A one and six zeroes for The Wheel Specialist’s heroes
The Wheel Specialist’s franchisees are celebrating a monumental milestone on the family firm’s road to success: their millionth alloy wheel refurbishment.
“If you could balance all those wheels on top of each other,” says Ginny Murphy, the company’s CEO, “they’d reach from here on Earth to the International Space Station and halfway back again.
“It’s mind-blowing, and a measure of the sheer hard work and dedication of our franchisees around the country.
“So when I say ‘Thanks a million’ to our franchisees, I really mean it. A lot of hard work, passion and commitment goes into every wheel we refurbish, and they have every reason to be proud of themselves.”
To celebrate the milestone, The Wheel Specialist’s HQ helped all of its franchisees prepare for the big moment by sending them beer, champagne, doughnuts, confetti cannons and a commemorative plaque for their showrooms.
It also commissioned an animated advert to boost brand awareness - and franchisees’ incomes - as well as a social media campaign offering one lucky motorist a free wheel refurbishment or customisation every year for five years.
At Head Office, Ginny and the team had two bespoke TWS cakes made, while the three franchisees and their teams who’ve contributed the most refurbishments to that million lined up outside their showrooms with a figure one and six wheels spelling out “1,000,000”.
“You can’t refurbish a million wheels and have a 4.9/5 Trustpilot rating without doing something right,” she says. “That’s an amazing achievement by our fantastic network of franchisees.”
The millionth wheel was eagerly expected by the entire network as The Wheel Specialist has a special device that counts every single wheel that passes through the network of showrooms.
“It was a magical feeling as we watched the total change from 999,999 to 1,000,000,” says Ginny. “We’re now into seven figures, and all of us are very proud of everyone involved.”
She adds that the achievement is testament to the vision, entrepreneurial spirit and hard work of herself and Neill Murphy, who spent years building it up from a single independent business to the success it is today, and Jon Murphy, who laid the foundations for the company with a painting and refinishing plant in Birmingham in the 1950s.