Our customer is an established automotive parts distributor with extensive experience in the Iraqi market.
Iraq’s brake pad market is highly competitive, with numerous brands offering products that look and perform much the same. The customer needed a distinctive private-label brand that could stand out from the competition while earning recognition and trust from end users.
Most of Iraq consists of plains and deserts. The country has a hot, dry climate, with summer temperatures reaching as high as 50°C. These conditions place particularly high demands on the heat resistance of brake pads.
Northeastern Iraq, especially the Kurdistan Region, is more mountainous and hilly. Frequent slopes and elevation changes require brake pads with greater wear resistance and durability.
Different operating environments therefore require different product solutions.
Customers in the plains are highly price-sensitive. Some buyers purchase large quantities of inexpensive products without fully understanding their materials or performance. This often results in inconsistent quality and constantly changing end-user groups.
In the mountainous northeast, customers have higher expectations for braking performance and require products that are more stable, durable, and wear-resistant.
Based on these differences, we developed two friction formulas for the customer:
Iraq experiences strong winds and frequent sandstorms. Sand can easily enter the brake calipers and other braking-system components. To address this problem, we supplied maintenance kits for brake hoses, calipers, and related components.
Sand entering the area between the brake pad and brake disc can also cause abnormal braking noise. We therefore further optimized the friction formula to improve braking comfort and noise performance.
Before beginning the partnership, we spent approximately two weeks researching the customer’s operations and local market requirements. This allowed Super Stop to enter the market with products closely matched to actual conditions in Iraq.
Before working with us, the customer purchased brake discs from another factory. However, procurement costs were high, while technical specifications and casting standards varied considerably between manufacturers.
Brake discs on the market often suffer from problems such as inconsistent quality, substandard materials, and excessive weight reduction. The customer did not have sufficient technical expertise to evaluate these products, choose the right surface coating, or identify a dependable factory.
Communicating with multiple suppliers required considerable time and effort, yet still did not guarantee the right choice.
To solve these problems at the source, Super Stop invested in a large brake disc factory in 2019 and became one of its shareholders. The factory has specialized in brake disc production since 1996. This investment allowed us to bring brake discs into our own controlled supply chain.
The Iraqi market contained many competing brands, but few products had distinctive features. It was therefore difficult for the customer to build market share and establish a strong reputation in a highly homogeneous market.
The customer needed a product range that could strengthen brand recognition while remaining competitive in a price-sensitive market.
Brake disc sourcing was another long-standing challenge. The customer had already worked with six or seven brake disc suppliers but was still unable to find a partner that could provide consistently reliable quality and dependable delivery.
We worked with the customer to understand local purchasing habits and market price expectations.
Taking Super Stop’s premium positioning into account, we developed an integrated strategy combining:
The goal was to give Super Stop a recognizable identity from the moment it entered the market.
We differentiated Super Stop at every level, from the packaging to the appearance of the products themselves.
The attractive and highly recognizable design allows customers to identify the brand immediately, helping it stand out in a market filled with similar products.
We supplied Super Stop with three maintenance kits covering the main service requirements of the braking system:
Together, these kits provide comprehensive maintenance support for the braking system.
Super Stop brake pads use upgraded red rubber-coated anti-noise shims of the same type used for Marelli products. These shims provide better heat insulation and noise control.
The brake pads use Marelli’s HC04X friction formula, maintaining the same high-quality positioning and performance standards.
We use an Italian-imported break-in coating that provides effective heat insulation, supports faster bedding-in, and helps remove contaminants from the brake disc surface.
Unlike some domestic coatings that may look similar but can lead to braking noise, the performance of our coating has been proven in practical applications.
We developed the Super Stop partially coated brake disc series to complement the brake pads.
The non-friction surfaces are protected with a GEOMET anti-corrosion coating, which is environmentally friendly and offers excellent corrosion resistance. The braking surfaces remain in their original finish and are not covered with paint or any other coating.
This design makes installation much easier. There is no need to grind the braking surfaces or clean them with chemical cleaner before installation, making the products more convenient for downstream repair shops.
The brake discs also work smoothly with our brake pads as a complete braking solution.
After the customer entrusted us with its brake disc sourcing challenges, we revised the product plan and arranged for the brake discs and brake pads to be shipped together. This became a successful one-stop purchasing solution.
The customer also frequently encountered problems with drum brake shoes.
Brake shoes can be difficult to install, and inexpensive products often have inaccurate dimensions. This can result in high rework rates for repair shops and, in some cases, problems affecting entire batches.
Super Stop brake shoes are manufactured using more precise production equipment and grinding machines. Their friction materials are developed based on our disc brake pad formulas, helping to maintain a consistent pedal feel and level of comfort between the front and rear braking systems.
With its attractive appearance and excellent price-to-performance ratio, Super Stop quickly gained recognition in the Iraqi market and helped the customer strengthen its local market share.
Super Stop focuses not only on premium quality but also on delivering outstanding value for money.
The customer continues to increase its investment in promoting Super Stop.
We conduct two local promotional campaigns in Iraq each year. The customer also brings its distributors to Baghdad or Erbil twice a year for product knowledge training.
These training sessions focus on helping distributors understand how to sell the products and clearly communicate their key advantages. Combined marketing programs have also generated significant local interest and customer traffic, with further promotional support being introduced continuously.
By supplying brake pads, brake discs, and brake shoes as one complete package, we eliminated the customer’s need to coordinate with six or seven different suppliers.
We have now worked with the customer for four years, and its annual purchasing volume continues to grow:
The entire Super Stop product range can also be supplied under other customers’ private labels without increasing the overall price.
Both the brake pads and brake discs come from factories within our own supply chain. Our brake disc factory has manufactured brake discs since 1996, and we became one of its shareholders in 2019. This gives us strong control over quality, supply, and cost.
We also helped the customer calculate the true cost of procurement. If a batch has quality problems and an entire container cannot be sold, both purchasing costs and operating expenses increase substantially. Choosing a reliable, integrated solution from the beginning is therefore the most cost-effective option.
The customer no longer needs to attend trade shows around the world or make repeated trips to China. Savings on trade show expenses alone can reduce the average cost of each product by RMB 1–2.
After the products entered the market, we also developed promotional gifts for the customer, including hand cleaner, gloves, brake fluid, and brake cleaner spray.
This support helped create a complete brake-system product range backed by ongoing marketing and promotional activities.
Today, the customer can focus entirely on operating its local business and maintaining its customers and distribution network, without having to worry about supply-chain issues.
