Is it possible for a motorist to spend over $500 on a complete brake repair and still not have their vehicle stop as well as it is capable? While brakes are a main part in stopping a vehicle effectively, other components, such as tires, shocks and struts, are often overlooked. With that in mind, are service dealers maintaining motorists' vehicles as well as they could be? Most vehicles manufactured today are engineered to perform in excess of 160,000 miles. Are service dealers maintaining the vehicles to ensure a long life, or are they simply repairing what the motorist requests them to repair, and sending the vehicle back on the road?
Statistics show that our highways are carrying an increasing number of vehicles and that both the average age, as well as the number of miles driven per vehicle, is increasing. This should be leading to an increase in the number of service opportunities. The Car Care Council tells us that the amount of unperformed vehicle maintenance and repair has grown to over $60 billion per year. Based on the Automotive Aftermarket Industry Association figure of 167,000 service dealers in the United States, that calculates out to be approximately $6,900 per service provider, per week, or on average over $700 per day, per technician. Lost sales and lost opportunities have an impact on all of us.
Ride control is one of the main areas affected by unperformed maintenance. We know that 86% of all vehicles at the scrap yard are equipped with the original equipment shocks or struts.
While most service technicians do an excellent job replacing defective or broken parts, their ability to identify and replace worn parts could be enhanced by advanced training. Worn parts are often overlooked simply because the service technicians do not know how to identify them. By missing out on replacing worn parts, service dealers are losing the opportunity to ensure that their customers' vehicles are performing up to its capabilities. As a result, none of us are getting the number of the ride control sales we should be, and even more importantly, the needs of the motorist are not being met.
Other ride control manufacturers have not been successful in offering a workable solution to unperformed maintenance, and have begun diversifying their product lines to include products that are much more easily identified to need replacing. At KYB, we view unperformed maintenance as a fantastic opportunity for our distributors and service centers. To make the most of this opportunity we have developed an initiative called Ride Control Solutions from KYBTM. This initiative has been designed to assist the service center in identifying worn ride control units. It also offers service writers the tools to effectively and ethically communicate, with their customers, the need for replacement ride control units.
By actively developing partnerships with our distributors, creating programs to accurately identify the needs of the service dealer and by increasing our service level in the field, KYB believes that we can effectively combat the increasing problem of unperformed maintenance. It should be the goal of our entire industry to ensure that each motorist achieves the maximum life from their vehicle. By using KYB aftermarket specific engineered technology and the tools gained through Ride Control Solutions from KYBTM, KYB believes that we can assist service dealers in achieving just that.
If you see unperformed maintenance as an opportunity and would like more information regarding Ride Control Solutions from KYBTM, please contact your KYB representative.