Retail reality: A tire dealer adjusts to online tire buyers and sellers

摘要

Like many brick-and-mortar retailers, Ken Sylvester of United Tire and Service LLC is participating in online sales. But instead of creating an e-commerce website for his Philadelphia-area tire stores, he is dipping into the pool of consumers browsing other companies' tire shopping websites. Online tire sales make up a small portion of the daily tire transactions across the 18 stores that are part of United Tire and Service, a group of dealers who operate independent tire shops in Pennsylvania's Delaware Valley.