‘ We have all had a situation where we decided nah, I can do that myself. Six hours later you have had 3 Autozone runs, 2 mental breakdowns and every curse word you can imagine. You wished you had paid the extra money and had an expert knock it out in 30 minutes. That’ s where a good local dealer wins.’
The Long-Term Future
A landscaper gets a notification at breakfast: the bearing on the older trailer has three weeks left. He approves the repair, the part is waiting, the bay is booked, and the claim is filed automatically if needed.
The nearest version of that future needs no hardware at all. A dealer with clean service history already knows what a trailer will need and roughly when. Nixon-Richardson expects sensors once they are cheap enough because early detection‘ allows customers to plan and budget better for repairs instead of dealing with a middle of nowhere breakdown.’
Warehousing also gives way to fabrication. Much of a trailer is cut and bent steel, so the bracket nobody carries gets made from a drawing. That matters most for customers rocking old AL-KO and Rockwell components.
Frey’ s endgame is not a sensor. It is a finished job.‘ Dealerships will be able to provide ready-made solutions based on data that takes the guesswork out and gets people off the rat wheel. Dealers who“ prove themselves as the experts in providing solutions,” Frey says,“ will keep customers for life.”
Parts will‘ still be listed in a database for reference and purchased that way,’ Motley says, and‘ customer interaction will be similar to the way we do it today, maybe even more online.’
‘ The counter isn’ t going anywhere, but its role is changing. It becomes more of a consultation center than a checkout desk. People still want to deal with knowledgeable humans, just without waiting in line while someone flips through a paper parts book from 1998.’
What Doesn’ t Change
‘ Bearings, brakes, suspension components, and tires are designed to be wear items,’ Nixon-Richardson says. Telematics changes how you find the problem, not the fact that the part wears out. Trailers will still need repairs performed by a local shop that can supply the parts.
Judgment stays human. There will always have to be a person involved, Motley says,“ because there are always variables and variations.” And there will still be that customer, as Shane Thompson puts it,“ who walks in five minutes before closing on a Friday needing a part for a job that absolutely has to be done tonight.”
Frey lands somewhere simple:‘ People don’ t like running around to get one project done. Whoever makes that easy is going to win, and that will be just as true in 2056 as it is today. Technology changes. That doesn’ t.’
Your customer buys a trailer twice in a decade and parts twenty times in between.‘ In the future,’ Frey says,‘ the data will set you free.’
Johnathan Aguero is the SVP of Revenue at Blackpurl and writes about the future of dealership technology and can be reached at johnathan @ blackpurl. com.
82 The Haul www. natda. org