E-Commerce In Parts Distribution, Circa 1976

HEAD: ‘Hurry, we need to send a Telex to Milan before school today’

By Mandy Aguilar I couldn’t possible fathom all those years ago, that I was then in the true forefront of electronic commerce. It was on Bicentennial 1976 and my dad drove me early in the mornings in his Fiat 128 to the dealership he used to run with my uncle in Puerto Rico. My part­time job those days was to electronically transmit points and condensers orders to parts manufacturer Magneti Marelli in Milan, Italy.

I became a teenager that year, but I was curious enough to fiddle with that ultra­futuristic contraption that sat inside the air conditioned office in that Fiat dealership’s parts warehouse: a typewriter with a phone! Yes, an Olivetti Te300 Telex machine. As a teenager I worked in my family’s dealership, always behind the counter in the parts department. The idea of working in the heat of a parts warehouse in Puerto Rico was not quite the thrill for kid my age. I figure I needed a way to get inside the air­conditioned office and learning to use that Olivetti Telex was my ticket to being cool. Well, at least being cooled off.

It wasn’t an easy thing for a teenager to learn, but my curiosity and my ignorance got the best of me and I was able to learn it. By far the hardest thing was that you can only go back three spaces if you typed the wrong character before the transmission paper tape was punched in error for eternity. Luckily, I got the knack for it and was often rewarded with the familiar response which became first words I kinda­of learned in Italian: Trasmissione ricevuta. Transmission Received!

Yes indeed, ecommerce back in 1976. Thirty six year later we are, all of us in the aftermarket auto parts industry, now deeply involved with ecommerce, from electronic catalogs to order­taking via the Web. From eBay to Facebook via Twitter, we all need to market our parts online. Marketing has never been more important to our industry and the tool to manage this titanic task is ecommerce.

Often times, perhaps too often, we hear that the Internet has brought a paradigm shift to business. I guess if I had owned a travel agency 15 years ago, today I will certainly subscribe to the notion that the paradigm shift did indeed kill my business. It’s amazing how we have become our own travel agents, to the point of even memorizing flight schedules, frequent flyer accounts and easily eight to 10 airport codes. Yes, Mandy the travel agent. I couldn't possible tell you how many SJU to MIA to LAS airfare tickets I have bought over the years without ever talking to an airline employee.

But here is the golden nugget for all of us in our industry: ecommerce has expanded our business. We still need our brick and mortars warehouses, our stores, shops, delivery trucks, counter people and sales experts. Our customers demand it! In our neck of the World Wide Web woods, ecommerce is a tool to grow, not a means to replace the value proposition we bring to our customers. In other words, we are B2B, true and true. By the nature of our business to business reality, we can all use ecommerce to grow our existing business structures my adding capacity and efficiency with very manageable costs. Now how often do we even get a chance to do that?

I’ve been involved in this change and have seen many of my peers accomplish this; the results are of a magnitude usually only seen in our industry by way of expensive expansions, mergers or acquisitions. This is the thrill you’ll get from committing your organization at every level, not just IT, on providing the best possible ecommerce experience to your customers. As with all opportunities, there are challenges. There are no maps or scripts on how ecommerce will evolve. The emarketplace evolves fast and so must you.

Mandy Aguilar is the regional vice president for Jacksonville, Fla.­based The Parts House.