OPENING NEW MARKETS

Leslie Sales Team

Leslie Equipment Company Becomes SENNEBOGEN dealer

COWEN, WV–For almost 40 years, Leslie Equipment Company has committed itself to equipping its customers with the best machines on the market. This commitment continues as the company will now offer SENNEBOGEN’s green line of purpose-built material handlers.

Constantino Lannes, President of SENNEBOGEN North America, recently announced that Leslie Equipment Company has been appointed as the newest addition to the company’s growing distributor network for SENNEBOGEN. Leslie Equipment Company will represent SENNEBOGEN products from eight of its 10 branches located in West Virginia and Southern Ohio. Having built its success as a John Deere Equipment Dealer for more than 38 years, Leslie Equipment Company has provided crawlers, dozers, scrapers, graders, excavators, wheel loaders, compaction and forestry equipment by direct sales or through its rental division. As a SENNEBOGEN dealer, the company is now poised to break into new markets.

Opening up new markets
Todd Perrine, Senior Vice President for Leslie Equipment Company says the company is recruiting a material handling specialist to represent the SENNEBOGEN line to complement its machinery specialists for earthmoving, pipeline and forestry equipment. “We have people in all other sectors but this is new for us,” says Perrine, adding that the SENNEBOGEN line will be a nice fit for its customers in wood yards already using wheel loaders and skid steers. “This gets us into material handling situations. However, the big thing for us is having a dedicated machine line for the scrap yards and for waterway terminal facilities that are unloading commodity cargo barges with duty cycle machines along the Ohio River. Whether it’s coal, sand, gravel or limestone, any of those commodities being handled by port facilities up and down the river, that is the new market that we are most excited about because we have not been active in that business before,” he says.

Even though the company has sold equipment to port facilities and scrap yards before, it has not been a primary focus until now. “We have been supplying some machinery like wheel loaders and skid steers as well as all of the support equipment around it. We have quoted some long reach excavators for some of the ports along the river with converted machines, but by the time you add the booms to do the conversions, they are 20% heavier than SENNEBOGEN machines. The more money we have tied up, the harder it is to be competitive in that market,” says Perrine. He points out that recently the company lost a deal bidding against SENNEBOGEN with a converted Hitachi. “We hate to lose any deals and if we can get into something else that offers more options for our customers, then that’s great. Now with SENNEBOGEN, we are truly into material handling because these machines are designed for doing just that,” he says.

While picking up Leslie Equipment Company helps to fill in the SENNEBOGEN distribution map, it also opens the door for Leslie Equipment to complement its product lines for port facilities, forestry and C&D operations with a line of purpose-built material handlers. “For some sectors like the coal industry, we can meet their needs with some small machines. However, these guys unloading barges with conveyors requiring duty cycle machines, we just have not been able to compete there. If you don’t get the duty cycle machines then you probably don’t get the skid steer or the wheel loader up in the yard either. Having the complete package for different businesses makes it more appealing to the customer who wants to deal with a one-stop shop,” says Perrine.

(l – r) Todd M. Perrine - Senior Vice President, Leslie Equipment Company Anthony Laslavic - Regional Sales Manager, SENNEBOGEN LLC John Leslie – President, Leslie Equipment Company David Phillips - Store Manager, Leslie Equipment Company

Designed for the job
In addition to these markets, Perrine also sees new opportunities for its existing markets by adding SENNEBOGEN machines to its rental fleet. “We have ordered three stock machines for now. I’m going to put clam buckets on the 830 tracked machines and put them out on the pipeline business as a supplement to the rental operation. That’s a market that I know will benefit because there are none of these machines in the pipeline business right now,” says Perrine.

He says their wide stance and good counterweight capabilities will provide this market with lighter machines that reach further. “You take a 35 ton excavator for example and by the time you put a long reach stick and a clam bucket on it, you find that it’s no longer very stable because it’s so heavy. This is not efficient because you are carrying extra weight, burning more fuel and at the end of the day, you are not getting the productivity you need out of something that big,” he says. “But you can take an 830 SENNEBOGEN, which is 10,000 lbs. lighter, and put a bigger bucket on it to give it 50 ft. of reach without having a long stick,” he says. “You can do that because that is standard for these machines. They are made to do these things.”

Perrine says they have been watching SENNEBOGEN’s growth for some time before contacting the company through a mutual friend who worked for a dealer in Pennsylvania. “We got into a situation where we had to compete against them a little bit and we knew that SENNEBOGEN didn’t have a dealer in West Virginia, so it finally it got to the point where we pursued it.” After a few meetings it became clear that the two companies were suited for each other.

Delivering on the promise
“SENNEBOGEN is a good family owned business just like we are. We like the way they do business and the way they build machines. Do it right the first time, do the engineering and testing and make sure it does what it promises before you put it out in the field, and don’t let the customer be the test grounds,” says Perrine. “These are just some of those philosophies they have that match up with our philosophies. Treat people right: all business transactions are very honest and sincere; we are the manufacturer; you are the distributor; but we are all in it together. We have connected with their values.”

With 24 service trucks on the road and an extensive parts inventory backed up by a knowledgeable team of certified mechanics with years of combined experience, Leslie Equipment Company places a high priority on supporting its customers. As such, the company values the service and sales training support that SENNEBOGEN offers its dealers and it will be taking advantage of it.

“Our company knows how to take care of customers. We invest in training employees, service, parts, sales and administration,” says Perrine, adding that SENNEBOGEN will be rolling out an extensive training program. They recently attended the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) show in San Diego. “Our objective is to make everyone in the company familiar with the SENNEBOGEN product line,” said Perrine.

In turn, Leslie Equipment Company will also organize events where invited customers will have a close look at the green machines with walkarounds and short outdoor demos in addition to a focused marketing campaign that includes magazine advertisements, flyers and a corporate brochure produced in-house. “We are very excited about this opportunity, and we are going to invest the time to understand the machines and to understand the people in that business,” says Perrine.

About SENNEBOGEN
SENNEBOGEN has been a leading name in the global material handling industry for more than 58 years. Based in Stanley, North Carolina, SENNEBOGEN LLC offers a complete range of purpose-built machines to suit virtually any material handling application. A growing network of distributors supports SENNEBOGEN sales and service across the Americas, ensuring the highest standard of professional machine support and parts availability.