Mondiale VGL introduces first Volvos into fleet

Tom Chapman, Rory Gerhardt and members of Volvo and Mondiale VGL.

Freight forwarding specialist, Mondiale VGL, has taken delivery of six new Volvo prime movers.

Two new Volvo FH16s and four FH13s will be put to work in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, predominantly hauling shipping containers to and from major port terminals.

All six trucks are covered by Gold Service agreements.

The distinctive new vehicles will be closely monitored and benchmarked against the company’s existing transport fleet in regard to total cost of ownership and uptime.

Rory Gerhardt, Mondiale VGL Fleet & Compliance Manager notes the Volvo product offering has improved immensely.

“The big thing for us is their telematics platform and their reporting on the ESG side of things and their ability to write environmental reports,” he told Prime Mover.

“That along with the competitive pricing has made it a very attractive proposition,” said Gerhardt.

These new trucks are part of a fleet refresh with some units purchased for additional work secured late last year.

“The FH16s are additions to our existing fleet. They will be pulling A-doubles for us now for some of the heavier stuff we’ve signed up to recently,” said Gerhardt.

“We do a lot of heavy specialised boxes. These trucks will certainly help. I’m interested to see how they perform against the V8s in our fleet as well.”

The Volvo FH13s will be designated existing Super B work around the ports with quad sideloader operations.

“Ninety-five per cent of our truck business is geared around Performance-Based Standards,” added Gerhardt.

These Volvos are the first ever to have been introduced into the Mondiale VGL fleet.

The trucks arrived just prior to Christmas. They have only been in service for a couple of weeks.

“The cab, the ergonomics, the performance — the guys love them,” said Gerhardt.

“There’s a lot of tech in them.”

Volvo’s reputation for a leading safety spec is also part of the attraction for reducing possible incidents and ensuring drivers are not only comfortable but looked after.

Cabin coolers, lane departure cameras and forward, rear and turntable cameras all make it a compelling product.

“They are safer and efficient for drivers and a lot more comfortable,” said Gerhardt.

“They’re fit-for-purpose.”

He added, “It’s well established that the European product is pretty good whether it’s Mercedes-Benz, Volvo or Scania. So it becomes partly about the aftersales stuff and what they were offering. Volvo’s aftersales has drastically improved and is one of the best on offer in our opinion.”

Mondiale VGL handles end-to-end freight solutions from sea and air freight to wharf transport, import and export.

It currently operates across 19 countries.

“We did big numbers last year and we set records in October and November,” said Gerhardt.

“The numbers forecast for the next 12 months are even bigger. Again, a majority of that is heavy stuff. We move a lot of stone and tile product. We’ve invested in quads for this kind of cartage.”

Gerhardt confirmed the fleet had another eight quad trailers being built by Vawdrey slated to come off the production line in February.

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