With tires making up a significant portion of a fleet’s cost, a bit of outside advice can mean a great deal of savings in the long run. One great place to start looking for advice is with a commercial tire dealer.

“Commercial servicing dealers are experts at commercial tires and are a valuable resource for fleets to use to help with lowering the cost of ownership of tire program costs,” says Gary Schroeder, executive director of the global truck and bus business for Cooper Tire and Rubber.

“It is rare for a fleet to deal only with manufacturers due to a fleet’s needs such as tire delivery, mounting, roadside service, etc.,” says Michelin North America’s Nate Kirian. “The best relationships are three-way relationships where the manufacturer brings value in providing top quality products, information, pricing and a consistent nationwide network of service providers that individually deliver excellent service to fleets.”

Kirian also adds that Michelin offers a program for small fleets and owner/operators to join the Michelin Advantage National Account Program, which provides the same benefits to smaller operations.

Fleet Equipment took our own advice to heart and turned to our sister publication Tire Review, which commissions Marketplace Insights to perform an annual survey of tire dealers charting their opinions and perception of commercial tire brands and product traits.

The survey was completed over 1,500 phone interviews with tire dealers, asking them to rank the best brands in a variety of categories, which was converted into a ten-point scale, with 10 being the best possible score, as you can see in the graphs below. Overall, 2018 saw an up-tick in scores in most areas. After results were somewhat down in the 2017 survey, most brands made at least a small rebound. A few made major jumps, especially in fuel efficiency and technical support.

You can view some of the survey results below.