Magazine for the professional tire industry
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MTD December 2016 2016 SEMA Show Montrose Tire & Wheel sells and installs tires and wheels, and also repairs wheels. (e business doesn't perform auto service.) It serves customers who live within a couple miles of the dealership. So what would the customers of Montrose Tire & Wheel miss if the dealership disappeared? e answer is more than "tires." Customers wouldn't have mobility. ey wouldn't be able to express their personalities through their tire and wheel choices. ey'd miss out on the high speeds, the thrills, and the excitement the business delivers through wheels and tires. Flores wondered if the question is limited to products, or would it also extend to the service the business provides. "It absolutely extends to the service experience," Brown said. "When I talk about brand, am I just talking about somebody's logo or color? No. It's also the experience that you give. It's the product. It's the service that you do. It's your people and how they carry that out. It's all those pieces together." Creating these lists of benefits also helps focus on the competition, Brown said. If your list reveals answers that don't differentiate from the competition, there's a problem. At the same time, it's a way to zero in on emerging competitors. "A lot of the time if you're thinking about competitors, you're always thinking about someone who looks like you. But the competitor who messes up your industry or disrupts your business never looks like you. ey look like somebody else," Brown said. "So you can look at, 'who else can supply these same benefits?'" Stearns' and Brown's presentations were two of many educational sessions available to dealers during the 2016 SEMA Show. On the trade show floor in the Las Vegas Convention Center, dealers were immersed in thousands of products displayed in more than 2,300 exhibit booths. Here are some of the products that caught the aention of tire dealers, as well as Modern Tire Dealer's editors. Kenda Vezda UHP A/S Kenda USA's first entry in the ultra-high performance all-season segment is the Vezda UHP A/S. e tire's special silica com- pound combines summer lev- els of wet and dry performance. "It also is capable of driving in light snow conditions," said Dan Shavers, Kenda's chief engineer, tire engineering development. Both the compound and footprint shape were optimized for excellent tread wear, he added. e tread's four large cir- cumferential grooves limit hydroplaning and augment wet traction performance. A high void inside paern also helps with wet handling and traction performance. e tire is available in 43 W- and Y-rated sizes: four 16-inch, 14 17-inch, 12 18-inch, seven 19-inch, and six 20-inch. It was developed at the company's Kenda American Technical Center in Green, Ohio. Duraturn Travia M/T e Duraturn consumer tire lines are almost complete with Making a case for Chinese truck tires in the U.S. For the second straight year, Mary Xu, deputy chairman of the China Rubber Industry Association (CRIA), walked the floor of the Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) Show to campaign for Chinese tires in the USA. A year ago her trip followed a decision by the U.S. Department of Commerce and the International Trade Commission (ITC) to implement tariffs on consumer tires imported from China. In 2016, her SEMA Show visit collided with the ongo- ing investigations of tariffs on truck and bus tires from China. The CRIA is much like the Rubber Manufactur- ers Association in the U.S. There are more than 1,400 members who represent all aspects of the rubber industry, from the provid- ers of raw materials to the makers of rubber belts and other products. About 300 of the CRIA members are tire manufacturers, Xu said. "The Chinese tire manu- facturers did not hurt the U.S. producer," she said. The CRIA and its hired attorney, Max Schutzman, a New York lawyer who specializes in tariff and trade cases, point to the dis- senting opinion in the ITC's preliminary vote to continue the investigation of truck and bus tires imported from China. Two ITC members saw no indication that the U.S. tire industry was being harmed or threatened by truck and bus tires from China. "I know the union is very powerful," Xu said, referring to the United Steelworkers who initiated the complaint about Chinese truck tires. "It's not just price; it's political." Xu doesn't deny Chinese manufacturers will be hurt by tariffs, but said no matter what happens, the U.S. will still rely on tire shipments from China. The U.S. doesn't have enough truck tire production to be self-reliant. When manufacturers shift production from China to another country to sidestep the tariffs — and many have already done so — Xu said it creates another problem. "In the long run it's not good for the U.S. market because they have more and more competitors." Mary Xu said the real pain of tariffs on truck tires from China falls on the American consumer who is shopping for a low-cost option. A low void outside pattern on the Vezda UHP A/S max- imizes dry handling. 24