GOOD TIM
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What should the truck dealership of the future look like, where should it be and how should it sell its services? Lancaster reckons that it has some of the answers at its new Mercedes-Benz outlet in Dartford.
• Lancaster's new Mercedes-Benz truck dealership has three important things going for it: design, position and management. All of them are as forwardlooking as possible.
Lancaster, whose sales territory is east London and Essex, has made a conscious decision to improve the image of truck selling and it has built a brand-new dealership to prove it. "We've definitely tried to go more upmarket than the average truck dealership," says Ian Dobson, Lancaster's southern division managing director. "I think that our main objective was to raise the quality of service for drivers. That was the key element in the equation."
Lancaster moved into commercial vehicle sales in 1983 when it purchased Goodliffe Trucks in the East End. The dealership was based in Chequers Lane in Dagenham, down a side-street and behind a railway line off the A13. They were just the sort of cramped, dirty and oldfashioned premises Dobson detests. The company began looking around for a new site, and a new image.
The search took three years, before the company found an industrial estate being built at West Thutrock, right alongside the north entrance to the M25's Dartford Tunnel. It is an excellent, modern and spacious location, ideal for picking up passing trade from the motorway.
When Commercial Motor visited the new dealership it had only been open for a week, but it had already dealt with several foreign registered trucks which were passing through the Tunnel and decided to drop in for assistance.
Dobson is keen to give the new dealership a convivial atmosphere and make it the sort of place drivers will want to drop into for what he calls "a full onestop service".
"This is a one-way site," he says, waving his hand round the outside of the building. "Customers drive in and bring their vehicles round to the main reception area, and then drop off the keys with us. We have designed it all so that the driver can then sit in a pleasant reception area and have a coffee and read or watch the colour TV." The waiting area is big, brightly lit and has a sandwich, crisps and chocolate dispensing machine.
Nothing has been left to chance. The building is a 25m wide, steel frame, onespan unit clad in trendy mirror glass and the overall effect is neat, tidy and very high-tech. It took 18 months to build and cost about .E2 million.
RETURN ON CAPITAL
Since it acquired its first truck dealership Lancaster increased its total sales by 60%, a large proportion of which comes from the after-sales and spare parts market. Lancaster's return on capital has been around 22%, and the new
investment is going to dent that record for a year or so but, according to Dobson, "we aim to return to that level in two years' time", There is certainly enough space to grow. The new site has around 1,860m2 of room available.
Keeping the customer happy includes giving him a shuttle bus at Lancaster. "If the driver doesn't want to wait around here," says Dobson, "we provide a shuttle bus to take him back to his depot. The bus will run all round east London and Essex and pick up on request" The bus idea is typical of the way Dobson is imparting a number of high quality car sales techniques into truck dealership. Lancaster sells a wide range of vehicle marques including Volvo, Mercedes, Audi, Porsche, Ferrari, Volkswagen, Vauxhall, Honda and Jaguar. The company is part of the big Jardine Matheson group.
Lancaster also has four drivers who will go out to customers' yards and collect the vehicles if needed. "I want to make sure that none of our customers is ever forced to waste time on our behalf," says Dobson. Three of the delivery and collection drivers are HGV holders. "We're keen to retain every old customer from our east London territories," says Dobson, "and I think that by treating them properly they will form a better relationship with us. I reckon that we will be able to do about 50% of our servicing work on the collection and delivery system."
The quick, drive-through concept extends to the workshops themselves where each service lane can accommodate three vans or two HGVs at any one time. "There will be 22 technicians in there by September," says Dobson, "and six of them will work in our paint shop."
The paint shop is way ahead of the competition and is again bringing car service standards to the truck world. It is an Italian-made Saico unit, which can be divided into two for spraying vans or opened up.as one large HGV shop. Hot air circulates down from the ceiling through a giant gas-fired heating and baking system.
"We're spending about £120,000 on the paint shop spray booth alone," says Dobson, "and we're investing heavily in chassis realignment equipment for major axle repair work. Dobson claims that his Sako paint unit is one of the first in the UK for commercial vehicles.
The floor is quarry tiled in the main workshop area which keeps things neat and tidy. "Our old Dagenham depot had a traditional concrete floor," says Dobson, "and that just used to absorb all the grease and oil we threw at it." The nonslip tiles will absorb very little muck and Mercedes-Benz recommends them to its dealers.
A lot of planning has gone into plumbing-in all the air and lubrication feed lines to the working areas. "We wanted to keep the number of leads and hoses trailing around the floor to the absolute minimum," says Dobson.
PARTS DELIVERY
Lancaster stocked up the new dealership with about 2250,000 worth of parts. There are between 10,000 and 12,000 lines held at Dartford, and a fleet of company vans will deliver parts as needed to key customers. "There are 1,200 names on our customer account list at the moment," says Dobson, "plus a large number of casuals."
The extra room at Dartford will also allow Lancaster to go into used sales. A separate compound with closed circuit TV and night-time security guard is being provided for used vehicles.
"Some of my other car sales philosophies will include opening from 8am to lOpm," says Dobson, "and on Saturdays, too." His sales force of five are HGV-trained in the main, and have good all-round truck experience. "They're consultants nowadays really, and they have to sell on things like whole-life costs. We're also an approved tachograph test centre too so we have all sorts of extra packages to sell."
Why invest 22 million in a new truck dealership when much of the industry is in the doldrums. "I wasn't happy to operate from sub-standard premises," says Dobson. "Our strategy is to out-perform in every area. Good quality staff is essential to success and decent working conditions help generate that. This is the biggest ever investment in a solus Mercedes-Benz truck dealership."
Dobson is staying hungry. "The heavyweight sector was up in sales terms by 30% in the first five months of this year over 1986, and the van sector has grown by about 10%. That's MercedesBenz' overall market share. We're going to keep pace with that growth, if not better it."
by Geoff Hadwick