They may only make up 9.5% of the replacement consumer tire sales channel in the United States, but car manufacturers and their dealers continue to invest in their tire programs.
I recently had an opportunity to discuss Ford Motor Co.’s Quick Lane Tire & Auto Center operation with Doug Danstrom, Ford’s director of service performance. Ford has two formats that operate under the Quick Lane banner: Quick Lane Tire & Auto Center, which has around 800 locations, and Quick Lane Express Service, which includes 900 locations.
Quick Lane Tire & Auto Center locations “can be (located) on or off” a Ford dealership’s main property, while “Quick Lane Express is primarily an in-bay program to help (dealers) with throughput,” Danstrom told me.
Together, the formats provide “a strategic advantage for us. Quick Lane has been going for over 20 years at this point. It’s a mature program. We feel it helps us with service retention. That’s probably the number-one thing most of the (vehicle) OEMs work on with their dealers. How can we retain service business?
“We think the biggest defection point where we lose customers is oil changes and we think tires are the second area where they jump,” said Danstrom. “And when they jump, they’re probably less likely to come back to the (car) dealership for maintenance services. Our goal has been to attack those deflection points — both in the offerings we have and the time it takes to do those services.”
Ford hasn’t established a target turnaround time for tire replacement at Quick Lane facilities, “but we definitely track what we call key-to-key metrics on oil services and tire rotations. Most Ford dealers and Quick Lanes (offer) something called ‘the works package,’ which is a multi point inspection, as well as tire rotation and an oil change — all combined — and we have the goal to (do that) in less than one hour.”
Like most independent tire dealerships, Quick Lane offers tires at different price points. When customers bring in their vehicles for first tire replacement, “we have a strategy of offering the OE tire fitment, especially if the customer likes the way the vehicle rides or likes the life they got out of their tires. In many cases, it’s a ‘best-better-good’ offering.”
As vehicles age, “there are different price points,” said Danstrom. “We find customers may move away from that OE fitment and go toward” less-expensive tires. Quick Lane locations also sell tires for electric vehicle (EV) applications, Danstrom told me. “Any tire that’s sold OE on the vehicle when it leaves the factory floor, we have that fitment available for our customers.
"In the case of EVs, we know there aren’t as many parts in a lot of EVs, so we feel we have to be good at the tire side of EVs. It’s still a small piece of what we do.”
Tire supply is never an issue at Quick Lane locations, according to Danstrom. “Our dealers stock x number of tires and in most cases, have relationships with distributors who can get them tires two or three times a day in most markets. Because most of our vehicles are Fords — not all — we have a pretty good feel for what in each dealer’s protected area are the vehicles that will be coming in and how many are out there.”
Danstrom said that “along with growing the (Quick Lane) program, we’ve invested a lot in additional coaches and training the past couple of years. That’s a lot of in-dealership time on a monthly basis to work with (service) advisors” on the process of selling tires, with a focus on product education and presentation skills.
Ford also is investing in the technology offered at Quick Lane locations. “We’ve worked hard to connect Hunter drive-over tire (devices) and alignment machines — building those right in to connect with our tire selling tools to make it easier for our advisors to present offerings very quickly to our customers.”
Danstrom says the company looks at Quick Lane and the services offered there as being complementary to Ford dealerships.
“Most dealers who operate Quick Lanes...that portion of their business is where they do the lion’s share of their light repair work and maintenance. Then at their main shops, they’re doing warranties and some of their larger repairs.”
Independent tire dealerships remain the dominant replacement consumer tire sales channel in the U.S. with 67% share of the market, according to MTD’s recently published Facts Issue. This isn’t going to change. (In fact, I believe that percentage will increase.) However, auto dealerships will remain formidable competitors.
Questions? Comments? Contact me at [email protected].
