Why car dealers can’t afford to overlook tire sales – David Boyle | CEO of TraXtion

Welcome to another edition of Inside Automotive on the CBT Automotive Network. Tires are essential in everyday life, whether you’re a car dealer or a consumer. So, as many dealership service departments look for ways to be more efficient and profitable, we wanted to discuss TraXtion‘s solutions with Dave Boyle, the President and Chief Executive Officer. We’ll also get David’s perspective on the EV revolution and what dealerships are doing to prepare for it.

TraXtion is s a software-driven technology company that is revolutionizing the $30 billion tire and tire maintenance services industry. The whole reason behind selling tires is retention, says Boyle. When looking at a typical car dealer or OE’s retention, around the 30,000-mile mark is when retention drops dramatically. It takes just about the same mileage for the first set of tires to wear out, and because most consumers don’t view dealers as a source for tires, they start getting work done in the aftermarket. Then car dealers begin spending lots of money trying to win those customers back.

“If you capture that first tire sale, your retention numbers go up, you flatten the waterfall out a little bit. And the retention numbers go up dramatically. And the end result, you have a much better long-term retention, and you’ll sell more vehicles as a result,” says Boyle.

Boyle believes there is tremendous value in customer retention, and it can all start with selling tires. He explains that when TraXtion customers sell more tires, they sell a lot more other service work like alignments.

It starts with capturing the opportunity. For over ten years, TraXtion has developed and pioneered sophisticated technology that scans tires and automatically sends a text message report directly to the customer’s smartphone. The text message also initiates a dialogue with the customer. 

They are more likely to trust a data-backed analysis of their tires than a service advisor. While TraXtion’s software empowers consumers, it also adds layers of reporting and measurements for car dealers to monitor.

TraXtion also keeps an eye on the emerging EV market and how it might permanently change service drives across the country. Many services, like oil changes, will stop once electric cars grow. However, Boyle says the good news is that one of the weak spots of an EV is the tire. EV owners are going through tires much faster. Tesla published data that showed 23 service visits for tires over a 400,000-mile lifespan for one of their test vehicles.

“When we started this company, our focus was on helping dealers sell more tires. We knew it would go and have an impact on retention…Obviously, tires are still a big part of what we do, but what we learned along the way is that our system not only scans the tire for wear, but it also scans the tire for an alignment,” says Boyle. “And what we found was that there’s even a bigger opportunity with alignments.”

To learn more about TraXtion, visit traxtion.com, or schedule a demo here.

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