10 minute read
Leading by innovation
Jungheinrich Australia has invested in 50 new service vans.
MHD catches up with Grant Stewart, Sales and Marketing Director at Jungheinrich Australia to find out why the fast-growing forklift provider is committed to putting innovation first.
NTP Forklifts has been the exclusive partner for Jungheinrich products in Australia since 2008 and in 2015, Jungheinrich acquired NTP Forklifts. What was once a small privatelyowned local company now has the backing and support of an international organisation with revenue of nearly €3.8 billion in the last financial year.
According to Grant Stewart, Jungheinrich Australia could always offer the high-quality Jungheinrich forklifts but struggled to pair the product with the standard of customer service expected of one of the world’s leading brands. “Jungheinrich is a superior European provider, and their forklifts are top of the range. But with that there is an expectation to give a service that matches the product. However, NTP Forklifts Australia being a small private company just couldn’t match the service offering that some of the other big players could offer,” Grant says. Grant joined Jungheinrich Australia two years after the acquisition happened and was tasked with transforming the organisation to function like a corporate entity, with all the infrastructure and technology that is needed to offer a high-level of support, advice and service. “We recently engaged an independent consultancy to survey our customers. We very quickly found out that customers were happy with the product, but not at all with the service,” Grant says.
For Grant, this discovery resulted in a huge overhaul for Jungheinrich Australia, starting with the branding. “The service levels were not of a standard expected by Jungheinrich. Customers would receive a superior
product but if they needed service or support the standard just wasn’t there. The survey revealed that most of the customers deemed the service ‘worse than we could have anticipated’. But this jolted us into action,” he says.
INVESTING TO SERVE Jungheinrich Australia has been investing heavily in improving the levels of service for its customers. This includes an investment in 50 new service vans, as well as highlyskilled technicians to go with them.
“We bought 50 vans in the space of two to three months. While this is an enormous burden of cost, we are absolutely dedicated to giving the standard of service that is expected,” Grant says.
Additional investments include holding $7.5 million in spare parts locally. “There is an expectation that we have those parts, so we have doubled our spare parts holdings. We can now offer an overnight delivery from Singapore,” Grant says.
Further investments have been made locally too, with a new 13,000 sqm site in Sydney. “This site is almost double the size of our previous Granville facility. I invite anyone to come and have a look. We have spare parts, demonstrations of new products, workshops and even a model warehouse,” Grant says.
This will also be followed with similar facilities being built in Melbourne and Brisbane in the coming months.
TALENT To support the growth and development in Australia, Grant is very aware that the best talent has to be on the team. “We have an extensive training process for our technicians. We have the best industry guys across our service and sales areas,” he says. This includes bringing talent in from across the global Jungheinrich brand. “We send a number of people to Singapore for training regularly and want to make sure that everyone is up to speed with the global standard of Jungheinrich,” Grant says. Grant sees many opportunities at Jungheinrich Australia for those who are looking to grow. “We are looking for the best people, across our service, sales and admin teams. We want the industry best so we urge anyone who wants to join this growth phase to get in touch,” he says.
With more than 30 years in the forklift industry, Grant has seen some major developments. But his main motivator for joining Jungheinrich was to “finish his career on top”, he says.
“When I started in this industry in 1986, there wasn’t much change for many years. The market was the same. We would go out and offer the same truck as every other competitor. But Jungheinrich is so far ahead of the market,” Grant says.
Grant says that many forklift operators here in Australia would engage in automation, technology and innovation but they would often have to take customers to a headquarters in Europe or the US to demonstrate these products. However, with Jungheinrich they have this technology on hand here in Australia to demonstrate to clients that they are committed to this market. “We are heavily invested in technology – automated guided vehicles (AGVs) and our Lithium-Ion offerings are leading the way in this arena,” Grant says. Historically, the Australian market has been slow to offer this kind of technology, Grant says. “There are so many benefits to Lithium-Ion technology. Without even considering the savings on labour costs or OH&S benefits. There are also savings that cover space needed to store spare batteries. With a truck now being able to work three shifts on one charge, you just don’t need that kind of storage space anymore,” Grant says.
Jungheinrich is heavily investing in new technology.
There are additional environmental benefits to this kind of truck. “A traditional battery may last three or four years, but a LithiumIon battery can last seven or eight years in this capacity and then a further four or five in solar housing or building,” Grant says.
MARKET-SHARE Jungheinrich are on a global growth trajectory, and this is also mirrored in Australia. “Our goal is to reach nearly 10 per cent of the market share. We’re number three or four in the market,” Grant says.
In June alone, Jungheinrich Australia sold more than 600 units and Grant doesn’t see any signs of this level of growth slowing down. Jungheinrich has some major businesses on-board here in Australia, including some high value clients such as Coca-Cola and Woolworths.
Jungheinrich Australia also provide forklifts for the entire Hello Fresh operation in Australia. “E-commerce organisations are very much concerned with efficiency and speed. HelloFresh were interested in our offering because it is so quick and we offer a long battery life and fast charge time. This partnership worked well due to the synergies between the two companies. They are a German business and they are on a huge growth trajectory like us, so we just got each other,” Grant says.
There are also plans later this year to diversify the offering and to work with customers to offer an intralogistics solution, something that Jungheinrich is focused on in Europe. “In November this year we will begin to offer our intralogistics solutions and mirror our European offering. We will be a one stop shop for all things materials handling. We’ve transferred one of our directors from Europe to the head office here in Adelaide to start offering this level of service,” Grant says. Jungheinrich recently worked with Toll on the Toll City site in Singapore to offer a complete intralogistics solution. “We did the consultancy, the racking, the trucks, the WMS, the technology, everything was done through Jungheinrich, and this is the level that we will be bringing to the Australian market,” Grant says.
Working for Jungheinrich Australia has given Grant the opportunity to work for an organisation that is leading by innovation, and not reputation, he says. “I love the opportunities that come from working for a large corporate entity – to be able to offer best practice, expert consultancy and high-quality trucks is really motivating at this stage in my career,” Grant says. ■
HOW HELLO FRESH KEEPS ITS WAREHOUSE MOVING
As a fast-growing business with a focus on materials handling efficiency, Hello Fresh needs to be able to rely on its forklifts. Its fleet of rental trucks from Jungheinrich Australia fit this bill perfectly. Combining cutting-edge technology with industry leading service, they allow Hello Fresh to get on with the job of revolutionising the food industry.
Established in Germany 2011 and now delivering over 21 million meals annually, Hello Fresh is changing the way the world buys and prepares food. Now with a presence in 11 countries including Australia, the company is on a mission to take the hassle out of making healthy, fresh tasty meals at home.
With distribution centres in Perth and Sydney, its local arm is on a rapid growth trajectory. To cater for its ever-increasing customer base, it is preparing to expand its facility at Pemulwuy in Western Sydney, which even now handles around a million items at any given time. As a food delivery business, the efficiency of its logistics and materials handing operations will continue to play key roles in its future success.
THE FLEXIBILITY TO GROW According to Justin Foster, Hello Fresh’s Inventory Manager, rather than purchasing its own fleet of forklifts and reach trucks, Hello Fresh chose to rent its equipment through Jungheinrich Australia.
Currently its fleet includes an AM 22 hand pallet truck, an EJE 116n electric pallet truck, an ERE 120n ride-on pallet truck, an EFG 216kn electric counterbalance truck, an ETV 114n electric reach truck, and an ETR 335d double-deep reach truck.
“In 2017, when we started working with Jungheinrich Australia, our site here in Sydney had just been built and our operations were significantly different to what we see today. For one thing, we were doing only 20 per cent of the work we currently handle,” Justin says.
According to Justin, the very fact Hello Fresh rents all its equipment has made these types of changes possible.
“It has meant we have never been tied down. Our operations are agile, and we can increase the size of our fleet as the need arises. Regardless of whether it’s for short or longer-term leases, Jungheinrich Australia can generally supply us a vehicle within two weeks,” he says. JUNGHEINRICH SERVICE AND PARTS CAPABILITY Singling out Martin Strogilakis, one of Jung heinrich Australia’s, Key Account Managers for special mention, Justin praised the quality of service he has received from the company.
“Before establishing the relationship, we were looking for a supplier that believed in Hello Fresh and didn’t see us as a small client; somebody who was willing and prepared to grow with us and treat us as a major account. That’s why we chose Jungheinrich. And that’s what they have d elivered us,” Justin says. “If we have a problem, I’ll send an email to Martin knowing that I’ll have a reply within an hour. Then generally on the same day, or at the latest the next day, I’ll have a tech on site doing everything possible to keep
Hello Fresh chose to rent its equipment through Jungheinrich Australia. our operations moving.”
With its Service and Parts operations centralised at its National Distribution Centre in Sydney, Jungheinrich Australia can ensure parts delivery is as fast as possible. And, in cases where the part needed is not available locally, they are able to call on their international parts network. “Their communication and responsiveness have been key features of our relationship. To me, this type of service goes to show that Jungheinrich values Hello Fresh as a client. As I mentioned, that is exactly what we were looking for when we first considered working with them,” Justin concludes.
