Total Tire & Auto Care of Statesboro brings a need Jody Rogers perceived through his contracting business together with David Shackelford’s knowledge of the tire business.
Open more than a month now, the shop at 2703 Northside Drive West is also established as an NAPA AutoCare Center. Not to be confused with the local NAPA parts store, this designation means that the shop’s work carries a nationwide limited warranty on qualifying repairs and services.
“If we work on a college student’s car here, or say we put an alternator on a lady’s car, she drives to Atlanta and the alternator messes up, she can go to a NAPA-certified car care center, and they’ll do the warranty work,” Rogers said.
Ag and industry
Unlike most auto care centers, Total Tire aims at an additional segment of the tire and service market. When Rogers and Shackelford were interviewed at the shop, employees were handling a big tire from an earthmoving machine and had made a field call to a cotton picker with a flat the night before.
Indeed, the original idea for Total Tire & Auto Care came from Rogers’ other business. He and his father, Jimmy Rogers, own Y-Delta Inc., the Statesboro-based building and contracting company in operation since 1986. Y-Delta has a sizeable fleet of vehicles, including earth-moving equipment as well as trucks.
“We just decided to do this off of an idea of trying to do something to service our own trucks and things like that, and it just all came about. …,” Jody Rogers said. “There were really not a lot of options in Statesboro to get your big equipment worked on, like loaders and backhoe and tractor tires.”
So Total Tire is equipped to replace and service tires from agricultural and many industrial machines, even those with solid tires and rubber tracks, all the way down to lawnmower tires, as well as those for passenger vehicles such as cars, pickups and SUVs.
Its flagship brand is Cooper Tires, but like most tire dealers, Total Tire also sells and installs other brands besides those on its signs.
“We get every name brand there is,” Rogers said.
More than tires
In addition to tires, Total Tire & Auto Care does front-end alignments, brake, suspension, exhaust and electrical system work and oil changes and sells and installs wheels, batteries, alternators, starters, lift and leveling kits, belts and hoses.
“Pretty much anything you can think of outside of rebuilding engines,” Shackelford said.
As manager, he heads a team of eight employees. The shop has eight service bays, plus trucks for roadside and field service.
Shackelford came to the new venture with 21 years of experience in local tire sales and automotive service. Before that, he worked as an electrician about 15 years, including roughly one year with Y-Delta.
“I’m old-school when it comes to customer service,” Shackelford said. “Customer satisfaction is absolutely our first priority.”
Total Tire’s location, on the curve at 2703 Northside Drive West, was once the home of Nevil Tire, but Nevil Tire Pros moved to its current location down the street almost 15 years ago, and the two businesses are not affiliated.
In addition to its shop, Total Tire & Auto Care has a warehouse for the larger tires and has purchased adjoining land for a hoped future expansion. More parking and a couple of additional bays would be in order, Rogers and Shackelford said, but no plans are definite yet.
The Total Tire team has decorated the storefront and lobby for Christmas, including a tree with paper bulbs requesting specific items as unwrapped gifts for Home Instead Senior Care clients.
The waiting area is designed to be family-friendly, with a trainset and coloring books for children.
Grand opening
This Friday from noon until closing time will be Total Tire’s grand opening, with a ribbon-cutting ceremony being scheduled and refreshments available through the afternoon, Shackelford said.
Business hours are 7:30 a.m. - 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday and 7:30 a.m. till noon Saturday.
Herald reporter Al Hackle may be reached at (912) 489-9458.