Matt McGinnis, Kem Krest Chief Commercial Officer
September 14, 2026
At Kem Krest’s recent Supplier Summit, automotive OEMs, suppliers, and dealer groups came together to discuss one of the biggest challenges in aftersales: the data gap. This recap shares the key takeaways and why better visibility across the service fluids and parts supply chain matters for OEMs, dealers, and customers.
The Aftersales Data Gap OEMs, Suppliers, and Dealers Need to Close
For the first time in a decade, chains have passed dealers as consumers’ primary vehicle service providers — 42% to 36%. Five years ago, it was 54% dealers, 20% chains.
That 22-point surge in market share for “chains” (multi-location non-dealer service brands) moved the same direction every single year. Consistency like that is what makes a trend structural rather than cyclical.
Kurt Ranka of Ducker Carlisle opened with that number at the Kem Krest Supplier Summit we hosted last week in Ypsilanti, Michigan, and it reset the room. Nearly 40 supplier organizations were there, along with many of the leading automotive OEMs, as well as 5 of the most influential and outspoken car dealer groups. The theme of the summit was “Driving Clarity,” and the framing was simple: walk the aftersales chain end to end — OEM to supplier to dealer — and be honest about where the friction actually is.
Here’s what I took away, and it wasn’t what I expected.
Nobody in that room was short on data. What we were short on was a shared picture.
Every link is run by capable people making rational decisions with what’s in front of them — and each picture stops at the edge of its own link. The OEM sees a program. The supplier sees a forecast, a freight lane, a regulatory filing. The dealer sees a service lane and a customer who wants the vehicle back today.
When those pictures don’t line up, the cost doesn’t disappear. It shows up as expedited freight. As obsolete inventory. As a part that isn’t on the shelf on a Friday afternoon. And eventually as a customer who doesn’t come back.
Dealer Service Retention Is Losing Ground to Chains
The economics underneath the shift in market share paint a concerning picture. Since 2016, average customer-pay sales per repair order at dealers rose 82%, against 31% CPI over the same period. The average dealer transaction now runs about $522, versus $334 at independents and $270 at general chains — a 56% premium over independents for comparable service scope. Dealer cost per visit is up $120 since 2022 alone, the largest absolute increase of any channel.
And it compounds: volume falls, prices rise to protect margin, higher prices push out more volume. Today 38% of consumers describe dealers as “expensive or very expensive,” roughly twice the rate for chains — a perception set before the customer ever arrives. Among 18-to-24-year-olds, dealer share fell from 50% to 29% in five years. Where that cohort goes now, the market follows in a decade.
The frustrating part is that dealers are not losing on quality. Dealer first-repair-first-time runs 89% against 77% for chains. And when a customer’s primary provider is a dealer, loyalty is the most durable in the industry — dealer NPS slips only 6 points between repeat customers and all recent visitors, the narrowest gap of any channel. Chains drop 17 points. They’re filling the lane and failing to keep people.
So, dealers win when they’re in the consideration set. Unfortunately, they’re increasingly not in it. That is a supply and information problem as much as a marketing one.
Why Aftersales Data Gaps Create Risk Across the Supply Chain
That’s the structural issue, and we don’t say it plainly enough.
Information in our industry moves downhill. Specifications, requirements, forecasts, program changes — they originate at the OEM and pass down. Each party receives what the party above chooses to send.
Risk moves the other direction. The supplier carries the raw materials, production capacity, and manufacturers the inventory. The distributor carries the inventory, working capital, warehouse space, freight exposure, and increasingly… the liability. The dealer carries the customer relationship — the only part of this that’s genuinely hard to replace.
The people holding the most downside operate with the least visibility. Stated that way it sounds obviously broken. It persists because it’s nobody’s job to fix it: the gap sits between organizations, and every function is optimized for its own link.
It also hits precisely where it hurts most. When Ducker Carlisle asked buyers across dealers, fleets, independents and retailers what drives their purchase decisions, availability of parts ranked first — ahead of delivery speed, ease of doing business, and price. Availability is a forecasting outcome. Forecasting is a data-sharing outcome.
Two Models for OEM Aftersales Data Sharing
The Gatekeeper model is how most of this industry runs today.
The OEM sets the specification and controls approval. Requirements pass down sequentially. Information is released on a need-to-know basis, and “need” is defined by the party above you.
It has real virtues — structured, auditable, brand-protective. For new-vehicle production, with high volumes and tight tolerances, it’s a reasonable design.
It breaks in aftersales, which behaves nothing like production. Demand is unpredictable, volumes are small and spiky, vehicle populations age. Todd Campau, Senior Director of MEMA (The Vehicle Supplier Association), also spoke at the summit. His research shared suppliers’ own words on it: the OES process is reliable but bureaucratic, with long lead times, gaps in data exchange, and 15-year obligations against declining demand. Parts approvals are slow even for components that were originally OE. As one supplier put it, the process is very structured — but structured is not the same as “efficient”.
The fix suppliers proposed wasn’t deregulation. It was proportionality: treat aftersales like the aftermarket (aka the retail channel) with all of the price sensitivity and data requirements needed to compete in that channel. Structure original contracts with the OES channel in mind, and move at the speed of trust with partners who’ve delivered for ten or fifteen years without issue.
The Tripartite model is the alternative for data sharing. In our world it has three parties: the OEM, the supplier of parts or chemicals, and the distributor that moves, stores, kits, and delivers to the dealer.
Those three run the program together rather than in sequence. Direction is agreed jointly. Forecasts, replacement rates, inventory positions, and field data are shared across all three rather than passed down one rung at a time. The distributor isn’t a vendor executing instructions — it’s a party to the plan, because it’s the only participant who can see both what the OEM committed to and what the dealer is actually consuming.
Sit with that last point. The distributor occupies the seam. It’s the one position where upstream commitment and downstream reality are visible at the same time. A gatekeeper structure wastes that vantage point entirely.
What OEMs and Suppliers Can Improve When Aftersales Data Is Shared
MEMA asked suppliers directly what they wish their OEM partners would share. The list was specific: replacement rates at the part-number and application level, regional volume estimates, car parc data, vehicle diagnostic data, inventory transparency — and a reliable twelve-month forecast.
What they’d do with it was equally concrete: sharper forecasting and right-sized inventory investment, faster response to field issues, participation in product planning early enough to influence it, and production planning that reserves adequate volume for service instead of treating it as leftover capacity.
The flow is blocked upstream too. Suppliers hold quality and durability data, technical and installation guidance, product collateral, and insights connecting jobs that come due at similar service intervals. Most of it never reaches anyone who could use it. One respondent summed it up: we have material we’d love to share, but it isn’t always easy.
The sharpest example: when a supplier engineers a solution to an original design issue, it’s often difficult to push that improvement through the aftersales channel — so the better part goes to the independent aftermarket instead. Everyone loses that trade. The OEM loses the fix, the dealer loses the sale, and the customer gets the improvement from somebody else.
Put that next to the consumer data and the cost becomes concrete. A dealer channel losing 18-point share over five years cannot also afford to be the channel where the improved part isn’t available.
A Better Question for OEM Aftersales Leaders
I’m not arguing gatekeeper governance is wrong. Some programs require it.
I’m arguing that most of us never chose a model. We inherited one, and we’re running automotive aftersales on governance built for production — while the consumer data says we have maybe a decade before the habits harden.
So: which model is your aftersales business actually operating under? And if you’re honest that it’s gatekeeper, what would it take to move one program — just one — closer to tripartite? With Kem Krest’s position as the leading aftersales distributor, we are actively working with OEM partners to help them close the data gap between OEMs, Suppliers, and Dealers.
The most useful thing anyone said to us last week was about a supplier relationship that finally clicked: once you’re connected, they share really well.
The willingness was never the problem. The connection was.
Sources:
Consumer and channel data: Ducker Carlisle 2025 Consumer Sentiment Study (4,820 consumers, OEM service benchmark data from 19 OEMs, and analysis of 6 billion annual card transactions). https://www.duckercarlisle.com/
Supplier survey findings: MEMA original research – Todd Campau, Senior Director, MEMA. https://www.mema.org/
Both presented at the 2026 Kem Krest Supplier Summit in September 2026. Content used with permission.
Matt McGinnis is Chief Commercial Officer at Kem Krest and a board member of the Independent Lubricant Manufacturers Association. www.kemkrest.com www.ilma.org
Matt McGinnis, Kem Krest Chief Commercial Officer
September 14, 2026
At Kem Krest’s recent Supplier Summit, automotive OEMs, suppliers, and dealer groups came together to discuss one of the biggest challenges in aftersales: the data gap. This recap shares the key takeaways and why better visibility across the service fluids and parts supply chain matters for OEMs, dealers, and customers.
The Aftersales Data Gap OEMs, Suppliers, and Dealers Need to Close
For the first time in a decade, chains have passed dealers as consumers’ primary vehicle service providers — 42% to 36%. Five years ago, it was 54% dealers, 20% chains.
That 22-point surge in market share for “chains” (multi-location non-dealer service brands) moved the same direction every single year. Consistency like that is what makes a trend structural rather than cyclical.
Kurt Ranka of Ducker Carlisle opened with that number at the Kem Krest Supplier Summit we hosted last week in Ypsilanti, Michigan, and it reset the room. Nearly 40 supplier organizations were there, along with many of the leading automotive OEMs, as well as 5 of the most influential and outspoken car dealer groups. The theme of the summit was “Driving Clarity,” and the framing was simple: walk the aftersales chain end to end — OEM to supplier to dealer — and be honest about where the friction actually is.
Here’s what I took away, and it wasn’t what I expected.
Nobody in that room was short on data. What we were short on was a shared picture.
Every link is run by capable people making rational decisions with what’s in front of them — and each picture stops at the edge of its own link. The OEM sees a program. The supplier sees a forecast, a freight lane, a regulatory filing. The dealer sees a service lane and a customer who wants the vehicle back today.
When those pictures don’t line up, the cost doesn’t disappear. It shows up as expedited freight. As obsolete inventory. As a part that isn’t on the shelf on a Friday afternoon. And eventually as a customer who doesn’t come back.
Dealer Service Retention Is Losing Ground to Chains
The economics underneath the shift in market share paint a concerning picture. Since 2016, average customer-pay sales per repair order at dealers rose 82%, against 31% CPI over the same period. The average dealer transaction now runs about $522, versus $334 at independents and $270 at general chains — a 56% premium over independents for comparable service scope. Dealer cost per visit is up $120 since 2022 alone, the largest absolute increase of any channel.
And it compounds: volume falls, prices rise to protect margin, higher prices push out more volume. Today 38% of consumers describe dealers as “expensive or very expensive,” roughly twice the rate for chains — a perception set before the customer ever arrives. Among 18-to-24-year-olds, dealer share fell from 50% to 29% in five years. Where that cohort goes now, the market follows in a decade.
The frustrating part is that dealers are not losing on quality. Dealer first-repair-first-time runs 89% against 77% for chains. And when a customer’s primary provider is a dealer, loyalty is the most durable in the industry — dealer NPS slips only 6 points between repeat customers and all recent visitors, the narrowest gap of any channel. Chains drop 17 points. They’re filling the lane and failing to keep people.
So, dealers win when they’re in the consideration set. Unfortunately, they’re increasingly not in it. That is a supply and information problem as much as a marketing one.
Why Aftersales Data Gaps Create Risk Across the Supply Chain
That’s the structural issue, and we don’t say it plainly enough.
Information in our industry moves downhill. Specifications, requirements, forecasts, program changes — they originate at the OEM and pass down. Each party receives what the party above chooses to send.
Risk moves the other direction. The supplier carries the raw materials, production capacity, and manufacturers the inventory. The distributor carries the inventory, working capital, warehouse space, freight exposure, and increasingly… the liability. The dealer carries the customer relationship — the only part of this that’s genuinely hard to replace.
The people holding the most downside operate with the least visibility. Stated that way it sounds obviously broken. It persists because it’s nobody’s job to fix it: the gap sits between organizations, and every function is optimized for its own link.
It also hits precisely where it hurts most. When Ducker Carlisle asked buyers across dealers, fleets, independents and retailers what drives their purchase decisions, availability of parts ranked first — ahead of delivery speed, ease of doing business, and price. Availability is a forecasting outcome. Forecasting is a data-sharing outcome.
Two Models for OEM Aftersales Data Sharing
The Gatekeeper model is how most of this industry runs today.
The OEM sets the specification and controls approval. Requirements pass down sequentially. Information is released on a need-to-know basis, and “need” is defined by the party above you.
It has real virtues — structured, auditable, brand-protective. For new-vehicle production, with high volumes and tight tolerances, it’s a reasonable design.
It breaks in aftersales, which behaves nothing like production. Demand is unpredictable, volumes are small and spiky, vehicle populations age. Todd Campau, Senior Director of MEMA (The Vehicle Supplier Association), also spoke at the summit. His research shared suppliers’ own words on it: the OES process is reliable but bureaucratic, with long lead times, gaps in data exchange, and 15-year obligations against declining demand. Parts approvals are slow even for components that were originally OE. As one supplier put it, the process is very structured — but structured is not the same as “efficient”.
The fix suppliers proposed wasn’t deregulation. It was proportionality: treat aftersales like the aftermarket (aka the retail channel) with all of the price sensitivity and data requirements needed to compete in that channel. Structure original contracts with the OES channel in mind, and move at the speed of trust with partners who’ve delivered for ten or fifteen years without issue.
The Tripartite model is the alternative for data sharing. In our world it has three parties: the OEM, the supplier of parts or chemicals, and the distributor that moves, stores, kits, and delivers to the dealer.
Those three run the program together rather than in sequence. Direction is agreed jointly. Forecasts, replacement rates, inventory positions, and field data are shared across all three rather than passed down one rung at a time. The distributor isn’t a vendor executing instructions — it’s a party to the plan, because it’s the only participant who can see both what the OEM committed to and what the dealer is actually consuming.
Sit with that last point. The distributor occupies the seam. It’s the one position where upstream commitment and downstream reality are visible at the same time. A gatekeeper structure wastes that vantage point entirely.
What OEMs and Suppliers Can Improve When Aftersales Data Is Shared
MEMA asked suppliers directly what they wish their OEM partners would share. The list was specific: replacement rates at the part-number and application level, regional volume estimates, car parc data, vehicle diagnostic data, inventory transparency — and a reliable twelve-month forecast.
What they’d do with it was equally concrete: sharper forecasting and right-sized inventory investment, faster response to field issues, participation in product planning early enough to influence it, and production planning that reserves adequate volume for service instead of treating it as leftover capacity.
The flow is blocked upstream too. Suppliers hold quality and durability data, technical and installation guidance, product collateral, and insights connecting jobs that come due at similar service intervals. Most of it never reaches anyone who could use it. One respondent summed it up: we have material we’d love to share, but it isn’t always easy.
The sharpest example: when a supplier engineers a solution to an original design issue, it’s often difficult to push that improvement through the aftersales channel — so the better part goes to the independent aftermarket instead. Everyone loses that trade. The OEM loses the fix, the dealer loses the sale, and the customer gets the improvement from somebody else.
Put that next to the consumer data and the cost becomes concrete. A dealer channel losing 18-point share over five years cannot also afford to be the channel where the improved part isn’t available.
A Better Question for OEM Aftersales Leaders
I’m not arguing gatekeeper governance is wrong. Some programs require it.
I’m arguing that most of us never chose a model. We inherited one, and we’re running automotive aftersales on governance built for production — while the consumer data says we have maybe a decade before the habits harden.
So: which model is your aftersales business actually operating under? And if you’re honest that it’s gatekeeper, what would it take to move one program — just one — closer to tripartite? With Kem Krest’s position as the leading aftersales distributor, we are actively working with OEM partners to help them close the data gap between OEMs, Suppliers, and Dealers.
The most useful thing anyone said to us last week was about a supplier relationship that finally clicked: once you’re connected, they share really well.
The willingness was never the problem. The connection was.
Sources:
Consumer and channel data: Ducker Carlisle 2025 Consumer Sentiment Study (4,820 consumers, OEM service benchmark data from 19 OEMs, and analysis of 6 billion annual card transactions). https://www.duckercarlisle.com/
Supplier survey findings: MEMA original research – Todd Campau, Senior Director, MEMA. https://www.mema.org/
Both presented at the 2026 Kem Krest Supplier Summit in September 2026. Content used with permission.
Matt McGinnis is Chief Commercial Officer at Kem Krest and a board member of the Independent Lubricant Manufacturers Association. www.kemkrest.com www.ilma.org
