The Activant Report: key products sales activity

What's Hot

Why do radiators, power steering pumps and wheel bearings fail? The root causes might be difficult to identify — a burst radiator seam, for example, could be related to a leaking head gasket — but it's your job to provide the right replacement parts when and where your customers need them.

Now more than ever, having the right products on hand depends on extensive insight to emerging trends in parts consumption. For example, this month's snapshot of parts demand, developed through the Activant ® Vista® solution, highlights a handful of fast-rising and quickly declining applications for replacement radiators, power steering pumps and wheel bearings.

The fastest rising radiator applications reflected in June 2008 Activant electronic catalog transactions were the 1995 C & K1500 pickups from General Motors (5th overall this year, compared to 16th in June 2007) and 1996 Jeep Grand Cherokee (6th this year, 24th last year). "Radiator replacement in older models is very hard to predict. It can be caused by an engine overheating situation, such as a head gasket failure, or gradual deterioration caused by electrolysis," explained one manufacturer. "Seeing demand rise this quickly on these applications isn't really surprising — these vehicles are just entering a very active stage in their repair cycle."

Noisy power steering pumps aren't much fun for anyone, especially the technician. This month's Vista snapshot points to three applications — the 2002 and 1997 Grand Cherokee (rising from 18th and 14th to 4th and 5th , respectively) and 1997 C & K1500 pickups (6th this year, 12th in June 2007) — that are prone to noise issues. Consumers commonly complain about "honking" noises in low-speed turns in a variety of light trucks and SUVs, reports one pump manufacturer. "In a lot of these cases, the system hasn't been bled correctly," he explained. "So, the data could reflect multiple installations on some vehicles until the technicians were able to identify the real problem."

In the wheel bearing category, Ford applications dominate the top 5, with the 2002 Explorer and 2002 Focus rising from 15th and 18th position, respectively, in June 2007 to 2nd and 3rd this year. The Focus is susceptible to loose rear wheel bearing retaining nuts — a potentially dangerous problem that has been documented in bulletins from the automaker. Excessive front wheel bearing "play" is the most common complaint on the Explorer, reports one bearing manufacturer.

What's Not

Three applications — 1994 C & K1500 pickups, 1995 Ford Taurus and 1995 Honda Accord — fell out of the top 10 in June's electronic catalog transactions. Due to their age, this declining demand most likely indicates these vehicles have passed through their initial engine and cooling system repair cycles, the radiator manufacturing representative explained.

The fastest falling application in the power steering pump category was General Motors' 1989 C & K 1500-3500 pickups, which dropped from 10th nationally last year to 25th in June of this year. "That's an old truck, so I wouldn't have expected it to drop as quickly in just one year," said a manufacturer's representative. "Those trucks are probably on their third or fourth owners, so noise issues might not be a concern for them anymore."

In the Wheel bearing category, two Ford F150 applications — the 1998 and 1995 model years — dropped out of the top 10 in June's eCatalog transactions. "They won't drop much more over the next couple of years," predicted a bearing supplier. "There are obviously thousands of those trucks in most major markets, and they are hard on the wheel-ends. We might have two or three replacement cycles left before they hit the scrap yard."