KHL Group - Rental

Rental Company of the Year (10 depots or more)

GAP Group (Shortlisted)
GAP Group is one of the UK’s most ambitious rental companies and in 2009 it continued to innovate and expand its offering. Among its initiatives during the year was the establishment of a non-mechanical division to supply equipment such as fencing, road crossing plates and trenching.

It diversified its customer base and added 83 new local government customers in 2009. It expanded its GAP one Managed Services offering to major accounts, adding asset management and services such as training, health and safety and environmental support.

The company’s commitment to training its own staff was exemplified last year by the establishment of national vocational qualification training for many of its staff.

HSS Hire (Shortlisted)
HSS is a renowned name in the rental industry, but the company has not been standing still and trading on its reputation. In 2009 the company was among the first anywhere in the world to offer an online rental system giving selected customers the ability to on- and off-rent equipment in real time over the internet, as well as access a wide range of other information on their rented equipment.

Neither has it been standing still on its depot network and fleet: in 2009 the company opened 12 new depots, and the company’s fleet is now 25% larger than it was three years ago. Also new in 2009 was HSS Onsite, a service where HSS sets up temporary rental facilities at its customers’ sites.

HSS’s safety credentials were meanwhile given a boost when a major UK consumer watchdog found that HSS was the only one of its surveyed rental companies to provide equipment with no safety faults.

The company takes sustainability seriously, having established measures to tackle carbon reduction and sustainable consumption. For example, it has halved the number of ‘wasted journeys’ that it was making, reducing costs to both customers and the environment.

Ramirent (WINNER)
For Ramirent, 2009 was about talking the actions needed to prepare it for a return to growth. Tight costs controls and low capital expenditure secured a strong cash flow and a positive operating result despite the difficult conditions.

Fixed costs were cut by €75 million and the company says this sound financial management means that its employees entered 2010 working for a financially sound company capable of exploiting the opportunities during the recession.

The company continued its work in expanding its quality standards throughout the organisation. For example, its operations in St Petersburg are now ISO 9001 certified. Ramirent established a common Code of Ethics during the year and introduced a web and telephone Ethics Helpline for all employees.

If financial management was paramount in 2009, the company still found time to develop a new branding strategy, focused around the Ramirent name and with the new brand promise, ‘Let’s solve it’.

Rental Company of the Year (under 10 depots)

Atut Rental (Shortlisted)
Polish rental company Atut Rental is proud of its achievement in 2009 of developing and implementing a new rental software tool. In doing so, Atut has re-examined its processes a created a new, more flexible operating structure than benefits both Atut and its customers. Atut says it clients are now seeing better availability of machines, better maintained machines, and better control of invoicing and therefore their costs. Atut says the success of the implementation means that it is considering marketing the rental software system with its Polish IT partner.

The company says that it successfully undertook the project in the middle of a severe financial crisis, with margins squeezed, and while facing new competition from competitors.

Bredenoord (WINNER)
Bredenoord is a family owned power rental company based in the Netherlands that has long been known for its engineering skill. In 2009, however, it took this expertise to new levels, with the launch of one of the world’s first ‘clean’ portable generators incorporating fuel cell technology.
 
This was a significant technical achievement on its own right, but in addition, the company has developed a self cleaning soot filter – Clean Air - that reduces the soot emissions from its diesel gensets by over 99.9%. Today, the company is investigating the potential offered by synthetic diesels: its conventional gensets fuelled by synthetic diesel combined with the Clear Air filter can substantially reduce emissions.

At the same time, the company has continued to invest in its core rental business. With a fleet of around 2000 generators, the company has operations in the Netherlands and Germany and in 2009 established its own rental operation in Denmark.

JVS Crane rental CZ (Shorlisted and Highly Commended)
Our third shortlisted small company is Czech company JVS Crane rental, which rents around 60 self-erecting tower cranes in the Czech and Slovak markets as well as in Austria. The company – founded in the early 90s by Tony Vacek (read ‘Watzek’), and now joined by his sons Tomas and Petr – has quadrupled its revenues since 2004. In 2009 the company managed to make a profit and save money in a very tough year.

Last year was also significant for JVS since it successfully implemented a custom-designed, web-based rental software system. Also in 2009 it introduced a new service to its growing number of international customers: the supply of crane operators with knowledge of foreign languages. In addition to speaking Czech and Slovak, it now has operators who can speak German, English, Hungarian, Serbian and Italian. This service was first provided to an Italian client last year working in Brno.

StroyRent (Shortlisted)
StroyRent of Bulgaria completes the shortlist of four for the small rental company award and is the third eastern European company in this category. Established in 2006, StroyRent managed to increase its sales in 2009 and finished the year with a profit.

During the year the company introduced three types of equipment never before used in Bulgaria: a drywall lift, a small self-propelled aerial platform; and a triangular wall/ceiling sander. The company says it will also remember 2009 as the year in which it created its own in-house equipment repair team and started to refurbish its own equipment.

Since the beginning StroyRent has believed in running a professional rental business. It is audited by the major established auditors like Ernst& Young and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), and sets itself high standards in terms of complying with safety regulations, even where this causes conflicts with its customers.

Rental Product of the Year

HH-Intellitech - Gerenuk 500 (Shortlisted)
Denmark’s HH-Intellitech has created a material handling attachment for use with telescopic handlers, cranes and other lifting equipment that can lift almost every type of building material, including facade elements, glass, concrete elements, granite, wood and steel.

The Gerenuk 500 has a 500 kg capacity and operates independently of the host machine with its own integrated electrical and hydraulic systems. The attachment can manipulate the load with millimetre precision, controlled remotely, and with a rotation 90 degrees below and above the horizontal.

The product offers rental companies a new and flexible rental tool.

JLG Industries - Toucan 10E (Shortlisted)
JLG Industries’ Toucan 10E is a vertical mast platform designed with rental companies in mind. With a working height of 10 metres, the lift provides access in tight places typically in industrial, maintenance, retail and food manufacturing settings.

The use of a direct electric drive system with brushless AC drive, brushless motors gives increased duty cycles and less charging. The electric drive also reduces the amount of oil in the machine and the hydraulic system has just six hoses, reducing the potential for leakage.

Mecaplus – ME12SL (Shortlisted)
The second aerial platform on the product of the year shortlist, the ME12SL from Spain’s Mecaplus is notable for its innovative automatic self-leveling system without the use of outriggers. The system addresses one of the dangers of working on aerial platforms – working on irregular and uneven surfaces. The ME12 SL gets around this with a levelling axle design that adjusts to the ground conditions and maintains ground contact on all four wheels as well as levelling the body of the machine.

Having introduced its novel design with this 12 m model, Mecaplus is now developing a family of larger machines using the same technology.

DF Ecology/TowerLight: Dust-fighter (WINNER)
DF Ecology, a division of Italian company TowerLight, is addressing the problems of dust exposure on building and construction sites with its new range of water spraying dust control products. The Dust-fighter propels a fine mist of water through a series of high-pressure jets and a powerful fan. It covers a wider area than conventional hose pipe systems, uses significantly less water, and spreads the water more evenly, minimising the formation of muddy surfaces.

Using its knowledge of the rental market through its lighting tower products, DF Ecology has made the Dust-fighter 7500MB a rental-friendly product: it is entirely self-contained, uses a super-silenced generator for power, and incorporates a 2000 litre stainless steel water tank sufficient for a complete day’s use. It weighs 1850 kg and can be fitted onto a rugged road trailer certified for use in EC countries and elsewhere.

DF Ecology says with health and safety officials throughout Europe stringently enforcing the control of hazardous material on sites, the demand for the dust control units are set to grow rapidly, offering rental companies a real business opportunity.

The ERA/IRN Rental Person of the Year
Chris Davies
Chris Davies is this year’s ERA/IRN Rental Person of the Year. Since joining HSS Hire in 2006 he has led the company as it has re-engineered itself into a business focused on serving professional customers in addition to the homeowner/DIY market where HSS has always been strong.

The company has been at the forefront of using the internet to market its services – and last year established the LiveHire system for major customers allowing then to order and off-rent equipment via a website.

In his career Chris has led companies in sectors including building materials, office equipment and leisure retailing. He is now successfully applying that broad experience to help make HSS a modern, innovative rental company.

Lifetime Achievement Award
The winner of this year’s Lifetime Achievement Award fully deserves the accolade, having for the past two decades been tireless in his promotion of the rental business in his home country and wider afield. Franco De Michelis, who started his career selling construction equipment in Europe, was a founder of Italy’s Assodimi/Assonolo dealer and rental organisation. Over the past 15 years he has trained over 1000 people in rental and has supported the development of many rental companies in Italy.
 
Franco’s outlook has always been much wider than his home market in Italy, typified by his early engagement with the European Rental Association and is contribution to the work of various technical committees as well as serving on the board of the organisation. He has been a fantastic ambassador and resource for the association.

The award coincides with the publishing of Franco’s new book – Creating Wealth with Rental – which distils much of his rental knowledge. It is the perfect time to acknowledge publicly the enormous contribution that Franco has made over his career.

The judges for the awards were:

Gerard Deprez, ERA President and chief executive officer of Loxam
Pierre Boels, Managing Director of Boels Verhuur
Dirk Stukkens, Global Account Manager, Komatsu
Michel Petitjean, ERA Secretary General
Murray Pollok, Editor, International Rental News