E-commerce sales are expected to grow to more than $400 billion by 2018, according to Forrester Research and eMarketer. But online ordering remains slow in the student transportation industry, a new STN survey of fleet managers shows.
Of more than 210 readers surveyed in December, only two — yes, you’re reading that correctly — told us that the most common way for their operations to purchase school bus parts is online using a district credit card.
This feedback came despite the increase of e-commerce options from bus dealers, parts manufacturers and resellers. One student transporter said online ordering remains a challenge because there is no live person to speak with to answer questions involving the application of parts.
“Most places are drop shippers and don’t have knowledge of the parts,” the reader added. “(We are) dealing with multiple manufactures that are tied together in a vehicle and won’t have access to each other or won’t communicate together to help in the decision of the necessary repair parts needed.”
The overwhelming majority, nearly 84 percent, said they continue to purchase over the phone from dealers via a purchase order. The next largest response was about 7 percent with face-to-face with dealer visits.
Check out these trends and more as readers also weighed in on such topics as repair and refurbishing projects, the effect of transmission on fuel economy, how recent fuel prices have aff ected decisions on alternative fuels and more.
