TR Footnotes FN_1212 : Page 1

TOWING & RECOVERY The Independent Voice of the Towing Industry December 2012 FOOTN TES S ® A G VIN TER 3 MO NS ge 1 MO ee Pa Keeping Industry Pros on Their Tows www.trfootnotes.com GETTO Century 1075 rotator in Belgium WORK SEE PAGE 21 Seeking new employees or to buy or sell a business? Advertise in our new classified Jobs section for a special rate of just $50 for a limited time! Your ad will be seen in four places: in print, online & in two monthly eNewsletters! SPOTLIGHT In This Issue: In The Towing Tow Trucks Abroad Building & selling them overseas is not like here Finance For January: Special Issue: Auto Body & Repair Advertise Now! Call David Abraham 877-219-7734, Ext 1 Volume 23, Number 8 x $3.95 © 2012 Causey Enterprises, LLC. All Rights Reserved. South Africa: Car Towing’s NRC BY THOMAS G. DOLAN PRST STD U.S. POSTAGE PAID PEORIA, IL PERMIT NO. 315 Towing & Recovery Footnotes P .O. Box 64397 Virginia Beach, VA 23467 ® The global nature of the marketplace is hardly new. What is new, however, for U.S. and Canadian manufacturers and distributors of tow trucks and tow-ing equipment is that their overseas business seems to be growing despite the worldwide recession. However, the two North American countries face many of the same challenges as well as the rewards in selling to the rest of the world beyond the dividing oceans. NRC Industries of St. Paul D’Abbots-ford, Quebec, Canada, has been sell-ing tow trucks overseas for at least the last 18 years, including in Europe, the Far East, Australia, and South Africa, according to NRC’s Export Sales Manag-er Bruce Jackson. “The overseas market has been growing for quite some time,” Jackson said. “Though there have been some ups and downs, overall growth has been steady and now appears to be growing even faster.” One challenge that all North Ameri-can companies face, Jackson continued, “is different countries have different rules and regulations that have to be met before the vehicle is allowed on See TOW TRUCKS ABROAD, page 3

Tow Trucks Abroad

Thomas G. Dolan

Building & selling them overseas is not like here The global nature of the marketplace is hardly new. What is new, however, for U.S. and Canadian manufacturers and distributors of tow trucks and towing equipment is that their overseas business seems to be growing despite the worldwide recession. However, the two North American countries face many of the same challenges as well as the rewards in selling to the rest of the world beyond the dividing oceans. NRC Industries of St. Paul D’Abbotsford, Quebec, Canada, has been selling tow trucks overseas for at least the last 18 years, including in Europe, the Far East, Australia, and South Africa, according to NRC’s Export Sales Manager Bruce Jackson. “The overseas market has been growing for quite some time,” Jackson said. “Though there have been some ups and downs, overall growth has been steady and now appears to be growing even faster.” One challenge that all North American companies face, Jackson continued, “is different countries have different rules and regulations that have to be met before the vehicle is allowed on the road. These often have to do with length, height, and, especially width. Some overseas trucks have a very small chassis or width of the chassis.” According to Jackson, it’s a common practice of North American suppliers, including NRC, to rely “on local distributors who provide the drawings for certain types of recovery equipment not made in North America, and so we make them to the required specifications and then sell them in kit form.” The foreign distributors help in other ways as well, Jackson said. For instance, the distributor knows the local conditions and competition so he understands how the imports should be priced. Also, when there is a foreign buyer, Jackson said, “we do not quote to overseas clients directly, only through our distributors, to avoid misunderstanding.” NRC’s foreign distributors are very important to the company. “All of our distributors are very highly regarded and we listen to them,” Jackson said. “We support them through emails, technology, and especially personal visits. We do a lot of traveling, which can be a challenge. But when our distributors do exhibits at trade shows, we’re there to support them.” One reward to meeting the challenges of doing business abroad, Jackson said, is that “when one country goes into a recession, another tends to be doing well, so overall things balance out and overall business maintains a steady growth.” For more information, see www.nrc-industries.com Dynamic Abroad Anthony Gentile, owner of Dynamic Towing Equipment & Manufacturing in Norfolk, VA, said, “I’ve been in the tow business for 36 years, was a distributor for Dynamic for 15 years, and have owned the company for eight years now. Dynamic was selling globally when I came here, so it’s been doing it for a long time.” Dynamic sells abroad primarily in Australia, Sweden, Mexico, and Canada. Sometimes, he said, there’s a need to modify a chassis, usually to a different width. “Being a small company, we can make the modifications easily, so this works out for our foreign trade.” Gentile communicates with his foreign customers mostly via his website and email. “The main challenges are with the language barrier, going back and forth, the costs of talking on the phone, the time differences, and shipping with the international rigging criteria of units in the containers. The rules can be strict and burdensome, which makes for a little more work and tedium.” Also problematic, Gentile continued, “is how the dollar changes, for that has a lot to do with how much business you do overseas. When the dollar is weak you do better, but the big news now is that the European currency is not so good. So with the same money your profits grow weaker.” The main advantages to selling his trucks and parts worldwide, Gentile said, “are increased sales, a worldwide name, and in opening up our models to design changes; if they work better in other countries, they end up working better here too.” For more information, see www.dynamicmfg.com Miller Over There Miller Industries in Ooltewah, TN, has taken its commitment to foreign trade a step further than most. Miller not only sells its products overseas, it operates its own manufacturing plants abroad. “Our Boniface Engineering facility in Bedford, England, is celebrating its 30th anniversary,” said Randy Olson, Miller’s vice president of marketing. “And for many years we’ve also operated the Jige International factory in Revigny, France.” In addition, Olson noted, Miller works with a number of independent major distributors as well as smaller trade companies that stock and sell Miller products in about 80 countries around the globe. Miller too faces a major challenge in dealing with the different laws and requirements among these many different countries. But, Olson added, “we have the largest engineering staff in the industry and so are well prepared to meet this challenge.” In fact, Olson explained, Miller has been able to turn these challenges into major advantages, thanks in large part to its two factories in England and France. “Often there is a lot of equipment that we developed abroad that is ahead of the U.S. market, so we were able to then introduce it here.” Olson offered one example: “Before, in the U.S., you originally had a boom and an independent underlift, two separate units that had to be combined. Adopting European technology, we integrated the two, creating less weight and fewer moving parts.” Olson noted that the older roads in Europe are much narrower than here. “So a number of years ago we introduced a side puller on heavy-duty trucks there so towers can more easily recover vehicles on their narrow roads.” Along these same lines, Olson said, “In the U.S., when you load a car onto a flatbed you have a bridle assembly that hooks on both sides of the car’s suspension and then you winch on the center part of the bridle. Now, with European cars, we’re seeing where they give you a tow eye on either side of some high-end models so you can use a sliding pulley assembly to get a straight pull on the tow eyes from the winch.” Miller has not only introduced European technology into the U.S. towing and recovery market, it also has introduced advanced technology into many of the companies it does business with in developing countries. “In some countries when we first introduce equipment, we have to apply training,” Olson said, “and most of that comes through working with interpreters. Sometimes, when there is a manual, it has to be translated into the native language. But a lot of times, in terms of controls, rather than words it’s better to use legends, visual images that everybody can understand. This helps make the use of towing equipment universal.” For more information, see www.millerind.com AWDirect Exports Tom Welsh, brand manager of AWDirect, a division of GHC Specialty Brands, LLC in Janesville, WI, comes to this topic with a somewhat different perspective. AWDirect is a wellknown equipment distributor of towing parts, safety gear, and accessories. Welsh mentioned the difficulties of products being acceptable in one country and not another as well the problems of shipping overseas, but, he added, “our biggest challenge as a distributor is not being provided with all of the information necessary, for if the products are not properly registered for export we can’t necessarily sell them overseas.” This is even true for products sold to Canada. To deal with such crucial details, AWDirect has an international department that has personnel fluent in many languages to help break down that barrier. AWDirect’s major markets include Canada, Japan, and other Asian countries. The company currently communicates through its website and the international phone lines. “At this time, we don’t specifically target the international trade, but it’s been definitely growing so it’s on the burner. We just want to take the time to make sure we’re doing it effectively.” As to the benefits of selling internationally, Welsh said, “We’re obviously promoting the towing industry in other parts of the world. As one of the industry’s leading suppliers, we vouch for our products and services and the opportunity to sell to a different country is a privilege.” For more information, see www.awdirect.com

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