Wine specialist takes on Toyota Toneros

Lanchester Wines offers a complete wine service, beginning at vineyards all over the world, to bottling, warehousing, bonding, distribution and branding. The 440,000 sq ft distribution centre located in County Durham is in operation 24 hours a day, where forklift trucks are used to move pallets containing 840 bottles of wine from the bottling plant to the warehouse for distribution, with 1,600 pallets being moved every day.

Lanchester Wines conducted trials with three different competitors’ trucks. At the trials the operators were impressed with the comfort and ease of use of the Toyota Tonero forklift.

Tonero forklifts are suitable for all applications up to 3.5 tonnes and feature industrial engines, a choice of transmissions, outstanding all-round visibility and are fitted with Toyota SAS as standard. SAS constantly monitors forklift operations and automatically takes corrective action when it senses factors that could lead to truck or load instability. Its six advanced functions work together to keep your driver and goods safely on the move and productivity on the up.

Lanchester Wines MD Tony Cleary says: “We have built a great partnership with Toyota and I am pleased to say the fleet of trucks and the service support we have been given are meeting the challenges of our growing business”.

The relationship began after a meeting at the Commercial Vehicle show.

Tony explains: “We were really impressed when we met Toyota Material Handling at the Commercial Vehicle show. I found the team on the stand incredibly professional, they took time to find out about my operation and discuss with me how their products, both trucks and after-sales support could benefit my operation.”

Zoe Johnson, marketing manager at Toyota Material Handling UK adds: “The events are a great opportunity for us to meet companies, let them see our products but more importantly meet our sales and service teams. We believe that people buy from people, so we always make sure we have an experienced team on-hand to spend time with visitors to understand their operation and discuss their requirements.”

Toyota Material Handling UK is a regular exhibitor at the Commercial Vehicle show and has confirmed they will be attending the show again this year on the 14-16 April 2015, Hall 3, Stand 3A80.