Robert Kierzek, CEO of Inter Cars SA was interviewed by Mirosław Giecewicz.
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Many Polish companies are dependent on domestic economy. Your position is different, because foreign IC subsidiaries generate sales revenue no matter the situation in Poland. How does the situation look like in each of those subsidiaries and are you planning expansion to other markets?
In its strategy Inter Cars bet on investment in post-communistic counties. First of all because of similarity of development. Secondly because of huge potential of those markets. Today the strategy is confirmed, the subsidiaries grow dynamically, on average with two-digit number and today they account for 35% of total sales revenue of the whole group. And I am sure this share will be growing.
Today, from among all post-soviet countries, we are not present in Russia and Belarus, as those markets lack stability, and we cannot see any chances to have our subsidiaries there at the moment. Whereas totally new perspectives are brought by Internet, which does not respect any administrative borders, and via which we will be trying to get to those countries where we do not have our operations.
In 2012 you launched a modern e-platform – Motointegrator which offers spare parts as well as a wide range of services for retail customers. What is the level of responsibility of the platform and are you planning to launch similar projects abroad?
Today we are treating Motointegrator as another branch, because this is the level of turnover generated by it. This is undoubtedly a big success, taking into account that it was launched just a year ago. We get the information from many garages, that the customers get to them directly after having used a search engine on Motointegrator.pl website. On the other hand a number of ordered services via the system is growing, so we can say that Motointegrator meets the basic function of it, helping the customers to find reliable garages. As we have been saying many times, we want to transfer experience of Motointegrator to all the places where we are present with traditional offer, as this is a product which is dedicated for garages and cannot exist without them.
Young HR programme is an investment in young people. Inter Cars SA, in cooperation with partners, support schools. This is one of the most interesting ideas, as it supports students of automotive schools, that is future mechanics. What are the achievements of the “young HR” programme?
This program gives great opportunities of combining theory with practise. A car is more sophisticated and technically advanced and most repairs without suitable devices is just impossible.
It is important not to thing of the program as only equipping the schools with devices, but there are also added values, such as practical trainings in garages. Trainings for the students are led by experts of our suppliers, the same who train our customers. And if there is a training for mechanics which is performed in one of our Regional Training Centres, there is always a free place for some students, so that they could have contact with practical knowledge and learn among specialists. Trainings performed for a group of students is mostly theoretical one, such trainings are of course organized as well, in order for both groups – students and mechanics – can stay together – than the level of the training is different. I assume that in such “joined” trainings mostly students with a desire of knowledge will take part. Thanks to this it will be very easy to spot the best of them, and mechanic present during the training can at once hire such student as an apprentice.
During the programme, Inter Cars S.A. delivered diagnostic devices, garage equipment and other educational materials to ten schools. During this whole time we could see that vocational education in Poland is now going through its renaissance. We are also pleased to see that the programme is popular among the local authorities as well. This encourages us to continue our operations and the programme for the following years.
In April this year you have recorded the history-high monthly sales revenue of PLN 283.8 million. Does this mean that sales is growing?
First we need to say that 2012 was not one of the best in our industry. The vision of crisis which was all around, especially in media, kept lots of people away from normal and standard maintenance and running repairs of their cars. But those decisions cannot be postponed forever.
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Long winter was also one of the causes of malfunctions of the cars. That is why when the weather turned into a much better one, the garages were under attack. This in turn resulted in sales increase, what can be seen in our reports of monthly sales revenue.
At the beginning of 2012 you were saying: “In our strategy for the next few years we bet on development of sales of goods which are not the core element of our product range, that is automotive spare parts.” What products did you have in mind?
Our main area of activities are mechanical automotive spare parts for vehicles. So everything that cannot be called that name is a point to development. We are thinking here mostly about lubricants, batteries, tyres or visual parts. Not long ago those products were the domain of special wholesalers. Today the situation is a bit different, but there is still a lot to be done.
And the last question. Applying for bankruptcy by one of Polish aftermarket distributors – Fota Company – for sure will change something on the market. What can this mean for Inter Cars SA?
There is no denying that despite big differences in sales volumes, in many product lines our offer was similar. So we know today, that difficulties of our competitor resulted in increase of sales revenue with those customers, who has not generated big revenue with our company till now.
The garages need a continues supply of spare parts. So if this pessimistic scenario comes true, that is Fota SA will go bankrupt, we are sure that this will have a positive impact on sales figures of other companies from the industry.
Thanks to its distribution chain and market position, Inter Cars will be able to fill the gap most efficiently.
Thank you for the interview.
