COMMERCIAL vehicle brands Isuzu, Hino and PACCAR Australia’s DAF and Kenworth have named their top-performing dealers for 2017 in recent weeks.

Isuzu Australia Limited’s National Dealer of the Year award was shared between two standout retailers from its network of more than 50 outlets – the 2016 outright winner Ballarat Isuzu in regional Victoria and Mid Coast Trucks in Macksville on the New South Wales mid-north coast.

Ballarat Isuzu dealer principal Ian Deacon described the result as “truly an honour to be recognised as one of the best, two years in a row”, while Mid Coast Isuzu dealer principal Tony Smith put the result down to strong customer relationships and “a change of strategy with ‘speed to market’ a focus”.

Ballarat Isuzu also picked up the award for Best Sales Dealership and Mid Coast took home the Best Parts Dealership gong.

Suttons Trucks Arncliffe in Sydney’s southern suburbs was named Best Service Department, with dealer principal Luke Taggart paying tribute to service manager Stuart Williams and his team.

Ballarat, Mid Coast and Suttons were also among nine Isuzu dealerships to receive separate recognition as part of Isuzu’s 2017 Dealer Excellence Program, which rewards those who reach “the highest standards” across various business areas including sales, customer satisfaction, staff training, business management and service and parts.

The others were Gilbert and Roach Isuzu (Newcastle), North East Isuzu (Adelaide), Gold Coast Isuzu, Tony Ireland Isuzu (Townsville), South West Isuzu (Bunbury) and Canberra Isuzu.

Over at Hino Motor Sales Australia, Prestige Hino from Dandenong South in Melbourne’s outer south-east took out its third consecutive Metropolitan Dealer of the Year award, while West Orange Motors in NSW was named Regional DOTY.

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Prestige Hino dealer principal Angelo Valerio paid tribute to the dealership team and put the win down to “setting goals to evolve the company into the 21st century”.

West Orange Motors dealer principal Aaron Daniel likewise said the award was “an amazing recognition of the strong teamwork, effort and dedication of all our staff”.

‘Excellence’ awards were also presented across sales, parts and service categories, with Prestige Hino winning metro sales, Illawarra Hino regional sales, Sci-Fleet Hino (Coopers Plains and Eagle Farm) taking out both metro parts and service awards, West Orange Motors regional parts and Pacific Hino (Cairns) service regional.

WA Hino Sales and Service’s Robert Tot was named 2017 Salesperson of the Year and Vanderfield Hino Toowoomba received special recognition for its 25-year partnership with the brand.

CMI Adelaide made it back-to-back wins for the Customer Experience award (metropolitan class), with West Orange Motors (regional class) and Johnson’s Truck and Coach Service in Mildura (rural class) also winning awards in this category.

CMI Adelaide dealership also took out the Hino Financial Services Award.

PACCAR Australia also recently paid tribute to its top-performing dealers across the region, with Kenworth DAF Melbourne winning the 2017 DAF Trucks Australia DOTY award and Southpac Trucks in New Zealand named Kenworth DOTY.

For the Melbourne dealership, this was its third win of the DAF DOTY award (adding to its titles in 2007 and 2012) and general manager Brad Motteram said the award was “something we can celebrate with everyone”.

“It gives me great pleasure to receive this award and share it with the entire team, because that’s what it is, a team award – it’s a sales, parts, service and finance award,” he said. “It’s also recognition for our administration staff.”

Across the Tasman, Southpac Trucks’ Kenworth DOTY award – part of a program that spans Australia, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea – was the first overall win for the dealership, which is based in Manukau (Auckland) and has branches in Hamilton, Rotorua and Christchurch, plus 18 parts and service dealers across the country.

The award, and separate gong for the 2017 PACCAR Australia Service DOTY, was presented to Southpac chief executive Maarten Durent and CEO of parent company The Colonial Motor Co Ltd Graeme Gibbons.

The presentations were made by PACCAR Australia managing director Andrew Hadjkakou and sales and marketing director Brad May.

By Terry Martin