Iveco Daily – Mighty Helpful for Richmond Mitre 10

Iveco Daily – Mighty Helpful for Richmond Mitre 10

A new Iveco Daily tray truck is keeping professional trade customers and keen ‘DIYers’ in Melbourne’s CBD area well stocked with a broad range of timber and building supplies from leading home improvement company, Richmond Mitre 10.

27 January, 2016

The inner-city Richmond location of the Mitre 10 store presents particular challenges to delivery vehicles which must be comfortable and manoeuvrable to drive, while still being able to transport worthwhile payloads of around 1.5 tonnes. The Daily 50C170 is used to deliver strapped timber as well as sheet products and bagged materials – fitted with a versatile steel tray with removable drop sides and racking, allow the outlet to configure the truck to best suit the materials that need to be delivered.

Richmond Mitre 10 Operations Manager, Ben Shaw, said the Iveco Daily needed to fill several important criteria before being selected to join two other trucks on fleet.

“At the moment we have a large crane truck, a medium-sized truck and the replacement we were looking for was a smaller-sized cab over truck,” Ben said.

“We needed a vehicle that would enable us to deliver in the inner city, in smaller, tighter spaces where the other two vehicles just couldn’t get to.

“The Daily’s dimensions and size of the tray work in the inner city, it allows us to get multiple deliveries out that are substantial – we can keep the vehicle out longer with more deliveries on it rather than running a ute out all the time, and having a new vehicle is always good.”

The truck features an advanced 3-litre turbodiesel engine producing 125kW of power and 430Nm of torque from a low 1500 rpm, but perhaps what’s even better for Mitre 10 is the Daily’s smooth shifting, 8-speed full automatic transmission, which makes it a breeze to drive.

“Having something with a full automatic transmission was handy for us in the inner city because there’s nothing worse than constantly having to change gears in slow-moving traffic,” Ben said.

“We also wanted any staff member who has a car licence to be able to drive it. Previously we had a medium rigid manual vehicle which only endorsed drivers could operate, and that made it quite difficult for us on the weekends to do local deliveries, it also made it awkward for us in that we had to have a dedicated driver for that vehicle.

“Now we can use a yard person with a licence, put them in it and it’s like driving a ute.”

Along with inner city delivery, which normally consists of three cycles per day, with four drops per cycle, the Daily has also been called on to do much longer trips into the wider Melbourne metropolitan and surrounding regions.

And on the open road, the truck is just as versatile as in Melbourne’s stop and start traffic, according to Ben.

“On some occasions the truck also travels considerable distance if needed, and the reports we have back from the driver is the comfort factor, it’s like driving a sedan, they’re also happy with all the perks that come with it like sat nav, climate control and blue tooth,” he said.

Aside from the vehicle itself and its great many benefits, Ben said that using Iveco’s in-house financier, CNH Industrial Capital, to lease the truck was an easy, convenient and hassle-free process.

“The financing options which are available with Iveco were attractive and not available in the current Japanese models,” Ben said.

“It’s certainly made us think about capital expenditure for the next financial year and also about renewing our fleet as it makes more sense in the long run to have a fully serviced vehicle that’s been paid for, or at least factored to be paid for, rather than having to constantly service old and aged vehicles.

“We had some aged vehicles that made us unreliable with some of our deliveries – having a brand new truck has made us more reliable, it also gives us a lot more confidence in the deliveries we can do.”

Thanks to the strong performance of the Iveco Daily, another Daily model is now under consideration for the businesses’ second store in Benalla in north central Victoria, and with medium duty trucks also due for renewal, Iveco is now at the top of the shopping list. 

Iveco

Iveco Australia manufactures and imports commercial vehicles spanning the light, medium and heavy duty truck segments and, under the Iveco Bus brand, buses and coaches. The commercial vehicle range includes on and off-road models beginning with car licence vans, through to road train prime movers rated at up to 140 tonnes GCM. The Acco and Powerstar vehicles, developed and produced specifically for the Australian market, complement Iveco’s worldwide best sellers such as the Daily, Eurocargo, Trakker and Stralis. Iveco vehicles are ably supported by a dedicated network of 50 dealerships and service outlets strategically located nationwide, offering aftersales services that include extended warranties, roadside assistance and programmed maintenance contracts. Iveco’s Australian manufacturing base in Dandenong Victoria, represents a major investment in the local truck and bus industry. Iveco directly employs more than 600 people nationwide and thousands more Australians in related industries, from retailing operations to component suppliers.