“Every time that phone rings, that’s our family. Every time a customer is sitting in our waiting area, that’s our family. Who doesn’t love their family?” With that question, Ricky Benton kicked off Black’s Tire Service Inc.’s annual meeting, which is taking place this weekend in Myrtle Beach, S.C.
Hundreds of Black’s Tire employees – whom Benton also counts as members of his extended family – will cycle through info sessions covering sales techniques, store management and a variety of other topics during the event, which is titled "Vision 2020: Black's to the Future."
That includes the dealership's wholesale teams, "who are training to be able to better serve our wholesale partner-dealers," said Rick Benton, who runs Black's Tire's wholesale business. "We partner with dealers and families, just like our own, to help each other and make a difference."
“Nobody in the tire and automotive business within our footprint, the Carolinas, has what we have,” Ryan Benton, who heads up the dealership's retail division, told attendees.
Black's Tire had an outstanding 2019, according to Ryan. The company added two retail stores – one in Myrtle Beach and another in Monroe, N.C. – to its footprint. And it is making major investments in its wholesale-distribution center network.
Black's Tire will continue to reinvest in its operations, Ryan told MTD. “We feel that’s necessary. We’re investing in employee training. We’re continuing to invest in store equipment and our trucks. We have plans to remodel some older stores.”
Recent overhauls of the dealership's point-of-sale and accounting systems should bear fruit, as well. “We’re counting on those things to make us more productive,” he noted.
"The world is changing," he told attendees. "But if we change with it, we'll grow."
