Construction World June 2018

Proline Logistics In 2005 Proline started with 11 brick trucks and now has a fleet of 48 trucks of which 25 are Scania trucks. Its main contract is current- ly to transport the ISG Group’s products (Ocon Brick, Technicrete and Rocla) in Witbank, Olifantsfontein, Roodepoort and Meyerton. Although Proline transports mainly bricks, Pretorius says that it also transports products where a crane is required to on and offload – such as Rocla’s infrastructure precast cement products. Apart from him, the management team in this company of around 80 consists of Craig Platt, the operations manager in Olifantsfontein (he runs the Olifantsfontein and Witbank branch), Martin Trollip, the controller at Roodepoort (ISG Group) and Sydney Mabuza as Pre- torius’ right hand man in Meyerton. Mabuza liaises with the drivers and clients. Pretorius says what sets Proline apart is its service. “Communication and onsite service is key in this business, and at The payload being transported, bricks, has an important impact on the truck – especially fuel consumption. “Fuel is a major part of the equation – for any company in transport. Wear on tyres and the on-time delivery are not less important, but a truck with optimal fuel consumption is vital to the sustainability of a transport company. The fuel consumption on our fleet of Scanias is like a day and night difference when compared to the other trucks,” says Pretorius. Even though Scania vehicles are renowned for their optimal fuel consumption, this is a consequence of tailoring. In the transport sector there is no thing as one size fits all. The most successful pro- viders of solutions to the transport industry are those that can truly tailor to the customers’ needs. To be able to tailor a solution, Scania has to know the customers’ business. Only this will lead to a situa- tion where you have only scheduled downtime, predictable repair and maintenance costs, and a product that can assist in achieving the Pretorius says that when he first started at Proline, it had a fleet comprising of a certain OEM which was replaced by trucks from another OEM. "The latter was sold as soon as their maintenance contracts had run out as they would have been too expensive to maintain without these. Just before that we bought six Scanias and from day one they were amazing,” Pretorius says. These were G460 6 x 4s. The 25 Scanias in Prolines’ fleet are now made up of two Established in 2005, Meyerton-based Proline Logistics, transports bricks and related products in Gauteng and adjacent areas. Proline is owned by Mike and Sheila Koch. There are currently 25 Scania trucks in Proline’s fleet. Ruhan Pretorius, director of Proline talks to Construction World about how Scania tailored the solutions (bodies, finance, repair and maintenance) for it to focus on its business. Flexible repair and maintenance contracts All Proline Scanias are covered by a full repair and maintenance contact. “Our previous OEM did not want to extend the maintenance contract for two of our older Scania vehicles are out of the maintenance plan, but Scania has been flexible enough to extend it for two years,” says Pretorius. both we excel,” he says. Bricks as payload optimal bottom line for the company. Sustainable relationships The SCANIA day and night DIFFERENCE

G410 8 x 4 tippers, 16 G460s and five 8 x 4 rigid brick carriers (P410) (two of these on order). “From day one the service was great, there was never an issue. If you had a problem Scania was on your vehicle in the least amount of time. With our previous OEM’s trucks we had many troubles – we often had hours of downtime. This was a major part of our choice to move brands. Add to this the fact that the fuel consumption has proven to optimal and you definitely have a sustainable relationship,” says Pretorius. A sustainable business is crucial – for both Scania and the customer. It believes that the salesman sells the first vehicle, but the workshop and aftersales services sells the second. “Transport is a trust business – no matter what you are transporting. The relation- ship has to be strong. You have to know that when things go wrong – and they do – you can rely on you partner. It is long term – short term is of no interest to Scania,” says Lance Strachan, sales repre- Proline already runs five 8 x 4 P410 rigid brick carriers that has a crane with which it on and offloads the payload. It pulls a trailer. At the time of writing, Proline had just ordered two more. “The brick carriers are adapted by the bodybuilder. It was a process and Scania assisted. We needed to get the most length out of the chassis for the body and then still have space for the crane. The bodies are specially made at 7,5 m so you can increase your payload,” says Pretorius. “It would seem that brick transporters prefer rigid trucks more: you can hook the trailer off when trucks have to deliver bricks inside estates,” says Strachan As Scania is basing its products on a modular system, it can be changed easily to tailor the vehicle. All Scania vehicles are tailored to be bodied on and is a well proven ingredient to Scania’s success. Driver training When Proline acquired its first six vehicles, they sent drivers for train- ing at Scania. “If you look at the fuel consumption, this helped a lot," Pretorius concludes.  sentative at Scania’s Alrode offices. A solutions based offering

From left: Proline’s Ruhan Pretorius and Sydney Mabuza with Scania South Africa salesperson, Lance Strachan.

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CONSTRUCTION WORLD JUNE 2018