The Coronavirus pandemic had posed many questions for a customer of Tire Streets. Such as, how long will my tires take to be delivered? And when will new stock be available? We understand that customers may have these concerns. It is no secret that Covid has impacted most businesses either for good or bad. 

Throughout the majority of 2020, and the best part of 2021, the pandemic restricted transportation and shipping. Customers have the right to know how long their order will take or when their specific tire or size will be available.

Covid’s impact on the distribution

The impact on the distribution of our tires has not just affected the US, but also the UK and Europe. Customers can expect delays but our customer service team will be updating customers on changes to distribution, delays, and quantity of stock.

With shortages from every major manufacture and tariffs and prices increasing, retailers and every part of the supply chain have felt this hit. As a sole distributor of a lot of products but the problem we are facing is providing our key product the 651 Sport across all our regions. The above issues in the industry have opened new business for us but the business we can not keep up within every region. The normal allocation for these is now spread thin for the US and across (Europe and the UK).

Increase in price of shipping containers

Since the beginning of 2020 and the start of the coronavirus pandemic the average price of shipping a container globally has increased by more than 350%. 

Why is this?

In the spring of 2020, there was an initial demand reduction due to the pandemic, importers canceled orders and carriers announced black sailings instead of moving under-utilized vessels. This created a backlog of ready shipments at factories when restrictions started to ease. Carriers also reduced their orders for new containers, this left the industry with fewer containers heading into the 2nd half of 2020.

Other factors that impacted the shipping industry were the changing of consumer habits, the import surge due to an influx of stay-at-home purchases, port congestion, and unbalanced container flows.

The cost of shipping containers has increased dramatically since May 2020, with the US East and West coast increasing by $6,000, the UK by $10,000, and Germany and Spain both increasing by $9,000. 

Has shipping been delayed?

Shipping delays have been prevalent. Because of the above shortages or mostly just not being able to keep up with distribution, we are also dealing with delays that are making predicting when these products will be here hard. Our normal ordering cycle is 3 months from Indonesia to our warehouses. With these delays, which happen before leaving and at importing we are looking at a 5 – 6 month cycle. 

Communication with customers

We are trying our best to stay on top of when these containers will be here but to be honest it is not an exact science. We have an idea and we can almost count on the container being delayed at least 2 weeks after the ETA. Customers can get notified when products that are out of stock on the website come back in stock by going to the product page and clicking the ‘Notify Me’ button and entering their email. This is the fastest and easiest way to stay up to date when things are available. 

The day-to-day running of Tire Streets…

As we largely operate as a digital outfit, the team has been largely unaffected by the pandemic. With a global network of people, we have been able to function without a hitch. That means orders, stock management, marketing, and providing the best set of tires conveniently and cost-effectively as possible have been uninterrupted. 

Moving into the 2nd half of 2021…

With restrictions slowly being lifted around the world, we can expect transportation of goods to become easier and easier however due to backlog and disruption we may have limited stock on certain tires and sizes. 

With a light at the end of the tunnel, we are confident that more stock will be arriving in the next 3 months or so. As we have mentioned, knowing when new stock will arrive is not an exact science, there are multiple cogs in a complicated machine that need to fit into place. 

How do I find out more?

If you’re a customer or someone looking to purchase a set of tires, we are working hard to keep everyone up to date with the latest stock, when new stock will arrive and anything else you may need.

If you have any questions please email info@tirestreets.com.