CLERMONT-FERRAND, France — Michelin Group and Sumitomo Corp. of the Americas (SC0A) netted $174 million and $107 million, respectively, from the sale of TBC Corp.'s retail assets in May 2023, according to the firms' fiscal 2023 financial statements.
TBC is owned 50/50 by Michelin and SCoA.
TBC sold the assets — 392 NTB Tire & Service Centers and 203 Tire Kingdom Service Centers — to Mavis Tire Express Services Corp. last May for an as-yet undisclosed price.
The deal — the second such transaction between TBC and Mavis in a four-year span — expanded Mavis' retail holdings to nearly 2,000 stores across 28-plus states. In 2020, Mavis acquired 112 NTB stores in four major metropolitan areas from TBC.
The parties declined to disclose the purchase price at the time of the transaction a year ago, but did say that they had agreed for TBC to provide wholesale tire distribution for Mavis' existing retail locations.
Prior to the deal's being closed, SCoA told investors in a first-quarter 2023 conference call that TBC had been "struggling to improve the profitability of company‐owned retail stores, and with the overall industry environment changing, we have been discussing how to focus our management resources …"
The acquisition ranks as the largest transaction in the retail tire business in the U.S. in the past 25-plus years and solidified Mavis' position as the largest independent retail tire dealership in North America.
