Merrick fronts Volvo Group press conference

After starting in his new role as Volvo Group Australia President and CEO in September 2018, Martin Merrick has headed the biennial VGA press conference.

The press conference was held in Brisbane on May 15, just prior to the opening of the 2019 Brisbane Truck Show.

The Scotsman succeeds Peter Voorhoeve – now head of Volvo Trucks North America – and brings with him a wealth of truck industry knowledge gleaned over more than three decades, since he began his career as a truck mechanic in Glasgow.

Mr Merrick has been a part of the Volvo family for the last 31 years, from when he joined Volvo Group in the Scottish city as a reception engineer, liaising between customers and workshops. From there he moved on to roles in sales, dealer management, and heading up Volvo Group's retail business in Scotland and the north of England.

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He joined Volvo Group's executive management team three years ago, moving to Gothenburg, Sweden, to become the group's Senior Vice President of Retail Development.

Addressing Australian and New Zealand truck and transport journalists at VGA's sparkling new Wacol headquarters in Brisbane, Mr Merrick outlined his plans to build on Volvo Group's success in our region through growing even closer to its customers across the Volvo, Mack and UD Trucks brands…

"What I'm really passionate about is customer success," said Mr Merrick.

"Delivering customer success is about working in partnership with our customers, enabling them to achieve a safer environment, a more efficient and more productive business, and ultimately a safer and more profitable industry.

"To achieve our goal, we will build on the success of our 'Service, service, service' mantra to deliver a premium customer experience. My vision is that our people will get even closer to our customers, to know their businesses intimately, and that with that we will deliver solutions that will enable their on-going success.

"Sometimes our customers don't have all the answers to what can improve their business – that's where we can partner with them to identify key insights and become a trusted advisor, not only to improve their business but also to improve the transport industry as a whole.

"I'm convinced we're well positioned to deliver customer success."

Mr Merrick said 2018 was a stellar year for Volvo Group, both globally and especially here in Australia. In fact, the group's strong performance recently led to financial services firm S&P upgrading the transport giant's credit rating – a move that, Mr Merrick said, will allow it to offer customers even more competitive financing terms.

"What an incredible 2018 we had here in Australia," said Mr Merrick.

"It was a record year for us in many respects. The team at the factory did an amazing job to operate at above capacity to build the most trucks in a single year, at the highest quality recorded in our almost 50-year history."

VGA led heavy-duty truck sales in 2018, with 3807 units across all three brands (Volvo, Mack and UD) – PACCAR (Kenworth and DAF) accounted for 3438 units while Daimler (Freightliner, Mercedes-Benz and Fuso) accounted for 2107.

Volvo Group Australia collected a swag of internal awards for its efforts, being named as Volvo Trucks International Hub of the Year, Mack Trucks International Market of the Year and UD Trucks International Market of Year.

Last year also saw the organisation move into its new purpose-built headquarters in Wacol, just a few streets from its previous premises, and open a new state-of-the-art dealership just next door, along with a further outlet in Prestons in Sydney.

Mr Merrick said VGA would continue to invest in its people, and its Wacol plant, in the years to come.

"We have commenced a $25 million program to redevelop the factory over the next three years," he said.

"This builds on the almost $50 million investment delivered to the factory over the last five years. Investing in the Wacol factory will ensure that we meet our customers' needs while preparing for the future, as well as giving a boost to the local supply chain."

Mr Merrick said VGA's production facility, which was established in 1972, was truly world class.

"We've built over 65,000 Volvo and Mack trucks here and we are the only manufacturer to be awarded 'Australian Made' certification," he said.

"We make trucks for the Australian and New Zealand conditions, leveraging global innovation with Volvo engineering, and we also have engineers here to ensure we have the right specification for Australian and New Zealand conditions.

"We are not an assembly line but what we call a 'full part-number factory', but we are so much more than that. I've been fortunate to visit many full part-number factories, in Sweden, Belgium, North America, Japan and Brazil, and I have never seen a production line like what we have here in Australia.

"Walking down the line last week, I learned how our highly skilled people build a tri-drive prime mover. It's not just a production line, it's local engineering and manufacturing at its best.

"Our team of over 50 local engineers develop solutions for the Australian and New Zealand markets that we just don't offer anywhere else in the world. In partnership with our customers, we can design and build a truck that meets their exacting needs, enabling them to be safer, more efficient and more productive."