Purcell boosts NW presence with Phelps acquisition (update)

SEATTLE (July 28, 2016) — Purcell Tire & Service Center's recent acquisition of Phelps Tire will expand Purcell's service network to the Pacific Northwest — including three outlets in Alaska.

Potosi, Mo.-based Purcell and Seattle-based Phelps Tire disclosed the deal July 8. Initially, Phelps' eight locations will operate as Phelps-Purcell Tire through year-end, Purcell said, owing to the Phelps Tire brand recognition among the dealership's customers throughout the Pacific Northwest.

Phelps Tire operates five commercial/retail outlets in Washington and three in Alaska, generating an estimated $20 million-plus in annual revenue. The deal includes Phelps' retread plant in Seattle, but the plant will no longer be a Michelin Retread Technologies-licensed facility. 

“We are excited about the prospects that the Phelps expansion provides and the markets that it opens to our retreading and commercial footprint,” Purcell Tire Owner Bob Purcell said.

Phelps Tire's stores also handle some retail business and some stores are active in the OTR sector as well.

Purcell acquired the business from the estate of Norvall “Tink” Phelps, according to Jim Phelps, who was president of the tire dealership for the past few years.  

Phelps Tire was founded in 1947 by Norval Phelps Sr., Jim Phelps' grandfather.

Mr. Phelps said the family decided to sell because the market dynamics were shifting and competition was intensifying, even from within the Michelin Commercial Services network that Phelps Tire was part of.  

Charlie Allfrey, Mr. Phelps' brother-in-law — who had been the dealership's president for several years — has returned to the company to be operations manager under Purcell.

Mr. Phelps will now devote his full attention to another family business, Elliott Bay Auto Brokers, a retail car dealership specializing in high-end, reconditioned luxury cars.

The acquisition will make Purcell Tire one of the U.S.'s eight largest commercial tire dealerships with 50 commercial locations and five retread plants and estimated annual commercial-related sales exceeding $200 million. The dealership services customers in 41 states.

Prior to this, Purcell had a single location in Washington — a small representative office in North Republic serving the mining industry — but this marks the dealership's first entry into the commercial and retail tire sectors in the Evergreen State.

Phelps Tire's Washington locations are along the Interstate 5 corridor in: Renton, Seattle, Mt. Vernon, Everett and Tacoma. The three locations in Alaska are in Anchorage, Fairbanks and Wasilla.

Purcell's next closest outlets are in Nevada, roughly 750 miles south of Seattle.

All Phelps locations are TIA-Certified dealerships and were part of the Michelin Commercial Services network prior to being sold to Purcell.

Purcell will be selling MRT retreads that it sources from another MRT retreader, said a Michelin spokesman, who declined to say whether the company would seek to replace the franchise with another retreader in the area. 

Phelps Tire had been an MRT retreader since 1999 ; the dealership added Oliver-brand capacity in 2011.

Purcell Tire's existing retread plants use the Goodyear system.