Backed up by the brand
The outsourcing deal with Scania has made Argentine company Felipe Andreu e Hijos more efficient and focused on its own business.
During 2007, Argentine company Felipe Andreu e Hijos turned the work of maintenance and repair of its 75 Scania trucks over to Scania. The deal has made the company more efficient in transport management and customer service, and the owners have benefitted with more free time and an improved quality of life.
During 2007, Argentine company Felipe Andreu e Hijos turned the work of maintenance and repair of its 75 Scania trucks over to Scania.
“Our aim is to be ever more efficient in what we do, which is to transport and store products in our warehouses,” says Eduardo Andreu, a part owner of the company (with father Felipe and brothers Leonardo and Fabián) and the person responsible for company units. “The maintenance and repair of the trucks is not our business. Scania can do a much better job of that than we can.”
Outsourcing, he says, has allowed him more free time to engage in personal activities, such as singing Latin American folk music with a group of friends. In addition, he has also found time to fulfil a childhood dream – to learn to play the guitar.
The first three months of the agreement were the most complex, because all the company’s Scania trucks had to be inspected at the dealer’s repair shop to determine whether they fulfilled the manufacturer’s standards. Some units had to be sent to the repair shop more than once, which forced changes in the company’s logistics. After this first period, the vehicles were inserted into an exclusive, preventive regimen, which, says Eduardo, greatly reduced the premature wear of the trucks’ components.
Felipe Andreu e Hijos is located in the Luján de Cuyo district, 1,100 kilometres from Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina, at the foot of Andes mountains, in the province of Mendoza.
The company transports and stores general and hazardous products, using some 100 trucks in all. The trucks travel around parts of Argentina – a continental area of almost 2.8 million square kilometres – and cross the Andes into Chile.
Felipe Andreu, Eduardo’s father, was born in Spain and immigrated to Argentina in 1951, when he was 13 years old. His relationship with the transport business started in 1962 when he purchased a truck. Later he purchased two L 111s with his old partner, making him one of the first 10 customers of Scania Argentina, which was established in the country in 1976. Since then, his fleet has been composed primarily of Scania units, and today it is one of Scania’s reference transport companies.
In 2007, the company started a driving school to teach young people. The school also functions to incorporate new drivers into the company. The five best students in each level are given an opportunity to become company employees. The courses include practical driving and theoretical classes about safety, legislation, first aid and mechanics, among others. Staff at the dealer Aconcagua Vehículos Comerciales (AVC) systematically collaborate with the academy as teachers and examiners in several of the qualifying subjects.
Meanwhile, AVC and Scania Argentina technicians carried out an intensive course for all of Andreu’s existing drivers. This event, which in three days trained drivers in the correct use of Scania products, will be repeated annually.
“Scania is a heritage that we received from my father,” says Eduardo, “and we have always felt backed up by the brand. Because of this, we consider Scania close to our company and, because we are a family company, it is also very close to our family.”
Scania’s Services
Scania’s growing range of service-related products supports transport and logistics companies in their business operations.
These service-related products encompass everything from parts, maintenance agreements and round-the-clock workshop services on various continents to driver training and IT support for transport planning.
Altogehter, Scania is represented in about 100 countries through approximately 1,000 local sales facilities and 1,500 service points.
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