The Hindu Business Line : Goodyear's shop-in-shops

To garner a larger pie of the lucrative replacement market, Goodyear India has announced plans to expand its dealer network. The company is to introduce its internationally acclaimed shop-in-shop sales outlets in India.

The company said that it would open 300 international and multi-brand format exclusive shop-in-shop outlets by 2008 at a total cost of Rs 50 crore.

These stores would offer the customer a wider choice across various brands. All the new shop-in-shop outlets will sport a similar frontage, layout and colour theme and they will attempt to offer more than just tyres. Besides wheel alignment and balancing, the new format stores will give advise on tyre maintenance and offer accessories such as alloy wheels and car-care products — perfumes, car wash, and so on.

The company said that it has entered into tie-ups with manufacturers of car-care products for supplying these accessories. Earlier this week, the company announced the opening of six new retail outlets in Chennai.

Goodyear India plans to ramp up its new shop-in-shop outlets by opening 12-15 stores in the northern, southern and western regions and 3-5 stores in the east. The company, which already has 16 showrooms in Chennai, plans to open 12 new stores by the end of 2008.

The tyre manufacturer will be increasing the capacity of its Aurangabad facility, which manufactures radial tyres for cars. It plans to more than double its car radials capacity, at a cost of Rs 80 crore, to about 10,000 units per day by 2008.

Goodyear expects all cars made in India to roll out on radial tyres by 2008. With increasing awareness amongst customers and with a bigger base of vehicles on the road, the company is hoping to cash in on customers looking for good quality replacement tyres, the need for which is basically because of tyre wear and upsizing.

S Muralidhar

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