Tom White and TJ White of Tire Source had been looking for a new warehouse location for some time when a unique opportunity fell into their lap.
Two of the six-location dealership’s vendors are headquartered within the same plaza in North Canton, Ohio.
At an open house event for one of the companies, Tom, the owner of Tire Source, and TJ, Tire Source’s general manager, voiced the need for a warehouse space.
They were pointed to the empty office space at the end of the plaza that had just gone vacant and was on the market.
Tom and TJ decided to “kill two birds with one stone,” according to Tom, by turning the space into corporate offices and a warehouse.
The father and son duo began renovating space the day they returned from the 2023 SEMA Show last November.
Warehouse side
Tom and TJ noticed a need for a warehouse location after realizing a common problem at their stores: having to halt production whenever a shipment of tires came in as everyone had to unload the tires and stock them.
“We would be in our busy time at the end of a business quarter and ... we would have to essentially shut down the stores to bring those tires in and unload them,” says TJ.
The now-renovated space has four offices in its front half: one for Tom; one for TJ; one for Patrick Stuhldreher, Tire Source’s chief operating officer; and one for Mary White, the dealership’s controller.
The back of the facility can store nearly 1,500 tires at once. It has five loading docks and extra space for additional storage. (The warehouse received its first shipment of tires in January 2024.)
Tom says that the new warehouse will not completely replace the need to stock units at the Tire Source’s retail locations.
“Our stores still receive multiple daily deliveries from places like TireHub and U.S. AutoForce,” adds TJ.
“This new warehouse is more to get a bunch of one size of tires at the same time or get a better buy by bringing in one type of tire all at once. We can bring semis in here and we can take 700 to 800 tires at one time and it won’t shut down production at our stores like before,” he explains.
It also allows for bigger shipments to get unloaded at once. Most Tire Source stores can only take around 200 tires at a time.
TJ and Tom now can send shipments of tires to restock their stores, as needed.
The corporate side
“We were also worried about having a new warehouse and having to staff it, but making this our corporate headquarters kind of resolved that problem,” says Tom.
TJ says having the top officers of Tire Source under one roof helps the dealership’s leadership team make decisions faster.
“We were worried how we would manage the stores when we weren’t there, but it’s taught us how to communicate better and let our team be more independent,” he notes.
“We figured it out through trial and error and took some initiative on putting video phones in all store managers’ offices so we can still have those ‘face-to-face' meetings with them.”
