With roughly 2,200 dealers in attendance, leaders of Bridgestone Americas shared recent successes and outlined goals for 2009 at the company’s dealer meeting in Chicago in September.

Despite the challenging economic landscape – one where Americans drove 53 billion fewer miles in the last seven months vs. last year – Bridgestone Americas has seen success in gaining brand awareness, which in turn benefits its dealers, said John Baratta, president of consumer replacement tire.

Through aggressive ad campaigns and sports marketing, the company has taken a major step toward meeting its goal of growing “Bridgestone brand awareness in North America over the next five years while maintaining our strong existing brand position for Firestone,” said Michael Fluck, brand marketing manager.

With Bridgestone being the official tire of the PGA Tour, NFL and NHL – and Firestone sponsoring the IndyCar series – more and more consumers are entering tire dealerships and asking for the tiremaker’s products without any steering from the counterperson, what is referred to as “unaided brand awareness,” Baratta explained. “If you can grow brand awareness and marketshare year over year when the economy is soft, that’s a big accomplishment.”

The meeting’s tagline, “Shift into High Gear,” embodied the course of action Bridgestone dealers need to follow in order to maximize exposure and sales, the company said. Baratta named seven “gears” needed for success: products, education, grassroots marketing, the right customers, business management systems, the right image and branding.

From the start, Baratta said the company is there to support dealers with an ever-increasing product lineup. In today’s market, there are nearly 2,400 SKUs – an increase of about 700 since 2006 – and Bridgestone has met this trend by adding 480 new SKUs in the past two years, Baratta said.

The company offers seminars, training, dealer support and advances in brand awareness to enable its dealers to follow their own, unique plans for the seven gears, he noted. “(The gears) all must operate in sync with each other. They must be constantly examined, maintained, repaired or sometimes replaced,” he said. “Get those seven gears working together and your dealership will move to a higher level of service and customer loyalty that will result in increased sales.”

Coming Soon
In order to continue Bridgestone America’s growth strategy, the company will launch a new product line, as well as a new, exclusive dealer program, in early 2009.

To meet consumer demands for environmentally-friendly products, Bridgestone will introduce the Ecopia line of tires next year. The Ecopia line – which has been rolled out in other global markets – targets optimized rolling resistance without sacrificing traction, especially wet traction, the company said.

“The Ecopia EP100 will be available in six sizes in 2009 with aggressive brand expansion planned for 2010,” said Tim Dunn, executive director of brand and supply chain marketing. “The Ecopia EP200 all-season tire for the North America market will come OE on the Toyota Prius.”

The Ecopia line will fall under the umbrella of “eco products,” a new classification for Bridgestone products that meet certain requirements in categories like CO2 emissions reductions, natural rubber content and rolling resistance. There are already several products that meet this classification, including Bridgestone’s Turanza with Serenity Technology, he said.

“In addition to the Turanza, we’re talking about over 100 sizes in various patterns that we will be designating as eco-products beginning Jan. 1,” Dunn noted.

The company is also rolling out a new, by-invitation-only program for its network of Bridgestone and Firestone dealers. The exclusive Five Star Certified Performance Retailer program is designed to place the “best of the best” dealers in a position to better compete with premium car dealerships by supplying them with education, certification, up-to-date equipment and ready access to products, Baratta said.

“The program is already being tested with some of our dealers and the results are good,” he said. “We’ll be introducing it on a larger scale by March 2009 at the latest.”