Established in 2016, the freight carrier, D&G Logistics has largely flown under the radar over the past eight years despite accruing major accounts as a contractor for the likes of Toll, Team Global Express and Linfox.
The bulk of new work it has been furnished is in refrigerated transport, a growing sector it has no doubt hitched some future ambitions to. The company currently runs a fleet of 60 prime movers.
Pantechs, however, are becoming more prominent at dispatch despite nearly 90 per cent of their mobile assets being operated in a standard B-double mezzanine application.
“Everyone is facing challenging times with costs going through the roof,” says D&G Logistics General Manager Ray Spiteri. “In response to the current economic climate, we’re trying to do things a bit differently.”
The business is now running B-triples, roadtrains and quads as an outcome of this stagnating inflationary environment.
That means adding new lanes, upping payload capacity and capitalising on the innovations of high performance freight units when investing in new fleet.
“We’re finding the margin is getting smaller and smaller in regard to earnings,” says Ray.
“Our onus is in trying to get customers direct because it makes it a bit more feasible. Running quads and triples that will increase our profit and we can leverage off that and then pass on some of those savings to the customer.”
Part of that is providing a juxtaposition for the customer when it comes to the price of a B-double versus a B-triple. D&G Logistics will reduce that space it carries so the customer has to commit to loading extra.
“So instead of having to load two trailers you have to load three trailers and then there’s a discount in the rate,” explains Ray.
“We’re having a lot of success in regard to selling that because the proof is in the $50 or $60 a space difference in price which is helping us to kick a lot of goals at the moment.”
In maximising the capacity of the goods each truck is assigned, greater opportunities to discount or reduce costs for customers, are being found on these bigger combinations.
“Instead of us using two prime movers we’re using one prime mover and we’re moving instead of say, 34 spaces we’re moving 46 to 60 spaces,” notes Ray.
“It’s a cost-saving to the customer and it’s a lot more efficient for us with less prime movers on the road as well.”
A recently launched ABB-quad roadtrain is now running between Brisbane and Darwin. At present they anticipate approval soon for a permit to operate a B-triple from Melbourne into Brisbane, the biggest corridor for the business, currently.
“We’ve been really successful from Brisbane and heading towards North Queensland,” says Ray.
“We’re looking at opening depots in Cairns, Townsville, Mackay and Rockhampton. It’s quite funny. You could say we’re an interstate company but most of the work that we’re winning is ex Brisbane which is fine for us. It just shows us how much opportunity there is out there in every state.”
Of late the company has undergone several exciting changes including investments in new safety systems, new tracking systems, the gradual rollout of new dashcams and installation of Guardian driver fatigue technology in every truck.
“We’re getting extra cameras put on the side of the trucks to help with the drivers,” explains Ray. “It’s really positive stuff for the business.”
D&G Logistics earlier this year received its HACCP Certification to cart refrigerated goods and in addition to this the business will move into warehousing out of Melbourne.
Ray Spiteri and Business Development Manager Marcus Franco are based in Melbourne where a new depot is being established to go with the one in Brisbane.
Plans are already in place to secure their own location, a third, in the Sydney area. Ray and Marcus joined the company seven months ago.
When the company was founded by its owner, Gurpreet Dhillon Singh, the business model was initially anchored around use of rigid vehicles. This soon led to adoption of semis and then B-doubles.
A high percentage of the work is still in grocery supply with a strategic shift, of late, into the express freight sector.
“We’ve been very strong in the express section and we’re now doing triples and quads,” says Ray, who is the brother of Danni Spiteri, SGGS Victorian Branch Manager.
“Refrigeration is now just booming for us. And we’ve got an order for another ten or 12 B-double pantech trailers on the way with more mezzanine units also coming in. We’ve got major expansion plans.”
There’s also a high demand for the business to establish a permanent presence in Sydney.
“As all of our operations must be done through our customers it becomes a challenging point, not having anything in Sydney already,” says Ray.
The city can be daunting to outsiders particularly from the perspective of initial financial outlay. The price of entry is exorbitant.
Rental properties for those who haven’t originated or long ago established a footprint in Sydney can be intimidating.
“The difficulty is it’s really expensive compared to other major cities. Rental properties are through the roof,” says Ray. “We’re finding that a lot of companies share with each other only because it is so expensive.”
Even so, they’re prepared to start out small while leveraging off warehousing to cover costs.
“We’ll store freight and that will help us out and we’re looking at that model in Sydney because we sort of need to in regard to entering the market.”
At their 20,000m2 Brisbane site, D&G Logistics has opened up its own workshop with plans to replicate something similar in Melbourne as the business will take on its own repairs, another costly byproduct of the post-COVID economy.
“When you get a maintenance plan for a brand-new truck, any big issue whether it be a clutch or a turbo, it’s covered,” says Ray.
“We don’t have to worry about any of that. In saying that, you’ve got to ensure you’re not paying more on truck repayments month-by-month. Whereas some see it as taking the headache out of things.”
The mixed fleet is dominated by Mercedes-Benz Actros units with a sprinkling of Volvos and Kenworths. The new AAB-quad is being pulled by a Volvo FH700 Globetrotter with an XXL cab. Vawdrey have built the trailers.
The combination grosses at 119 tonnes.
“With the quads we weren’t heavily reliant on any one customer to load all of the trailers because we’ve got a few customers who don’t really like mixing and matching,” says Ray.
“For customers, 98 per cent of the time it’s either a B-double or a single. So having to get a customer to technically load two B-doubles at once is challenging.”
They have found, however, the further the end point of the freight lane is, the easier it is to allocate loads. A quad naturally brings with it different considerations. There’s obviously a lot more tyres involved should there be a breakdown.
“The thing is we’re not running 50 a week, we’re only doing one a week at this stage,” says Ray.
“Same guy, same truck, same trailers. In regard to heading over to Darwin there’s no issues. It’s quite easily done.”
On an NHVR gazetted route, D&G Logistics runs its B-doubles out to Gatton where they will hook up additional trailers before advancing into Darwin. The trip takes in total four days.
“We try and leave Friday morning to be over there by Monday,” says Ray.
“The thing with Darwin is everyone is pretty good in terms of transit times. We tell the customers five days express, six days general freight. But we get it there within four. We always allow that little bit extra in case there’s an issue. We’re now eight consecutive weeks running it. Originally it was launched as an ad hoc request if, say, a customer wanted to load all four of the trailers. This is the third month that we have consistently launched it every Friday to be there Monday. It’s gaining momentum.”