Turn 14 Distribution: The What, How, and Why of Integrating It into Your Auto Parts Store

As an auto parts seller, you have an understanding of the importance of car maintenance and tuning for your customers. Your business exists to help them modify their vehicles and delight passionate drivers. X-Cart does the same thing for automotive retailers: we provide robust software with advanced features and help transform your website into a powerful selling machine.

In this blog post, we’ll shed additional light on the integration with the Turn 14 Distribution as a trusted auto parts source. We’ll show you how X-Cart Automotive can power your online store with valuable features to increase efficiency and maximize profits.

What Is Turn 14 Distribution? (And Why X-Cart Customers Love It)

Named after the fourteenth turn of the challenging Wisconsin International Raceway (Elkhart Lake, Road America), Turn 14 Distribution is a company that has earned a good name in the automotive aftermarket industry for its superior knowledge and service. 

Speciality Equipment Market Association (SEMA) awarded Turn 14 Distribution, Inc. thrice for its excellence in distribution: It earned the Warehouse Distributor of the Year award in 2016, 2018, and 2021. It also won the prestigious SEMA Channel Partner of the Year award in 2022.

In 2023, X-Cart proudly announced its partnership with Turn 14 Distribution. We combined the skills of a leader in parts distribution with our scalable automotive-focused software. As a result, X-Cart users can now integrate  with a nationally recognized warehouse distributor, providing fast delivery times and smooth inventory management.

What You Should Know to Become a Turn 14 Distribution Dealer

The supplier companies are selective when choosing new dealers. They want to ensure your business is reliable enough for a long-term beneficial partnership. Upon application approval, the T14 dealer gets the following benefits: access to massive inventory, post-sales support, 60% US shipping coverage within one day and 100% in two days, and far more.

Requirements to become a T14 dealer:

• Licensed

A business license is a must when filling out a T14 application form. It protects you from possible legal issues and increases your credibility in the eyes of the distributor and your customers. Turn 14 Distribution requests a state sales tax license and federal tax ID.

• Value

Turn 14 Distribution assesses your chances to make high-quality content and efficiently resell products from imported automotive brands. Your value can also be seen in services, such as installation, suspension calibration, or dyno tuning.

• Knowledge

Turn 14 Distribution trusts dealers who have a deep understanding of vehicles, automotive brands, and car models. To resell spare parts, applicants should know the local automotive market and the target audience’s demands, e.g., which auto parts are replaced the most.

• Specialized

This requirement refers to an industry your business focuses on. Turn 14 Distribution is looking for a dealer who concentrates its efforts on the automotive sector or powersports.

• Business

An applicant also needs a professional automotive retail storefront, shop, or proprietary website before becoming a dealer.

How X-Cart Supports the T14 Capabilities

When we say we have seamless integration with Turn 14 Distribution, we mean streamlined back-end operations for data import and order fulfillment.

• Data Import

After you become an approved dealer, you can select automotive aftermarket brands and automatically import their product data into your X-Cart store.

Each brand has its own settings button, so you can configure your personal preferences and schedule automated updates.

• Order Fulfillment

The benefits of eCommerce automation extend far beyond flexible data import. It also simplifies the communication between a store owner and Turn 14 Distribution suppliers.

Once a customer checks out via X-Cart, the system automatically sends new orders to T14 for fulfillment. Their quote technology uses real-time inventory levels to find the closest distribution center(s) to fulfill the order. Then, X-Cart store can show the user the facilit(ies) the order will be fulfilled from and allow them to select from any of the available shipping methods. Additionally, integration makes it possible to display the same shipping rates you get from Turn 14 Distribution, so you can provide expedited shipping rates or Less-Than-Truckload (LTL) rates without having to worry about providing accurate pricing.

Finally, you’ll receive real-time order status and tracking updates from Turn 14 Distribution to inform your customers as soon as their orders have been shipped.

How to Price Auto Parts in Your Online Store

Along with regular inventory updates, pricing can be automatically synchronized between Turn 14 Distribution and X-Cart. Once you get prices from the distributor, you are in control of which pricing strategy your automotive business follows.

How to Price Your Product
Step-by-Step Guide For Beginners

Since X-Cart is an eCommerce platform for selling auto parts and accessories, we offer various add-ons for discounts and special offers to encourage your customers to buy from you:

Price Countdown shows how many days/hours/minutes are left till the end of your special offer.

Price: $85 / Included in the X-Cart Automotive package

The Wholesale add-on allows you to sell products in bulk at a discounted rate.

Price: free

The Sale add-on is used to display a discount badge on your store’s homepage and category pages and motivate customers with an urgency to purchase.

Price: Free, available in the X-Cart Automotive package

How to Leverage Fitment Data

As automotive-centric software, we’ve seen firsthand that fitment accuracy is vital for automotive aftermarket businesses.

At X-Cart, to get precise fitment data, you can utilize SEMA Data integration to enable car parts search by vehicle IDs (received from Turn 14 Distribution).

X-Cart offers the following tools to ensure quick fitment check on your website:

Make/Model/Year is a #1 add-on for auto parts stores. Intuitive, it was made to help your customers find the exact parts for their vehicles.

Price: $295 / Included in the X-Cart Automotive package

Vehicle VIN Lookup for X-Cart stores gives your customers a list of parts that fit their car after entering the vehicle ID into the search bar.

Price: Free, available in X-Cart Automotive only

Wheel & Tire Fitment eases the selection of wheels and tires in your X-Cart store by original or optional OE fitments.

Price: Free, available in X-Cart Automotive only

Let the Right eCommerce Tools Level Up Your Automotive Business

When you dive in automotive eCommerce, you expect to have a website that runs smoothly. You might also be concerned about how to import a massive auto parts catalog, configure complex synchronization, and who to address your questions to if you need help.

The X-Cart Automotive platform is an industry-specific solution that offers a standout storefront design backed by solid software and professional technical support.

In our effective collaboration, X-Cart and Turn 14 Distribution have tried to consider every little nuance for our client’s convenience: from accessing and managing a comprehensive range of products to smooth order fulfillment.