Belle Tire opened a new store in Kokomo, Indiana this past weekend, marking it as the 100th store under the Belle Tire franchise.
The new Kokomo store — located at 2333 E. Markland Ave. — has 22 employees, with 20 of them hired locally, according to the Kokomo Tribune.
Belle Tire President Don Barnes III told Tire Review that the company plans to open 11 stores in 2018, with three in Michigan and eight in Indiana. He said the company’s focus is on the greater Indianapolis area. Over the next 18 months, Belle Tire plans to reach a total of 20 stores in the Indy area with each store having 20 new employees.
“It’s (the area) contiguous to where we have an existing footprint,” Barnes told Tire Review the new Belle Tire locations planned in a recent interview. “We have [three] stores in South Bend as well as [four] in Michigan City, and we built three stores in Ft. Wayne, so the next contiguous market is the greater Indianapolis market.”
Over the next five years, the company expects to build up to 25 stores, Barnes said. He mentioned possible locations to expand include Chicago and Louisville.
For its grand opening, Belle Tire’s Kokomo location is offering a promotion of up to $100 off any set of four tires and an additional $50 off when a customer spends $250 on auto services.
Belle Tire, a Michigan-based family-owned tire retailer founded in 1922, offers tires and a variety of automotive repair services ranging from brakes, alignments, batteries, shocks and struts, auto glass repair and replacement, exhaust system repairs and oil changes.
