Fleet managers turn to used trucks in recession
February 1st 2010 The British Industrial Truck Association has suggested used truck sales have risen significantly in the UK, as many fleet and warehouse managers turn away from buying new equipment.
BITA’s secretary general James Clark said: “Although used truck sales figures are not part of BITA’s recording process, we hear there have been significant increases in the sales of used equipment, which in turn, of course, reduces the potential for truck suppliers to sell new units.”
According to BITA’s latest sales statistics, orders for new forklift trucks continued to fall in 2009, with a 33.6% drop during 2009, consolidating a 14.5% fall during 2008.
In terms of sales volumes, orders for a little over 17,600 new forklift trucks were taken by BITA members during 2009 - 8,900 fewer than in 2008.
As well as many warehouse and fleet managers favouring used trucks, BITA put this down to a number of other factors.
Fighting battles
“Of course there has been a general decline in demand for forklift trucks, as customers have fought their own battles with the recession – some successfully, some less so,” said Clark.
“There has also been a trend toward truck users extending their existing truck hire contracts beyond planned termination dates, rather than replacing them with new stock.”
Among the major forklift categories, the market for engine powered counterbalance trucks was hardest hit during 2009, with orders for diesel and LPG models falling by 42% and 45% respectively during the year. Diesel and LPG counterbalance trucks are used in large numbers by some of the most badly affected sectors of the economy, such as engineering and the supply chain to the building industry.
The market for electric forklifts showed a little more resilience according to BITA, with unit orders for electric powered counterbalance trucks falling by 36% during 2009 and the market for warehouse trucks by 25%. One bright spot was very narrow aisle (VNA) trucks.
Expressed on an annualised basis, this sector has shown four consecutive months of modest growth since September 2009.
Optimistic signs
“These are clearly sobering figures but we remain optimistic,” added Clark. “For some truck categories the market has stabilised and is hopefully set to begin to show a positive trend: the markets for powered pallet trucks, pedestrian stackers and low level order pickers display such a pattern.” More articles from Handling & Storage Solutions: | 
