If expanding your tire business is the ultimate goal, you might be looking for inspiration from other tire dealers who have done it, and succeeded. Modern Tire Dealer’s 2015 Tire Dealer of the Year Ricky Benton has more than quadrupled the number of stores in the Black’s Tire Service Inc. chain in the 19 years he’s owned the business.
Employees credit him with being a smart businessman with a good eye. He spots inefficiencies, invests in equipment and renovations when it improves business, and he likes to teach employees from the ground up. (Read all about Benton in MTD’s September cover story: MTD’s 2015 Tire Dealer of the Year Ricky Benton: ‘It’s all good.’)
Benton employs 525 people in the Carolinas. Yet, he insists not a single one of those people works for him.
“Nobody works for me,” says Benton. “They work with me as a team. I say that and I mean that.”
And that’s not just some fluffy statement. The 60-year-old knows his people, and introduces them not just by name, but also talks about how long they’ve worked with him, where they grew up, and how far they live from his home.
Benton likes to think of himself as “just one of the guys.”
Read more here: No one works for Ricky Benton.
