Iveco Trucks has made clear its commitment to the New Zealand trucking industry – with the opening of a new $16million national headquarters.
At last month's opening of what it terms "the benchmark in NZ truck dealerships," Iveco's dealer principal, NZ retail and wholesale operations, Jason Keddie declared: "Our intentions are clear. We're not here to be also-rans – we're here to make a statement.
"The (Iveco) product is an excellent product for the market – suits it very well. So we've got niches, we've got opportunities…we're going to be aggressive."
The opening, attended by senior management from Iveco Trucks Australia and parent company CNH Industrial, revealed a 15-bay workshop boasting state-of-the-art diagnostics and equipment, a warehouse that has trebled the size of its parts inventory, new NZ management offices and display space for over 50 trucks and vans.
As a dealership, says Keddie, the Roscommon Road, Wiri site "provides a complete end-to-end solution for our customers."  
But its opening, 29 years after Iveco entered the NZ market, also signals a push for Iveco to be a bigger player in the NZ new truck market.
While Keddie insisted that "at the moment I'm not chasing market share targets – I'm just trying to grow our brand," he also conceded that, clearly, "we're not staying where we are (in terms of market share)."
Last year, for instance, Iveco ranked ninth in the overall NZ market (above 4.5t GVM) – selling 252 vehicles, for a 4.88% market share. In the heavy-duty sector (above 23t) it was 12th, with 72 sales and a 2.9% share.
In the first quarter of this year, its registrations in the overall market stood at 57, for a 4.4% share. But in the premium big-truck market, it only sold seven trucks – the equivalent of a 1% share.
Said Keddie: "We're not getting ahead of ourselves and saying we want to sell triple the volume this year, and we want to sell double our parts volume….
"It's incremental business for us. We're looking at new opportunities. We're going to invite customers to come and see us when they're in Auckland, we're going to invite them to try our service, we're going to be very competitive…we're going to train our technicians thoroughly in our products.
"So the investment will pay for itself – I assure you.
"I think we've got a much bigger opportunity than what we've actually realised so far. To be fair we didn't quite have the facilities previously to really deliver that – and now this is what is going to take us to the next level."
Now, he suggests: "I think we need to work very hard on our brand recognition and our brand awareness. That's an area where we've got a lot of opportunity in.
"We've got a great product – we've just got to get that out to the market. Perhaps in a different style, a different way. Get more bums on seats, as they say.
"We've got some exciting new products coming through as well, which are very innovative."