in Fairlawn, Ohio — a suburb of Akron a short drive from Goodyear’s corporate headquarters — is a good example. Floor-to-ceiling wall displays touted the benefits of the Fortera brand’s triple-tread design and the durability and quiet of Goodyear’s all-season workhorse brand, the Wrangler ST. A kiosk in the middle of the tire center lobby was filled with cards explaining the strengths and benefits of each brand.

Randy Shapiro, 23, has been at the Goodyear store for five years. He was part of the largest staff I encountered: five salespeople and 15 techs. Shapiro and his coworkers attended Goodyear’s four-day boot camp, and their tire knowledge is regularly tested online.