In 2017, Carolina Racing Supply, a supplier of circle track racing parts based in Mooresville, NC, reached out to Terracor Solutions to build a zeckoShop e-commerce platform to take their in-store business onto the web and help them build a competitive advantage in their niche. The successful e-commerce implementation by Terracor Solutions has enabled Carolina Racing Supply to expand their business reach beyond their physical store and cater to a wider audience, resulting in increased sales and a stronger market position in the circle track racing parts industry.
About Carolina Racing Supply
Carolina Racing Supply was founded by Tom Sandal and Missy Barnette in 1999 with a vision to supply racers with quality, affordable components. Tom and Missy shared a passion for motor racing and realized that there was a gap in the market for the local hobbyist racers who found it difficult to get the parts they needed because most suppliers focused on the professional market, and opened in “Race City,” Mooresville, North Carolina. For a year or more, the business consisted entirely of the two partners, with the first employees coming on board sometime later as Carolina Racing Supply began to grow.
Although the company started out as a retailer, Carolina Racing Supply gradually morphed to become a wholesaler of products for the dirt racing market. They initially set up shop in a 3,000-square-foot, rented building, but as their business grew, they were able to expand their operations and move to their current location – a 7,000-square-foot facility, which they own.
Their inventory now includes their own in-house line, TomCat Performance, which they supply to a nationwide network of quality-conscious dealers. The company does over $2 million in sales, and their mix of customers is about 85% wholesale and 15% retail. The company’s website enables them to reach retail customers across the country. Although wholesale currently make up the lion’s share of Carolina Racing Supply’s business, it is in the retail sphere that they see the most growth potential, which is why it is so important for them to maintain an effective website and e-commerce platform.
How e-Commerce Implementation Transformed Carolina Racing Supply’s Business Model
For years, Carolina Racing Supply was a predominantly in-store and over-the-phone business. Missy and Tom believed that the nature of their business was better suited to direct trading than e-commerce. “Our feeling had always been that when you’re selling something like a race car part, you have to be able to talk to people, especially if you’re dealing with the retail market. You have to be able to talk to people, or people are endlessly going to be buying the wrong thing. And then nobody’s going to be happy. It became more and more obvious that we were wrong about that.”
Tom, Missy, and their team began to notice that their business was declining while other suppliers in the industry had functioning websites that were driving growth. There was no way for them to reach beyond their established local market. They needed greater reach, and they didn’t see any way to get that outside of an e-commerce platform. There were other factors at play too. From 2013 to 2016, they began selling tires in addition to parts. The tire business brought in plenty of turnover, but it began to take up the majority of their time and energy, and it was a low-margin product line. As a result, the parts side of the business – which had been its main purpose from day one – had begun to decline. In 2016, they decided to scrap the tire business and focus on parts again. Since this area of their business was not as robust as it had once been (and they had abandoned the tire business, which had generated so much revenue), the Carolina Racing Supply team had to find a way to bring the parts business back up to par – and fast.
They realized that being without a website meant they were lagging behind their competition. It became something they had to have. In particular, Missy had heard about zeckoShop, a scalable e-commerce platform that offers various solutions to help businesses successfully sell items online. It is customizable and integrates seamlessly with any operation, helping it to build online businesses and brands to specific preferences and requirements. Learning about zeckoShop, in turn, led them to Terracor Business Solutions.
Terracor Solutions’ E-commerce Implementation: The Reason Behind Carolina Racing Supply’s Partnership
After viewing the options available to them, Missy and Tom decided to work with Terracor Business Solutions, and our team would build them a complete zeckoShop e-commerce platform. Terracor and our zeckoShop solution fulfilled their three main criteria:
– It integrated with their existing business software, ie. Spire, meaning that information could be kept up to date across the business in real-time.
– It enabled them to host a website with two separate purposes – one for retail and one for wholesale.
– It offered high value for money and suited their budget.
Along with the affordable pricing structure came an ongoing technical support service, which would help Missy and her staff to grasp the functions of the platform and seek assistance whenever problems arose.
“At the time, it was a struggle,” Missy says, “because our business was in decline at that time, so it was a lot for us to take on, and fortunately, we had a little help from some people who believed in what we said: that, if we had this web store, it would be a great benefit to our business, which would likely struggle without a web store. We recruited some help to make that possible for us to be able to pay initially, and then we had faith that the business would gain from the website, and that would help to cover the monthly cost, and we absolutely understood the structure and the need for the monthly subscription particularly, not just for the hosting but the support. The support has been wonderful. Just knowing that whether I have a question about functionality or if there’s a problem, it’s just an email away, and someone answers. There’s no cost on top of a cost to get that answer. In the end, it has all worked out great.”
How Terracor’s E-commerce Business Solutions Unlocked the Potential of Carolina Racing Supply
The period of anticipation as the website was planned, built, and implemented was a tense one for Carolina Racing Supply. “Looking back at that time, from 2016 to when we
started on the website, which was November of 2018, I just felt like every day, I was hanging by a thread,” Missy recalls. “There wasn’t a whole lot of joy in running a business in that period of time. Once we started working with Terracor on the website, it gave me hope.”
“I didn’t have an understanding initially of how much more work had to be done after launching so that people could find the website. I spent more time taking care of promoting the website, making sure we had good descriptions and keywords and that they were in all the places that they needed to be in. When we went into the winter of 2019, the website was starting to gain some traction.”
The results soon became apparent. Missy sums up the e-commerce solution that Terracor provided as being “incredibly valuable.” It has expanded their reach and enabled them to implement marketing tactics that would not otherwise have been possible, such as promo certificates.
“It would be so much harder to reach new customers outside of our immediate area without having the web store,” Missy says. “We do a lot of internet advertising, and it all drives directly to the website. Once visitors get to the website, they see who we are and what we can offer, and we really feel that our website represents us. Then our service after the sale creates the relationship. You have to have that gateway that brings them through – and that’s the web store.”
The website also enabled Carolina Racing Supply to take in a larger volume of orders. With in-store or telephone orders, they would not have the capacity to take in as many orders. Each order would require someone to answer the phone or attend to a customer in-store. The website facilitates an instant, automated ordering process, with several orders coming at once.
“That’s where it saves a tremendous amount of time. It doesn’t tie up the staff on the phone and manually inputting these orders, especially the larger ones. We can just receive the order. It’s already got the pre-authorization on it, so we know the money’s there. So we just go about the business of packing it and shipping it and sending it on its way,” Missy says.
Missy says that she is very happy with the results that Terracor’s solution has delivered. “The support is solid; it’s financially feasible. I would have no reason to leave Terracor, especially on the zeckoShop side of things.”
Terracor did not only set up the website for Carolina Racing Supply. We continue to provide ongoing technical support. Missy explains that this is one of the things that continues to add value to their e-commerce experience. “When you make someone aware of a problem, it gets fixed. Sometimes I don’t know how to do something, and the support always comes through clear and helpful.”
Customers have told Missy that, of all the suppliers they work with, Carolina Racing Supply has the best website – far easier to use than competitor websites. The superior design of Carolina Racing Supply’s website means that clients can find what they are looking for more easily and also complete transactions faster and more conveniently.
The Terracor Business Solutions Advantage
Terracor Business Solutions is a business technology solutions developer, provider, and consulting firm. Our main goal is to help our clients integrate their business processes seamlessly, so they can spend more time on the task at hand while leaving their software solutions in our hands.
Our services include custom integrations, business consultation, web/ application development, and integrated e-commerce solutions. We strive to help clients integrate their business by utilizing their existing systems more efficiently and allowing for data automation. We work with a set of fundamental core values with the goal of helping our clients grow their businesses. Our success comes from ensuring that our clients, like Carolina Racing Supply, achieve their maximum potential.
Carolina Racing Supply is one of our many happy customers. We created a zeckoShop e-commerce platform for them that fully integrates with their existing business software and facilitates smooth ordering and fulfillment processes, as well as superior brand-building capabilities and promotional and marketing functions.
Would you like your business to gain the same advantage currently being enjoyed by Carolina Racing Supply? Then contact Terracor to discuss how we can help improve, automate, and build your multi-channel business with an e-commerce implementation.
