Ricky Benton, the owner and president of Black’s Tire Service Inc., is Modern Tire Dealer’s 23rd Tire Dealer of the Year.
Benton helped the founder of Black’s Tire grow from a single store in Whiteville, N.C. to eight stores by the time Benton bought the dealership in 1996. Since then, he’s added 28 more retail outlets (Black’s Tire & Auto Service), a commercial tire division (BTS Commercial), a tire wholesaling and equipment distribution division (BTS Tire and Wheel Distributors), a retread shop (Carolina Retread) and a racing business (Ricky Benton Racing Enterprises.)
Black’s Tire is tied for 30th on the Modern Tire Dealer 100 list of top independent tire dealers in the U.S., and holds the No. 23 spot on the MTD list of top commercial tire dealers.
Benton, 60, is a hands-on tire dealer who prefers to spend his days in the shop rather than sitting behind a desk. His 525 employees know him as a man who gets his hands dirty, and who will help a customer himself if the other workers are busy.
“The thing about it is you don’t have to be the biggest. You’ve just got to try to be the best. And the best is completely by service,” Benton says.
To read MTD’s full profile on Benton, available in the September issue, please see: ‘It’s all good.’
Share your congratulations with Benton and Black's Tire on the Modern Tire Dealer Facebook page, or on Twitter. Use the hashtag #TDOY.
