Becoming a Tyre Sealant Distributor – what you need to know
One of the many fanciful aspects of other tyre sealant websites is the hyperbole that they use when claiming to be major international vendors. Can you really believe them? Er, usually no…
Flags of convenience
If you are suspicious about such claims, you are right to be. Whenever we have looked into the claimed coverage of competitors, the information has proved to be exaggerated, out of date or just plain wrong. And that is in the case of sites that list their distributors (which are in the minority). In most cases, a country flag is shown or you are invited to click on an area of the world to find your outlet – only to be redirected to the manufacturer’s email or phone number. In other words, they want to be in that country or region – but they are not…
When researching the puncture sealant market around us, we at OKO have been shocked to see just how ‘distributor-unfriendly’ many companies are. They demand money upfront for the dubious rights to represent them in a country: they provide no meaningful product or marketing support: they appoint someone and then sell over their heads, or take over directly once the business has grown: and often they impose such stiff targets that they can fire a company at will if it suits them. Small wonder that so many operations make one purchase of stock and never repeat the purchase.
The checklist for new tyre sealant distributors
If you have considered working with another sealant company, here is an OKO checklist to enable you to avoid problems. If the answer is ‘yes’ to any of these questions, then walk away –
- Do they only ever price in their home currency?
- Is there always an additional charge for shipping?
- Must you pay for their printed marketing material (if any)?
- Do they insist on a high minimum initial order, with no allowance for a trial?
- Are they just reselling the product of a different company?
- Is this a brand that no-one has heard of?
- Is there a contract committing you to a multi-year distributorship, with no trial period?
- Are the quoted prices high (assuming that you have prudently checked them against those offered by OKO)?
- Alternatively, are the prices so low that the quality can only be suspect (i.e. let’s discuss where the product comes from and what is the provenance of the ingredients)?
A better deal
As you might have guessed from the above, by contrast OKO tries very hard to offer a fair deal to all of its distributors and we do not try to tie them down: we also make a big effort to provide a professional service to those who work with us worldwide. We are very proud of our claim to offer ‘The World’s Favourite Tyre Sealants’ – a claim that is backed up by our unrivalled presence in over 80 countries. We have nothing to hide – you can click directly through from www.oko.com and contact our distributors via email or their websites: the list shows all the major countries, and there are others besides that are catered for through the listed companies.
But we are not stopping there, nor should you assume that you cannot be an OKO Distributor. In the major European countries and a few other major markets, we need multiple distributors: and there are plenty of other countries where we are looking for sole distributors, or the existing one is specific to a certain vehicle sector. Here are some countries where we still need companies, and you are welcome to email us if you want to talk:
- UK: sub-distributors, especially in Scotland, and regional or local firms*
- Sweden
- Germany
- Italy
- Spain
- Switzerland
- Croatia
- Serbia
- Romania
- Czech Republic
- Bosnia & Herzegovina
- Algeria
- Tunisia
- Egypt
- Lebanon
- Zimbabwe
- Angola
- Kazakhstan
- Nepal
- Sri Lanka
- Indonesia
- Japan
- South Korea
- Venezuela
- Brazil
- Bolivia
- Paraguay
- USA (regional distributors sought)
- Australia
- New Zealand
(*If you are one of the many who have bought franchises or ‘master agreements’ then we can offer you a fairer purchasing deal with the brand leader, with no strings attached and no nasty surprises)
Going for the Century
So, doing the maths, if we cover off most of this list then we will be supplying OKO to over 100 countries around the globe. It’s well worth shooting for. (Don’t worry if I didn’t mention your country, contact us anyway; you never know, we may have missed you off by accident…)
And one last point. OKO is in the business of long-term development. We would rather have a new distributor who starts small and help that company build their tyre sealant market steadily, rather than push for an unsustainably large initial order that never gets repeated. If you feel the same way, then we should be talking…