Ifor Williams Trailers NZ ELDERS

In the last quarter of 2024, and following the retirement of Southern Trailers, Ifor Williams Trailers started the journey to reinvigorate the New Zealand market, with the appointment of new Distributors of their products on the North Island of New Zealand.

Already prominent in the trailer industry in New Zealand, the Elders family headed up by Tom Elders and his father Danny were quickly alerted to a chance in a lifetime opportunity, to become an Approved Distributor of the iconic Welsh Trailer brand; Ifor Williams Trailers, on the North Island.

Educated in West Yorkshire, Danny Elders went on to obtain an honours degree from the University of Leeds in Accounting and Finance with a major in Marketing. Danny was already very familiar with the Ifor Williams brand and knew exactly what it represented in the world of commercial, leisure and domestic towing.

Tom Elders, educated at Aquinas College, Tauranga qualified as a commercial pilot and worked in Adelaide, Australia prior to Covid, training commercial pilots for various airlines. As the family moved into the trailer market, Tom a system orientated self-starter, implemented systems to improve business efficiency and marketing, leading to significant increases in turnover. Tom has good knowledge of trailers and of the NZ trailer market, having been involved in trailer assembly and distribution since the inception of this family business.

Wasting no time, Danny and Tom drew on their combined expertise to present an inspiring partnership proposal, to become a formal and highly professional distributor of Ifor Williams Trailers.

‘IWT trailers have always been regarded as a premium quality trailer that deliver what they promise. Our company wants to offer only products that meet and exceed customer expectations. We believe that IWT’s product range will open a new segment of the market up for us to serve, with a product that we would be confident and proud to represent.

Being a father and son team, we have a vested interest in building a successful business over the longer term. We have a good reputation for being honest and reliable partners to act as one of IWT’s Distributors in the North Island of NZ. We are a company of hard working, honest straight-shooters and we have the market knowledge, energy and infrastructure in place to be great distributors of IWT products in the North Island of New Zealand for many years to come.

Deserving of the brand and the significant opportunity that was available, there was a rigorous and very competitive application process. We firstly met with Jac Williams from the Family Office who interviewed us, and conducted a detailed review of our business plan and application. We next met with the Directors and Owners of IWT, where it became clear to us that as two family businesses we shared a lot of the same core values and business ethos, and were well aligned to become strong business partners together’.

Late August, the selection process continued, and the Directors of Ifor Williams Trailers visited us in New Zealand, to meet us in person, see our location and to get to know us better.

John Williams, Managing Director said,

‘Carole rarely lifts her head from work for the factories in Wales, so it was very special for us, to be able to make the journey to New Zealand and be directly involved in the appointment of the New Zealand team. We have both always wanted to understand the New Zealand market better and looking back on our visit, we doubt that we would have been able to reach the same conclusions by proxy. Our trailers have been designed and tested for conditions that exactly match the New Zealand roads and driving through the beautiful windy back roads, from Auckland to Tauranga, we instantly knew, that we had a product/country match.

The whole Elders family are impressive. They are decent, hardworking, open individuals. Even before we met them, their business core values were demonstrably similar to ours and with age and experience, we have learnt, that trust is the fundamental platform on which good business prospers. We are excited to be working with Danny and Tom and we believe that we can present our carefully engineered product, to the New Zealand market, in a closely aligned way, by partnering with the Elders team’.

A number of weeks later Tom and Danny visited the Ifor Williams Trailers Advanced Manufacturing facilities in North Wales.

‘We were delighted to be invited to Wales, where we received intensive product training from Alex Lenden and all the Site Managers. We built firm business relationships with all the Ifor Williams team, who demonstrate the business’ values in everything that they do.

We became knowledgeable of which products are manufactured on each of the 5 manufacturing sites and we enjoyed acquiring such an extensive amount of sales knowledge, in such a relaxed and professional way.

As lovers of the beautiful game of football, we were extremely lucky that our visit coincided with a Wrexham game and along with John Williams, Managing Director, the Head of Manufacturing, the Head of Purchasing and Materials and the Head of Design, we were delighted to watch an exciting game of football, at this legendary club linked to Ifor Williams Trailers. We spent our other evenings with many members of the management teams, who we are going to be working closely with, eating and chatting, so we really did not have a moment wasted, in the company of the highly focussed Ifor Williams staff.

When we left the new Boundary Park site in Wales, we felt bonded to this unique and diverse business, and despite the long distance between us, we now feel like Ifor Williams Trailers is very close to home.

We look forward, to meeting up with the Ifor Williams team again, either in New Zealand or Wales and we especially look forward to sharing with you, our customers, the Ifor Williams range of products, which we know will work hard for you and your businesses here in New Zealand.’