You've seen Cuprinol's wooden man on TV — now see
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him on the trucks. The company's award-winning livery is an example of transferring a successful advertising campaign on to a vehicle fleet. paign. The picture of the Cuprinol man sitting on a fence gets across the message about its two main products, wood preservative and varnish, says customer services manager Pete Calvert.
The design, a brown illustration, green lettering on a white background, and a green chassis and cab, replaced a more basic livery. Although it used similiar colours, it did not "get the message across", says Calvert. The new one is a vinyl transfer and was drawn up by London firm Design Group International. The cost of the entire new image was about 250,000.
Remarkably, its trucks are between five and ten years old. Eight are Scammells. The other is an Iveco Ford Cargo. Tne oldest has done 800,000km. The company, which is based in Frame, Somerset, plans to modernise its fleet this year. Al] its 32.5-tonne drawbars carry twin demountable boxes. It uses seven subcontractors to do deliveries around the country. They tend to do smaller outlets, while Cuprinol delivers to the larger retailers direct.
Its products are carried on pallets and vary in size between 125m1 cans and 205litre barrels. Larger loads are carried in six three-compartment tanks, which can hold 10,500 litres.
The company won praise from judges in last year's competition for having a "clear and coherent" design which made a "dull product look interesting". However, there was some doubt over whether its reflective logo conformed to Construction and Use regulations. Commercial Motor checked with Department of Transport officials, which said it did.
El by Murdo Morrison