This week we investigate the new Fleetrite.com, International’s groundbreaking new e-commerce portal that brings the inventories of more than 600 dealers and its PDC network into a single site. We also address the International Trade Commission ruling of dumping of Chinese van-type trailers and subassemblies into the U.S., market, touch on the open nomination period for two HDAW awards and then cover Successful Dealer Award finalist Rush Truck Centers and our upcoming award presentation next week.
Lucas: Hey, everyone. Lucas here for today’s TPS weekly news roundup. A lot of really exciting stuff to get to. I’m going to go ahead and get started.
I’m going to begin with International Trucks, which on Thursday introduced Fleetrite.com, which is its new revolutionary e-commerce system. I had the chance to speak with International about Fleetrite.com earlier in the week before it was announced, and I’m really impressed by what they’ve built here. International brought in a number of their dealers, creating a sort of a creation council more than a year ago to decide, ‘Okay, what do we want our e-commerce platform to be? How does it make the customer experience better? How does it drive up time? What are the things we need to do to make the best e-commerce portal possible?’ They started that a year ago. They’ve been working tirelessly since then.
The new product is amazing. It has inventory from over 600 International and IC bus dealers. It has all International PDC product available. You can go in, you can search by your local dealer, you can search across the PDC network, you can search the entirety of the online network. It has pricing, it has availability, it has all kinds of specs and product attributes. International saying they will continue to enhance product attributes and continue to add product lines, add features moving forward. But the site is live as of Thursday morning, and International’s really excited about it. If you didn’t check out our story, be sure to do that and check out the website. I think it’ll really be a boon for the International dealer network and for the international parts space.
Other stories this week. The International Trade Commission (ITC) announcing that its sided on behalf of the U.S. domestic trailer manufacturers saying that the U.S. trailer industry has been ‘materially injured’ by the imports of van type trailers and sub-assemblies from China. This means duties will be coming on Chinese product that [are] being shipped into the United States. Those duties should be announced here fairly soon. The American Trailer Manufacturers Coalition, which includes Stoughton, Wabash and Great Dane, spoke out on behalf of the ruling. They were excited for it. They said it was necessary to create equality across the trailer space. So, check that story out.
Also Heavy Duty Aftermarket Week (HDAW), which is coming in January. Registration’s out now if you haven’t done that. They are seeking nominations for the Heavy Duty Hall of Fame Award and the Women in Leadership Award. This is the first time they’ve accepted open nominations for these two awards. So, if you know someone who you think deserves to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, or you know a woman who is in leadership in the industry and you think she deserves recognition, be sure to nominate someone for those two awards. You can find the links for both on the story on our website. Nominations are being accepted until Nov. 11.
And then lastly, our Successful Dealer Award program. We are in the final days. The winner of the Successful Dealer Award will be announced on Tuesday evening in a private reception in Nashville. We ran our fifth and final finalist profile this week of Rush Truck Centers. If you didn’t check that out, please be sure to do so. Our other finalists, California Truck Centers, Excel Truck Group, Kenworth of Pennsylvania, and Kenworth Sales Company. Those profiles also available on the website as our little vignette videos about all the businesses. Be sure to check those stories out. As soon as that winner is announced on Tuesday, that story will go live. You’ll see it next Wednesday.
Everything else we’ve talked about this week, available on the website, available on our social media. Be sure to like and subscribe to these videos so you get them each week. Be sure to like and subscribe to our social pages. Be sure to be subscribed to our newsletter so you don’t miss any of this news. Have a great weekend. We will see you next week. Thanks everyone. Bye.
