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MALAYSIA
Guests inspecting the MesTread plant upon its opening
Teow Leng Eng and Edmund Teng with some of their team
MesTread Sees Great Market Potential
MesTread may well be a new player in the Malaysian tyre retreading market, but the company is confident that its experience in the logistics sector and an attitude described by the company as “putting one’s heart in the right place”, will help it to make an impact in the local market.
“If you do business with your heart, you will certainly warm your customer’s heart”, says Head of Sales - Dealers Channel Teow Leng Eng. “This is what we are doing”, he adds. “We retread with our hearts. We make sure that from the raw materials to final inspection every step of the retreading process is for the best benefit of our customers,” MesTread Tyre Solution Sdn Bhd started its production in middle of April, but held its official opening later on the 18th June.
“The opportunity came in at the right time”, added Head of Sales- Fleet Channel Edmund Teng. “One of our directors, who owned Mesjadi Logistic was instrumental in the set-up of MesTread. Operating a logistic company, he uses many retreaded tyres. But, he was not so satisfied with the quality and felt that it could be better. This prompted him to come up with the idea of producing his own retreaded tyres. With his backup and with our expertise in the industry, we believe that we are able to offer both dealers and fleet operators a better choice,”
Teow and Edmund are responsible for sales, while Alex Chan is the
Head of Department- Production. They were former colleagues, and they have over 25 years of experience in the retreading industr y. Thus, their tacit understanding with each other combined with their technical skill and know-how, makes them a strong team.
“When I was in my previous company, I visited retreading plants in many countries,” commented Alex. “This gave me a chance to look at the equipment that they used and their retreading process. I also have experience in retreading plant layout, set up and technical know- how transfer in China. All these have helped me to be more precise when it comes to new plant set up and management.” There is a saying: “A workman must first sharpen his tools if he is to do his work well,” says Alex. Although their company’s plant is small, it is fully-equipped with branded retreading equipment. The builder, buffer and curing chamber are fully automatic for consistency in quality. “Safety is of utmost importance to us. We make sure that each retreaded tyre goes through high pressure testing before we deliver it to the customer as a final inspection, ensuring reliability and safety even though it is time consuming.”
"No compromise on quality" is Mestread’s policy and, according to Teow, the company has already applied for MS 224 certification, the specification for Retreaded Pneumatic Rubber Tyres for Passenger Car and Commercial
Vehicles in Malaysia.
Currently, their maximum production capacity is 2,000 pieces of retreads per month. According to Alex, they have achieved their two year target, which is 1,000 retreads per month. Their main customers are from the Klang Valley and South Malaysia. “We have also started exploring the East Coast market, and hope to penetrate into Northern Malaysia by next year”, said Teow.
MesTread retreads light truck, truck and bus tyres utilizing the precure retreading system. Of their total production, 70 per cent are radial tyres, and 30 per cent are bias tyres. 80 per cent of their business is from Customer Own Casings (COC) while 20 per cent is from stock casings. The company provides its service directly to the end-users and also goes through dealers.
Under the company, there are two brands, MesTread and MesSave. According to Teoh, they will encourage customers who demand high mileage to go for MesTread if their casings are good, while MesSave is for those who are more price oriented, or for tyres that have been retreaded before. However, Teoh stressed that the retread process is the same, only the rubber compound is different. ”
“ In addition, what is really useful is the fact that we can get direct feedback on the tyres as Mesjadi trucks also run on our retreads.” Edmund added: “ This help us to further improve our retread quality. At the moment, Mesjadi makes up 2-3 per cent of our total production.”
To have an efficient inventor y
control and to keep a record of production, MesTread is using tyre barcode labeling. This system is still not ver y common in the industr y but it allows them to track virtually ever y aspect of tyre management. If the customer is also using the system, then the customer can check online and immediately know how many tyres have been delivered giving him/her a better control of his/her stock.
What challenges are the company facing as a new player in the market? “ Well, ” Edmund replied, “ I would say our selling price is our biggest challenge. We are not here to sell cheap, but to provide users with a better option. As a new player, people do not know whoweare,soitisnoteasyat this stage. But, after visiting our plant during its opening and seeing our finished product, customers have been less reserved. When they tried our retreads, they were convinced of our sincerity, professionalism and skill. ”
MesTread is fully aware that the market trend is currently moving towards a one-stop tyre solution. In order to be able to stay competitive in the market and to provide a complete service to the customer, MesTread has to position itself as a total tyre solution provider.
“ We are the sole distributor for Thailand Superstone light truck, truck and bus bias tyres in Malaysia. Thus, we are able to provide our customer with both new tyres and retreads. Besides that we also provide our customers with a 24 hour breakdown service as a value added service, ” added Teow.
44 Retreading Business