Tire dealers depend on the tire brands they carry to deliver customers – retail or commercial. They are the key and, sometimes, only tool a dealer has to attract and keep customers. Tire marketers think their brands are great, including all of the pre- and post-sale service they provide. But just how do those brands perform?
For the 15th consecutive year, Tire Review asked North American tire dealers to rate the performance of the tire brands – consumer (passenger, performance and light truck/SUV) and commercial (medium truck) – they carry and sell.
Click here to see the 2007 Brands Study
Tire Review’s annual Tire Brand Study measures dealer opinions and perceptions about the brands they carry and sell. This Study examines both major (including associate) and private brands separately so that each group could be fairly and directly compared with each other.
Dealers were not permitted to comment on brands they did not carry, and consumers and end-users were not polled. The results only reflect the expressed opinions and perceptions of independent tire dealers.
Babcox Research conducted this Study for Tire Review, analyzing tire dealer responses from some 700 completed telephone surveys. Response samples were taken to assure the number of responses gathered was consistent with accepted industry brand marketshare figures. Limits were placed on the number of dealers
interviewed per geographic region, thereby restricting the impact of certain brands with strong distribution in one region or another.
A total of 1,463 specific brand mentions were collected for the Consumer Tire portion of the Study, and another 599 brand mentions were obtained for the Commercial Tire portion. It is interesting to note the number of Chinese tire brands that received mentions by dealers.
Dealers were asked to rate each brand of tires they carried on a 1 to 10 scale – 10 being highest – on a series of categories.
An aggregate overall score for each brand was calculated, averaging the results from each category. The top brands, plus ties, are shown in bold. Last year’s category winners are indicated with an asterisk.
Tire Review’s Brand Study results are available by contacting Bob Roberts, research manager, at 330-670-1234 ext. 252, or by e-mailing Bob at [email protected].
