1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156 
aking room at Southfields
Page 16
Page 17
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
Southfields' move from its cramped HQ at Loughborough to a purpose-built plant at Langar proves that some clouds occasionally yield silver linings. With 50% more factory space it's keen to reap the rewards in more sales with a range of new products. Brian Weatherley reports.
• liming is everything in commercial vehicle manufacturing. When the gods smile on you, grasp the opportunity. Southfields' move to its new factory at Langer, Notts is a good example of that philosophy, A year ago the firm was juggling trailer and bodybuilding between three sites around Loughborough, wniie its trailer overflow park was eight miles away from the main assembly plant. "It was space that crippled us in Loughborough," says MD Richard Jayes. "It had been on our minds for the past three to four years to move and we approached the county council. But there was nothing from an industrial point of view coming up at the right time, so we had to look further afield."
Ironically, the solution was provided when Langer Engineering—which previously occupied a 7.5-acre site 22 miles away from Southfield's main plant—ran into difficulties. Regular CM readers will recall Langer revealing a major tie-up with Turkish trailer giant Tirsan at the NEC Motor Show (complete with belly dan cers and PR ballyhoo) back in April 2001. But within six months of that announcement Langer was in receivership, and Southfields was negotiating to take over its site. The sale was finalised in October 2001; the move to the new site was completed in April 2002.
Welding bays
Buying a ready-made factory certainly has benefits, as Southfields' sales and marketing director Jeremy Malpas confirms: "What really attracted us was the infrastructure—the 'craneage', welding bays and tools. The transition from Loughborough to Langar was much easier than it might have been moving to a bare site. The final move was very Quick; we virtually locked up Loughborough one day and started building at Langer the day afterl." Relocating also provided produi improvements. The centralised has given us a much smoother pro than line," Malpas reports. Loughborough we had bay produc whereas now we have basically stra through lines so were able to turn vehicles much quicker. We can now I bodies on the ground and oomph finish them off, including paint. T thanks to the 15 overhead cranes Langer site already had installed, can then lift them onto the cha which can come in at any stage."
As a result Southfields is now ab quote a maximum turnaround on bodies of no more than 15 days I receiving the chassis. "We can do shorter too," Malpas stresses. "WI can you find anyone else that gua tees that turnaround?"
The new factory boasts two moi paint ovens. "We're very proud of paint finish," says Malpas. "It's the that money can buy—it must be, beci I've seen the invoices! I don't think anl can compete against us on warranty offer a five-year one across the bc even on a three-year contract," Clearly Southfields got a bar when it bought the Langer site. Accor to Malpas the final figure was art £175m for the 7.5-acre freehold site infrastructure already in place: "It good price, yes, although the rec,ei t their cards close to their chest!"
rho move also allowed the firm to tinue to develop new products, not through its partnership with man trailer maker Krone which has n ill place since 1999. 'We were very
keen to bring them into the UK," says Malpas. "They were really very good tr, work with, and again it's a family-run business like ours. What we like about Krone is not only their philosophy towards standardisation, but also the fact that they are very open to changing their designs to suit the UK market. They've done a lot of work on their trailer spec. There were other things too. Their build quality really hit home with us, and also their belief that Krone is the best!"
The current Krone/Southfields product line-up is an interesting blend of shared component and fully built up units (see box, below) complementing Southfields' own long-standing product range of trailer and rigid bodywork .
Significantly, despite offering 'traditional' UK-sourced chassis from a variety of suppliers including GI Fruehauf, SOC. Corus and Dennison, 75% of all Southfield semis are now based on Krone chassis. However, Malpas insists: "We're not going to single-sourong because if we just go to Krone we might upset a lot of long-term customers."
Production at Langar is currently split roughly 50:50 between trailers and rigid bodywork. Southfielids has been particulaHy active in the rigid sector, not least at 7.5 tonnes with its BusyBody range (which is now available up to 10 tonnes).
Rigid bodywork
'We could see the interest in homedelivery vehicles growing more and more," says Malpas. "Six years ago we were doing no more than 25 7.5-tonne bodies a year: in 2002 we're looking at doing 300." While some rivals have struck up 'on-line' partnerships with chassis manufacturers, Malpas says: "We very much want to market rigid bodywork to dealers and end-users. We'd rather have the profit than the glory."
Southfields' turnover is running at around £15m a year although last year was not an easy one as it included the extraordinary costs of the move. Malpas also reports that the bodywork market remains highly competitive: "There are some criminal prices out there at the moment."
Production rates are currently running at 500 trailers and 500 bodies a year. "It's not been a fantastic year—
we've not got it screaming on all cylinders yet—but we feel, without doing anything difficult, we can easily produce 1,200 units a year,' says Malpas.
So what makes Southfields different from its HvalsP "Being a family-run business gives it a personal touch." Malpas believes. "With business so competitive people sell to people—it's not an arm's-length transaction. As a company we were determined to invest in product development and over the past five years a new generation of managers has come through too. We build what people want... not what we want to build."