So, have you noticed the high price of tires lately?

Of course you have.

One of the great things about now being part of a larger media group is sharing information with our sister magazines. Over at Modern Tire Dealer, they do a good job of reporting tire price hikes.

Back in March, MTD analyst Saul Ludwig reported that since the start of 2012 there had been a sharp upturn in nearly every raw material that a tire manufacturer uses. Carbon black was up 20% and other key ingredients such as natural rubber, butadiene and styrene (used to make synthetic rubber), zinc oxide and chemicals all had turned up, too.

As a result, Goodyear announced a 5% increase on truck tire prices, Continental announced up to 9% hike, Yokohama raised prices 8%, Double Coin went up 5%.

All those price hikes led our counterparts at Work Truck magazine to wonder about medium-duty tires.

According to an article by Work Truck Editor Mike Antich in late 2011, tire prices have increased an average of 6% to 9% per year for fleets, with higher prices forecast to continue their upward trends. Truck tire shipments, according to the Rubber Manufacturers Association (RMA), were up 15.4% for truck tires.

So, Work Truck and HDT want to know, what are your truck tire purchasing trends? If your fleet purchases medium-duty truck tires, please, take a moment and check out our brief, confidential questionnaire:

www.surveymonkey.com/s/2012_TireUsage

We'll share the results in a future issue or blog post.

Related Stories:

May 2012 - Tires & Wheels: MPG for Mediums

5/23/2012 - New Rubber Source: Russian Dandelions?

3/12/2012 - Bridgestone Launches Project to Develop Sustainable Source of Natural Rubber