AFTERMARKET CARE
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Truck manufacturers have identified the aftermaricet as an essential revenue stream for their dealer networks, and to increase work levels, repair-andmaintenance deals on new sales, as well as more tailored agreements for secondhand trucks, are vital. Approximately 35% of Renault Trucks Midlands sales have R&M packages.
Carl Fletcher (above), group service manager, says expanding the business requires more than just French-built products, it needs all makes and trailers too.
When the site was being built, Renault entered into talks with VOSA, itself in flux over its transition to private ownership of testing stations and closing some locations, to test on site, but the idea was eventually rejected.
There is a VOSA-specif led lane, but Fletcher says the disruption to the workshop would have been too much. "It doesn't justify the space (it would have needed). We can have a more profitable business if we have it for our own use, rather than sub-letting it to VOSA," he says.
The long-term aim is for 24-hour opening, and Fletcher has to build the existing 600 hours a month to more than 1,150 to make it viable. At Tipton, he says, its 24-hour site has 2,800 workshop hours per month.
A local fleet contract to service more than 115 trailers has helped a deal which meant employing a trailer technician to meet demand and it could grow to in excess of 200.
"We have had a lot of enquiries about trailer servicing now operators have seen the activity," says Chris Hammond (above), who doesn't rule out a potential trailer franchise. "We have got to be flexible enough to consider anything."