The success of any transportation business depends primarily on its operational network and the strategic deployment of its fleet on the network in a manner that complements the connectivity with fast and timely delivery of goods. Reema Transport Pvt. Ltd. (RTPL), a Mumbai-based company, is in the business of transportation and logistics services since the last 3½ decades. The company’s focus has been on providing reliable, time-bound and hassle-free transportation, hygienic and secure warehousing, and related logistics services both for refrigerated and non-refrigerated cargo, coupled with quality services.
The company has been conferred various prestigious national and other awards such as the Mahindra Transport Excellence Award for “Outperformance in Driver Management Practices”, “Outperformance in Fleet Management” categories, the National Award for “Driving Positive Change in Refrigerated Category”, Cold Chain Industry Awards for “Best Cold Chain Service Provider”, and several other awards and recognitions for excellent services in the Cold Chain segment.
RTPL has set up a well-connected network, with branch offices in all the States of its operations to facilitate easy and quick access to customers, along with a well-defined contingency plan for any unforeseen situations. Today, it has spread arms across the country in Maharashtra, Goa, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and in the Union Territories of Daman, Dadra and Nagar Haveli.
We got in touch with Mr. Dileep Naik, Managing Director, to know more about the company’s current operations and its plans for the future.
Edited excerpts:
Please provide a brief outline of the company’s founding days and how it paved its way into the transportation segment over the years.
RTPL was born on September 23, 1983, as a small-time enterprise, catering to local deliveries for some of our clients within Mumbai city. In 1990, we spread our wings in Maharashtra, and then commenced operations in Goa, and partially in Gujarat. Our initial clients were engineering and FMCG majors like Crompton, Siemens, D-Link, IFB, Meltron, NELCO and the like.
In 2004, we forayed into cold chain transportation, whereafter there was no looking back. We expanded our network to cover the Central region of Madhya Pradesh, and over the years we added branch offices in major pharma hubs in southern States, such as Hyderabad in Telangana and Bengaluru in Karnataka that cater to services in the entire southern region. Today, we are one of the leading pharma service providers in temperature-controlled transportation, a position we enjoy on the strength of our policy, work culture, high quality service, a dedicated team, and our highly acclaimed fleet of reefer vehicles. We are a pharma specialist, in the true sense of the term.
What are the regions where you are currently strong and which are the regions that you would want to focus more?
RTPL services the who’s who of the domestic and international exim business spread across industry verticals such as pharmaceuticals, light and heavy engineering, packaging, electronics, chemicals and FMCG, not to mention the small traders and business houses. Our core service, however, is focused on the highly sensitive and critical pharmaceutical products such as life-saving drugs and other medicines, formulations, injectables, vaccines and blood plasma, including imported pharma raw material. Considering the high sensitivity of the products we handle, we operate our own exclusive and best-in-class fleet of custom-built refrigerated vehicles that come in varied dimensions and payload.
What about your fleet strength? Please elaborate on the number of vehicles, their GVW, their specification and how technologies like GPS, data loggers and temperature control enabled provides peace of mind and assurance of safety of goods being transported to your customers.
The company presently owns 75 + refrigerated and 25 non-refrigerated vehicles of various dimensions and capacities. Normal vehicles comprise LCVs, MCVs and HCVs. To complement this fleet, the company has 100 + dedicated vehicles that operate exclusively for RTPL. We strongly believe in best-in-class customer service and constant improvements based on innovation and customer feedback. Our reefer vans are GPS-enabled, with live temperature sensors that provide access to our customers to track and trace each shipment by its location, temperature, stoppage, route, along with door open and close alerts. Besides, we have back-up data loggers provided with every shipment.
Where do you get the refrigerated bodies made? Please elaborate on the specification of the bodies made and the preferred materials and the AC unit brand used?
Our refrigerated container bodies are fabricated at the facilities of our approved vendors based in Pune, Navi Mumbai and Coimbatore in the South. In the past we have used PUF insulation in a stainless-steel body, with a corrugated exterior. However, with new innovations in the reefer body fabrication technology, our recent acquisitions come with XPS insulation, with similar exterior. As for the refrigeration, all our vehicles are equipped with world-class branded air-conditioners of Carrier and Thermo King. Our entire fleet is pharma-compliant.
Do you have your own fleet maintenance yard/team? What is your preferred brand for tyres, lubricants, etc.?
We do have our in-house fleet maintenance team based in Mumbai. The team is trained to repair and service breakdowns and carry out preventive maintenance. Our preferred brands of tyres are JK and CEAT. The lubricant used is of Indian Oil.
We understand your major expertise lies in cold-chain transportation. Help us understand your strengths and value-added services in the same in tune of customisation in terms of managing goods.
We are pharma cold chain transporters rendering services to the pharmaceutical industry, specifically to transport the high value, highly sensitive products in temperature-controlled environment. We operate within our network to ensure and maintain high quality service levels, with a well-defined and effective contingency plan.
We also have expertise in handling milk van route shipments, for products like vaccines and blood plasma. Our core strength lies in catering to the niche market, while restricting our vehicles for the exclusive use of medicinal products, barring confectioneries on a limited scale. We are well equipped to adapt to temperature changes in the range of -30 to +50 degrees, with complete transparent and live data feed for our clients. Our vehicles undergo pre-trip checks as a mandatory proactive measure, with timely servicing to ensure high performance.
We are an ISO 9001:2015 certified company adhering to quality systems and procedures, with CTPAT and GDP compliance certification. We use certified bottle seals for pharma shipments to ensure the vehicle carries nothing other than the designated cargo. This is in keeping with the customer-specific requirements.
Do you undertake ‘only warehousing’ assignments too?
Presently we are not into warehousing for cold chain shipments. We however have ambient warehousing facilities in Goa and other locations.
How has been the business in the BS-IV and GST regime? How will you cope with the impending BS-VI transition? The rise in vehicle cost and fuel price will affect logistics. What are your plans to cope up with it?
BS-VI is a good initiative. We need fuel-efficient, smart vehicles on the road for better service and better environment. Yes, it has an added cost to it, but will be beneficial in the long run. As far as GST is concerned, we were initially shaken, like most other organisations of our size. The transition took some time to happen. The introduction of GST has done away with the tax barriers and check-posts across the country, resulting in seamless movements of vehicles across States without the hassles of the pre-GST era. This has led to huge savings in terms of highly reduced fuel consumption, time and energy, and, above all, the endless waiting of vehicles at check-posts.
We are now fully equipped to go with the GST regime, particularly post our migration to FCM from the initial RCM option.
What is your company’s team strength? What about the processes that ease the day-today operations for clients?
We operate with a manpower strength of 180 + employees, including drivers on our pay-rolls, spread across 20 branch offices, comprising of a centralized operations team spearheaded by the Head of Operations that overlooks the entire operational activities across the company’s network. A full-fledged fleet-cum-maintenance team headed by the Fleet In-Charge maintains and services the fleet of vehicles to keep them in a high state of road worthiness at all times. The two processes work closely together and co-ordinate with each other to provide the highest quality services to our customers, with the help of well-defined SOPs (Standard Operating Procedures), quality management systems, and procedures.
Share with us your company’s initiative to deal with driver shortage and measures you take to address the challenge in terms of hiring, training and retaining the driving community.
As is well known, driver shortage is one of the biggest challenges of the day, for every transporter, especially for those who are into Cold Chain Pharma movements. Detailed driver screening is critical, considering the nature of shipments, including adequate knowledge and skills, which is crucial for carrying the cargo safely. Once recruited, drivers undergo detailed training, including classroom as well as on job training. Once the fleet in charge approves the driver, he is given independent charge of a reefer van.
We nurture strong driver values in our organisation. The one community that is ignored but used by all is the driver community, and therefore we have several initiatives taken up for them. Most importantly we celebrate ‘Drivers Week’ every year, commencing on September 17, wherein all our drivers are celebrated, appreciated and thanked for their dedicated loyalty and service, not just to the company, but to the society at large. Along with them, we also support their family by providing financial support, in the form of books / study material, cash and kind.
Our initiative of ‘Chaalak se Maalak’ is an innovative concept inspired by Mahindra Transport Excellence Awards where a driver is given the once-in-a-life-time opportunity of becoming the proud owner of a truck with the company’s support. This is the sole motivation for our loyal drivers to own a vehicle with a zero interest loan from our organisation. This is not only for their career growth but also to help us retain them in our organisation.
What is your medium to long-term plan? Where would you want to place yourself in the competitive cold-chain logistics sector by the end of FY 2020?
Cold chain logistics is a highly competitive sector. India being a major producer of products like fruits, vegetables, flowers, pharmaceuticals, frozen foods, etc., we have high potential in this segment. However, our goal is working with the niche. Our next step will be expansion of our network to be a pan-India player with systematic and advanced IT potential, to work with high-calibre clients. In addition to this, we also have plans to foray into operating multi-temp vehicles, and cold chain consolidation, once our research is fool proof to enable the same for implementation within our niche target market.
We are a Rs. 360 million company as of now, with a steady growth rate of 10-12% on an average. However, since the last few years, our growth has been slightly lower in view of some major economic reforms introduced in 2017 that impacted our business. Nevertheless, we got over it with aplomb, and today we are poised to grow at a much faster rate with an expansion both in our customer base and operational network.