Prinx Chengshan Marks Five Years With New Products

Offering a broad reach

While the team is working to add dealers to its distribution network, Felberbaum said the company is also investing in marketing both the Prinx and Fortune brands with a two-fold goal: “to increase sales of the brand for you (the distributor) and your customers in a profitable manner. And we want to increase brand awareness.”

He noted that the brands offer a practical solution.

“We meet 95% of the needs for the PLT and TBR markets respectively,” Felberbaum said. The brands also have a ST tire, too.

For the Prinx brand, marketing has aligned itself with the United Soccer League (USL). Prinx is the official tire partner of the USL, and as part of that agreement there are opportunities to schedule USL dealer days. The first one is on the calendar for July 31^st.

The Fortune brand has gone all in on pickleball and is the exclusive tire partner of USA Pickleball. Felberbaum said the players and enthusiasts of the sport represent “an untapped market” with participants who travel by car to compete in tournaments.

Happy with 3PMS options

Ray Van Veen is the inventory manager for Trail Tire Supply, a wholesaler that serves western Canada, including its own Trail Tire retail stores. Van Veen says Trail Tire has been a Prinx customer for three years, and so far carries the brand’s light truck and commercial truck products in its six warehouses.

“We haven’t gone into the passenger yet. We will once they get all size of the all-weather tire,” he said, referring to the Prinx HiSeason 4S, which was introduced at the 2023 SEMA Show. The next two phases of size offerings are expected in 2025.

Van Veen said he likes that every size of the new all-terrain tire, the HiCountry AT2, will have the 3PMS symbol, as that’s an important selling point in his market. “In our world, all-season is on the way out. All weather is the new (normal).”

But he said the move by consumers from tier-one and tier-two products to lower-tiered tires is real and has been a sustained trend since the pandemic, so he sees a need and a market for value-priced products.

Van Veen said customers are satisfied with the Prinx offering. “Once we get customers on the product, they’re on it. The name is a little different.”