Michael Welch OBE, leading entrepreneur in the tyre industry, has announced plans to launch Rolo Tires in Europe, supported by advanced agentic technology.
Rolo is a new premium tyre brand founded by Michael Welch, the entrepreneur behind Blackcircles.com. Its mission is to make high-quality tyres more accessible to everyday motorists. Having spent more than two decades building tyre retail businesses across the UK, continental Europe, Asia and the United States, Welch believes the economics of the passenger tyre market have changed. Though they continue to favour quality and safety, motorists no longer accept that premium tyres should sit behind traditional price gaps.
Rolo’s planned roll out is to 6 European markets initially: France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain and the UK. It aims to sell to consumers by Q1 2027 and a North American expansion is planned for 2028. From its launch, it will offer summer and all-season tyres across its core product families:
Rolo 1 – Passenger car tyres for everyday driving, dialled up.
Rolo 2 – UHP tyres, made to move you.
Rolo T – 4×4 and light truck tyres, with big confidence built for bigger journeys.
The brand will launch through a direct-to-consumer model, allowing customers to buy online and have tyres shipped directly.
Rolo’s operating model draws on Welch’s 30 years of experience building tyre retail businesses. The company has developed and extensively tested agentic systems to support repeatable workflows across the business, helping Rolo operate in a leaner, more responsive and more consistent way from the outset, while positioning it to scale globally.
Rolo is open to selective strategic partnerships with retail, mobility, fleet, digital commerce or market-specific partners in Europe, who can accelerate growth while protecting the brand’s customer-first proposition.
Founder Michael Welch said: “I’m really excited to announce the launch of Rolo. Our factory-direct model is designed to give motorists access to premium-quality tyres at a more reasonable price, without asking them to compromise on quality, confidence or value. Starting direct-to-consumer is the cleanest way to establish the brand, the value proposition and the customer experience. But Europe is a diverse market, and we know the right partners can help us move faster in the right places. We are open to conversations with people who understand where the industry is heading.”
“The tyre business has a lot of operational complexity, but much of it is repeatable. After 30 years in the industry, I know where that complexity sits. What is different today is that modern technology allows us to define our processes much more precisely and deliver them far more consistently. Rolo is being designed around that idea: use agentic systems to handle repeatable work at scale, while keeping human judgement focused on the decisions that actually need it.”
Rolo is being built with wider social purpose. The company will support causes focused around enterprise, young people, and adoption and fostering via philanthropic partnerships with The King’s Trust and the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, established by Wendy’s founder Dave Thomas.
Welch said: “Business has given me opportunities I could never have imagined when I was starting out. As Rolo expands, I want part of that growth to support young people, enterprise and families. That has to be part of the brand from the beginning, not a soundbite or afterthought.”
Rolo’s mission is to build a modern, global tyre brand that makes premium tyre quality more accessible, more understandable, and better value for motorists.
The global online tyre e-commerce market is estimated at over USD 5.6 billion.
“The tyre market has changed, but the old hierarchy has not caught up. For years, the established premium brands benefited from enormous brand pull. Drivers bought what they knew, what their garage recommended, or what they had always been told was ‘best’.
That worked when the quality gap was obvious and information was limited. But today the picture is very different. Value brands have improved dramatically, customers are more price-conscious, and tyre label ratings now give people a more objective way to compare wet grip, efficiency and noise. Consumers can see more for themselves. They are asking whether the traditional premium price gap is really justified.
At the same time, the big manufacturers are under pressure to protect mix and margin. They are becoming more selective about where they focus their portfolio, their manufacturing capacity and their investment in tyre sizes. That creates a gap in the market. Customers do not want cheap for the sake of cheap. They still want premium levels of safety, confidence and quality – but they do not want to feel they are paying a legacy brand premium just because of the name on the sidewall.
That is the gap Rolo is being built to fill: a brand built for today’s consumer offering premium-quality tyres, a focused range of high-volume sizes, factory-direct economics and a price that makes sense for today’s driver.
We are not here to play by the old tyre hierarchy. We are here to challenge it.”
