Navistar Inc. has achieved a dealer authorization milestone with more than 100 dealer locations ready to guide fleets through their electric vehicle journey. With other EV-authorized dealers in process, Navistar will have more than 30% of its dealer locations ready to support the sale and service of both International and IC Bus EVs. These dealers cover 41 states and seven of 10 Canadian provinces.
To be EV-authorized, dealers must:
Provide a sales plan and resources to support the customer through the planning and delivery phases of their EV journey.
Invest in technician training to provide timely maintenance and repairs.
Invest in service equipment including lifts, tools and chargers to ensure dealers are fully prepared to diagnose all aspects of EVs and keep customer vehicles on the road.
“The International and IC Bus dealer network lives our customer-first value, and that is no different in the transition to EVs,” says Debbie Shust, vice president of the Work Truck Business, Navistar. “A zero-emissions future requires collaboration from all stakeholders. For our customers to have a positive experience with EVs, our dealers must be appropriately prepared to sell and service them.”
“We see the future of commercial transportation being more and more battery electric in certain applications,” says Rick Otten, president of Cumberland, an International and IC Bus dealer with nine locations across Tennessee and Florida. “We want to be ahead of the curve to best serve our customers and provide a flawless customer service experience for all the vehicles we offer — either diesel, electric or other fuel options — by application as a bridge to potentially electric as a solution.”
Navistar supports dealers and customers with a dedicated Zero Emissions team, following a three-step consultative approach to help customers more easily transition to EVs:
Consulting. Understanding concerns, motivations to adopt EVs, and discuss short- and long-term plans. This allows us to help craft an adoption roadmap for the customer that can include route and range analysis, grant funding, and charging and infrastructure planning.
Charging and infrastructure. Understanding power needs, assisting the customer in making the appropriate charging hardware decisions based on specific routes and application and future-proofing operations by looking at the customer’s long-term EV goals. Navistar and its partners can support customers in the design and buildout of infrastructure and charging.
Customer onboarding. Coordination of truck and body build timing, charging and infrastructure build, as well as customer, driver and other training to ensure that when the vehicle arrives, it can be woven into customers’ operations with minimal disruption.
Currently Navistar offers the all-electric International eMV Series medium-duty vehicle and the Electric CE Series from the electric school bus manufacturer IC Bus LLC.
