What you may have thought was a glitch in the matrix recently — the "matrix" being our website, tirebusiness.com — was actually a giant fix for all of the glitches that also will increase your access to our data.
For about a week in early October, tirebusiness.com went through massive behind-the-scenes system upgrade to create a better user experience. While the website doesn't look any different, trust us, it is.
If you think of it like a car enthusiast, then we just swapped our website's worn-out engine for a shiny, new one in a crate.
The change you will notice is our new subscription system designed to make it easier for readers to sign up, manage and start reading our award-winning tire industry coverage.
The subscription price did not change. It remains $99 a year.
(Unless you're willing to spend a little.) Cue Halloween-style fantastical laughing, strobe lights and thunder.
New to the website is our approach to selling data, which up to this point has been done á la carte. Prices for data sets ranged from $100-$600 each. To those readers and researchers out there who regularly reached out to us for a solution to the data store, consider this our acknowledgment: We heard you loud and clear.
Now, we offer an all-access subscription, $499 a year, and you'll get access to download everything from our data store.
This includes access to all of our journalism, including searchable data sets (often in Excel format) behind annual reports such as our Global Tire Report Top 75 tire maker rankings; global tire production facilities list; Top 100 North American tire dealers; Top 50 commercial tire dealers; and more.
After the website update was finished, most digital readers were forced to log in again. We apologize to anyone who had to change their password — we're not making a habit of it — but as a security measure, we did add to the complexity of passwords.
If you are a subscriber and having trouble with the website, be sure to log out of the site and log back in. If that doesn't work, take the "forgot my password" route and follow the steps to make a password that will comply with the new requirements. You can also try clearing out your search browser's cookies and cache.
We have a lot more up our sleeves heading into the future to continue creating in-depth journalism while finding better and easier ways to get it in the hands of people that want to read it. Small and big things, alike.
For instance, did you know we're on Tik Tok— The videos are quick, funny, interesting and consumed en masse by everyone under 30 years old. In early November, check out all of our behind-the-scenes videos at the SEMA Show and AAPEX in Las Vegas. Last year at the show, our videos of tire burn-outs went momentarily viral.
We're also adding more print issues next year. That's right, print's back, baby! We intend to bring our oversized magazines to your tire shop counter for many years to come.
It's an exciting time to be covering an exciting industry, and we thank you for giving us a read.