REALAnswers, Industry View

According to Edward Wanandi, CEO, and Jay Nieszel, president, it’s a combination of custom and quantity manufacturing, together with geographical diversification, uncompromising quality and open communication. We visited with Edward and Jay in their offices in Chicago, then took a field trip to Trailmobile’s newest, state-of-the-art trailer manufacturing facility in Liberal, Kansas. What we learned is that Trailmobile has forged its success by working together with employees, suppliers, dealers, customers and its industry—to serve all of them.

Do you expect trailers to get longer to provide more usable space?
Wanandi: “Though there are some 57-footers in some parts of the country, we believe that the 53-footer is about as big as trailers will be for some time to come. “Height is limited by bridges and width by law. Bringing trailers closer to the ground makes them incompatible with the height of many docks. Curtain-side trailers, which are popular in Europe, haven’t been popular here, because in this country, we usually don’t load and unload trailers that way. “So, we think trailers are about as large as they can practically and safely be.”

How does this relate to your core business?
Nieszel: “Part of being good to do business with is being a good corporate citizen. Safety is important to everyone, because we all share the roads. So, by supporting safety, we’re doing something good for all of our stakeholders.”

You’ve gone from one plant to four in less than seven years. How did you grow so rapidly?
Edward Wanandi, CEO: “We decided to refocus the company on better relationships with all of our customers and suppliers, instead of just on manufacturing.We emphasize communication and cooperation with employees, dealers, suppliers, and of course, customers.

“When you do that, interesting things start to happen. You discover that people appreciate your being upfront with them, and that they will be upfront with you, too. The result is fewer secrets, fewer grievances and a better working relationship. “That also means higher productivity in the plant and better sales, because you’re producing the value that your customers want to buy."

Can you give us a specific example of how this works?
Jay Nieszel, president: “We’ve located our plants strategically, in the best places to serve our customers. Our operations in Charleston, Illinois, and Jonesboro, Arkansas, are centrally located, to serve the whole country. “Our new plant, in Liberal, Kansas, provides refrigerated trailers for the meat-producing industry of the Middle West. And, by acquiring Mond’s operations in Canada, we are able to provide specialized service to our Canadian customers. “It would have been simpler to put everything in one place, but it wouldn’t have served our customers as well.”

Still, Jonesboro and Charleston aren’t very far apart.
Nieszel: “Not geographically, but each serves a very different market segment. In Charleston, we make both ‘fleet’ and ‘special’ trailers, while in Jonesboro, we concentrate on larger orders of ‘fleet’ trailers.”

“Fleet” and “Special”?
Nieszel: “In our terminology, ‘Fleet’ trailers usually are made for a very specific kind of hauling, and have relatively little optional equipment. “‘Specials’ are often used for many different kinds of hauling, and customers tend to order these with lots of additional options, to make them versatile. “At Jonesboro, our focus is on fleet trailers, in larger quantities, usually for orders of at least 25 units. By building them in quantity, we can improve quality, productivity and value for the customer. In Charleston, we build units with lots of options, and in smaller quantities.”

Has industry consolidation affected the way you do business?
Wanandi: “In some ways. What we see are the big fleets getting bigger and bigger, yet there still seem to be lots of very small fleets. It’s the mid-sized ones that seem to be disappearing. “Big fleets tend to have very specific needs and demand large quantities, on-time delivery and high value. These are the ideal customers for our Jonesboro operation. “The smaller fleets buy fewer trailers, but tend to spec them with lots of options. They’re ideal customers for our Charleston facility.”

What about Liberal, Kansas?
Wanandi: “Liberal is our showcase for refrigerated and insulated trailers. It’s brand new and state-of- the-art in every way. It really fills a need for us, to increase output of temperature-controlled trailers, and to open up the western part of the country.”

Being so spread out must create communication challenges. What role does communication play at Trailmobile?
Wanandi: “Open, effective communication is crucial to every part of our business. Fleets have to provide ‘just-in-time’ delivery to their customers, and they expect the same from us. “As we build an order, we’re in touch with the fleet,

letting them know the status, so they can plan accordingly. If something changes, we try to give them as much lead time as possible. We do the same with our suppliers. Everything runs much more smoothly when communication is open.
"In essence, we give our customers the same kind of guaranteed, just-in-time delivery they have to give their customers. Without effective communication, we couldn't do it."

And with employees and dealers?
Nieszel: “In some ways, that’s been the most gratifying aspect of all. We now have a true dialogue with these other ‘customers.’ Just as we want Trailmobile to be ‘good to do business with’ for end-users, we also want to work well with employees and dealers. “To that end, we’ve made our dealers an integral part of our design and product development process. We involve them at every stage and value their contribution.

“And, we’ve established five regions, each with its own vice president, to work directly with dealers and customers. We even added a person at each plant whose sole task is to act as liaison with our regional people, dealers and customers.”

Wanandi: “On the employee side, we’ve also seen a reduction in turnover and improvement in morale. That results in a better product, more productivity and reduced costs. It’s ‘win-win’ for everyone.”

And safety is a big issue for Trailmobile, isn’t it?
Nieszel: “We feel that safety is an outstanding investment. We’re in our 47th year of sponsoring safety award programs in more than 35 states. We also sponsor the Interstate Truckload Carriers Conference National Fleet Safety Contest, the American Trucking Associations’President’s Trophy ,and both the National Private Truck Council Driver Hall of Fame and Private Fleet Safety Awards. “To qualify for the Hall of Fame, a driver has to log 20 years, 2,000,000 miles or 50,000 hours of safe driving.” Wanandi: “And when you think about how much driving that is, we believe the trucking industry has a remarkable record of safety. The average automobile driver goes only about 12-18 thousand miles a year. The average truck driver logs about ten times that.”

What does the future hold for Trailmobile?
Nieszel: “We hear that equipment demand should be declining, but frankly, if it is, we’re barely noticing it. We also believe that because of just-in-time demands, we may very well see the ratio of trailers to tractors increase in the future. “And, because quality endures, we expect strong sales for a long time to come.”
Wanandi: “We expect to grow, but our growth will be carefully planned, so we don’t have to sacrifice our core values to get it. We’d like to be number one— not necessarily in sales—but in the minds of our customers, employees, suppliers and dealers. We’ll get there by continuing to offer quality, service, value and open communication.”