Best Places to Work: Time to nominate your dealership

Do you come to work every day with a smile on your face?

Are you always pulling out your business cards and name-dropping your dealership to others within or outside the industry?

Are you proud of the workplace and want to share its story with others?

Be sure to nominate your company for the third annual Best Places to Work survey, which seeks to recognize the best employers the tire and automotive service industries have to offer.

Tire Business, in conjunction with Best Companies Group (BCG), an independent research firm specializing in identifying and recognizing great places to work, once again is seeking the best employers in our industry.

The rules for the survey are simple. In order to participate, a business must:

• Be a retail, commercial, OTR, retread or wholesale tire dealership in the U.S. (publicly or privately held);
• Have a minimum of 15 full- or part-time permanent employees working in the U.S.; andBe in business a minimum of one year.

Among companies eligible are online tire businesses (such as Simple Tire, Tire Rack, etc.); franchised tire businesses (such as individual Tire Pros, Big O Tires, etc. franchisees); mass merchandisers with tire stores (such as Walmart Tire & Lube Express, etc.; individual stores not eligible); and wholesale clubs that sell tires (such as BJ's or Costco.)

Those companies not eligible include tire importers; tire manufacturer-owned tire stores; private-brand tire companies; and aftermarket businesses that do not sell tires.

The survey can be accessed at: www.bestplacestoworktb.com.

The process is simple. Each business is asked to fill out two surveys.

The owner or representative of the dealership must fill out the Employer Benefits and Policies Questionnaire, an online survey detailing company policies, practices, benefits and demographics.

Employees, meanwhile, are asked to complete the Engagement and Satisfaction Survey, a series of questions, using a scale of 1 to 5, ranging from "agree strongly" to "disagree strongly."

The survey includes seven demographic and two open-ended questions. Employees can fill out this survey online or on paper, if a full company employee email list is unavailable.

It should take an employee 10 to 15 minutes to complete the survey.

The deadline to register is fast approaching: Aug. 29. A week later, questionnaires will be available, and they must be completed no later than Sept. 17 (for the Employer Benefits and Policies Questionnaire) and Sept. 24 (for the Engagement and Satisfaction Survey).

The deadline for all employee surveys is Oct. 8.

Organizations with 25 or more employees must have a response rate of at least 40% in order for the results to count, meaning not every employee is required to participate. However, the higher the response rate, the more representative the analysis will be.

Organizations with 15 to 24 employees must reach an 80% or higher response rate for their results to count.

Last year's winners

Simple Tire L.L.C., the online tire retailer that has experienced robust growth over the past several years, was named Tire Business' Best Place to Work in 2020. Trevose, Pa.-based SimpleTire was founded in 2012 by Andy Chalofsky, his brother Josh Chalofsky and their friend Kenny Pratt

"As I look back at this year and this company, I am really proud of this team and how much impact we are having on the industry," Simple Tire CEO Andy Chalofsky told Tire Business.

"It's one thing to say you have a good team, but it is something else to see them execute and succeed. It's just very exciting all around."

Other 2020 finalists were (in alphabetical order):

• Best-One of Indy, with 11 retail locations and 135 employees, servicing Indianapolis;
• McMahon's Best-One Tire & Auto Care of Fort Wayne, Ind., a 52-year-old tire dealership with four stores and nearly 100 employees;
• MFA Oil Co. of Columbia, Mo., a Big O Tires franchisee with 22 stores in Missouri, Arkansas and Oklahoma and more than 200 employees; and
• Tire Group International (TGI), a family-run, Miami-based wholesaler with more than 100 employees

St. Louis Wholesale Tire, a family-run business that specializes in specialty tires and inner tubes, was named the winner of the inaugural Tire Business Best Places to Work survey competition in 2019.

SimpleTire was among a group of finalists that year, which also included: Chapel Hill Tire, a Chapel Hill, N.C.-based tire dealership with 100-plus employees; Porter's Tire Store, a Russellville, Tenn.-based tire retailer with 98 employees; Service Tire Truck Centers, a Bethlehem, Pa.-based commercial tire dealership with 921 employees; and Telle Tire & Auto Centers, a St. Louis-based dealership with 70-plus employees.

Tire Business will announce the 2021 finalists in December, while the publication will reveal the overall winner in the first quarter of 2022.