Navistar announced that it now has more than 100 EV authorized dealer locations. The OEM says it will have more than 30% of its dealer locations ready to support the sale and service of both International and IC Bus EVs, across 41 states and seven of 10 Canadian provinces. 

To be EV authorized, Navistar says dealers must:

• Provide a sales plan and resources to support the customer through the planning and delivery phases of their EV journey;
• Invest in technician training to provide timely maintenance and repairs; and
• Invest in service equipment including lifts, tools and chargers to ensure dealers are fully prepared to diagnose all aspects of EVs and keep customer vehicles on the road.

Navistar says it has a dedicated Zero Emissions team, following a three-step consultative approach to help customers more easily transition to EVs. Those steps are:

• Consulting: Understanding concerns, motivations to adopt EVs and discuss both short- and long-term plans. This allows Navistar to help craft an adoption roadmap which can include route and range analysis, grant funding and charging and infrastructure planning.
• Charging and Infrastructure: Understanding power needs, assisting the customer in making the appropriate charging hardware decisions based on their specific routes and application, and future-proofing operations by looking at the customer’s long term EV goals. Navistar and its partners can support customers in the design and build out of infrastructure and charging.
• Customer Onboarding: Coordination of truck and body build timing, charging and infrastructure build as well as customer, driver and other training to ensure that when the vehicle arrives, it can be integrated into customers’ operations with minimal disruption.

“We see the future of commercial transportation being more and more battery electric in certain applications,” said Rick Otten, president of Cumberland, an International and IC Bus dealer with nine locations across Tennessee and Florida. “We want to be ahead of the curve to best serve our customers and provide a flawless customer service experience for all the vehicles we offer, either diesel, electric or other fuel options by application as a bridge to potentially electric as a solution. We are future-proofing our business and educating ourselves so that we can be trusted advisors to our truck and bus customers in their journeys to sustainable operations, regardless of where they are in that journey now.” 

For more information about how Navistar supports customers through the consulting process, check out the EV Road Map Podcast:

• Interested in commercial EVs? Here’s how to pick a partner
• Conversations that lead fleets down EV roads
• Charging into medium- and heavy-duty EV infrastructure challenges
• Deploy! Here’s what makes a successful EV transition
• EV infrastructure: Engage early and know your energy needs
• A guide to EV funding and infrastructure grants