Customer first

Cooper Specialised Handling md David Cooper tells HSS about the importance of customer relationships

As Cooper Specialised Handling sharpens its focus on ports business, HSS editor Simon Duddy talks to md David Cooper about the importance of customer relationships.

The company recently dropped the Baumann range of sideloaders to concentrate on its ports business as the UK partner for Finnish materials handling giant Konecranes.

"The sideloaders were becoming a distraction," says Cooper. "It was okay as a small company getting stretched across 20 customers, but when you are stretched across 100 customers the effort gets diluted. The ports business is very demanding on time and relationships." Cooper adds the ports business is thriving at the moment.He puts this down to firms catching up on material handling purchases that have been delayed in the last few years, rather than a boom in throughput as against a few years ago, although there has been an increase.He puts the success of Cooper SH down to two factors - the high quality of Konecranes trucks and his own company's customer relationships in the UK.

"It has been good to keep on the shirt-tails of Konecranes, because the manufacturer is going places but the relationships we have with customers in UK ports are equally key.With conventional forklifts, suppliers only see customers every 6 months because there are so many. In the ports business, there are fewer, so you get around and see them all every month or two. This close relationship is needed because customers buy equipment worth hundreds of thousands of pounds. If there is a problem you must nip it in the bud quickly.We tend to give our customers a lot of attention pre and after sale. It's about being close to the customer, holding regular review meetings, being transparent, and killing problems before they start to expand." The firm has seen its profile increase in recent years after it was rebranded Cooper Specialised Handling from SMV UK in 2008.

"When SMV was bought by Konecranes, we re-named the business Cooper, and that's when things exploded. Customers now realise they are talking to the guy who makes the decision, and maybe they didn't know that before." At the recent FLTA Awards, EcoDrive software, developed by Koncranes, was a finalist in the Environment category. NearGuard pedestrian alert system was also a finalist in the Safety category.

Cooper is excited by the technologies.

"EcoDrive can save users a fortune on fuel," he says. "When the truck driver jumps into the cab, you are at his mercy on how he uses that machine. For example, even if 1400rpm is needed for optimum hydraulic performance, some drivers feel the need to floor it to 2200rpm because it is louder and they think the louder the better performance wise." EcoDrive identifies the driver, and measures his behaviour - lifts per hour, fuel used, engine idle time, etc. Cooper estimates the difference between an efficient driver and an inefficient one can be as much as 10 litres an hour.He adds the technology has been well received since it launched a year ago, with customers finding it confirms what they suspected about driver performance, backing it up with hard facts. The issue is especially relevant with the development of a new generation of engines for the 3B engine implementation. The new engines have been developed as a result of European demands for engines with lower emissions.

"With the new engines, you get torque at barely over tick over.

Before drivers had to rev engines hard, now they just have to tickle the throttle. As well as having lower emissions, the machines are quieter and use less fuel." The new standards apply to engines rated 129-560kw and at the end of this year engines between 56-129 will also have to comply.

Cooper adds: "This has been the biggest challenge yet in reducing emissions, because what we are doing here is crushing the particulate matter, the soot.We now have a paradox where in the burn process you can either get the soot down but if you do that NOX goes up, or can get NOX down but soot goes up.

"Konecranes keeps soot down in the burn process and then NOX is treated after via the urea system AdBlue. This is injected into the exhaust gas as it leaves engine, so all engines need an AdBlue tank. The other way to do it is to treat the NOX in the burn process, and use a soot trap.We find this strangles the engine and requires frequent soot trap changes."