I was talking to a friend yesterday who just happens to run his own tyre sales company. He told me tyre manufacturers and wholesalers are dumping tyres at very cheap prices to offload stock that they will not be able to sell after the end of October. The reason for this is that from the bigging of November within the EU tyres will be required to be labelled with information on rolling resistance wet grip and tyre noise. The customer must be shown this label in advance of purchase and the law will extend to tyres fitted on a new car. It will be an offence to sell tyres without this label, and the label details will have to be shown on the sales invoice. It will be up to the retailer to enforce the regulation at the point of sale. Tyres will be given ratings from A to G but no tyre will be given an A rating at the beginning to encourage manufacturers to improve present products. Example label below.
at least we still have temperature, traction (I assume in the dry) and UTOG (for non snow tires). I think the sidewalls of tires are getting a little busy with information, especially some of the low pros with not a lot of room to begin with, now they're going to add more info, this is going to make buyers of performance tires upset. John, is this info going to be on the tire itself or just a sticker? cause if its just a sticker couldn't they just print new stickers with the new info? does this info apply to winter tires too? What's going to happen to the tires they don't sell? Maybe they can send them to Russia, Middle East, Asia or even North America to sell.
Strange that they find it cheaper to sell their stock at discount prices rather than just attaching stickers to their existing stock, which is what the rule requires: "manufacturers or importers have the choice of either putting a [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tire_label"]sticker[/ame] on the tyre tread or a label accompanying each delivery of batch of tyres to the dealer and to the end consumer...." Still, if the 3-year-old rule really results in any significant discounting, I'm sure UK consumers will be glad to know about it.
As far as I can know it the information will only be on the label at the moment but I would think that the tyre make and model will also be included. The regulations do not apply to studded tyres, remould, motor bike, or temporary spares, and tyres speed rated below 80km/hr Winter tyres as far as I can tell will come under the regulations Far eastern tyres are being sold cheap at the moment and unless the manufacturers do some serious testing they will not be able to sell tyres. Large fines can be imposed on the retailer flouting the regulations. See ETRMA.ORG for more details. The tyre information where commonalities exist will obviously filter it's way over to the US via forums such as PC. John.
Ah, I think I missed the point of your first post. The new regulations will prohibit sale of noncompliant tires starting November 1st, so dealers with low-quality tires on hand will try to sell them all before that date.
