Glenn Bucknell says the new equipment greatly increases output

Zip Water recently acquired a substantial fleet of new Toyota Material Handling equipment to support its large investment in an expanded production line that greatly increases output for its flagship HydroTap range.

Founded in western Sydney, Zip Water has built its business over the last 70 years. From humble beginnings, the company now exports its innovative drinking water systems to more than 70 countries from its factory in Condell Park in Sydney's west.

Zip Water has scaled up production to meet rising demand and updated its fleet of materials handling equipment, which now includes four Toyota 730-DR32TT double deep reach trucks, two 8FBE18 and one 8FBN25 Toyota battery electric counterbalance forklifts, Toyota Sprint elevated work platforms, Toyota walkie stackers and a Toyota 32-8FG30 LPG counterbalance forklift with Cascade hydraulic fork-widening attachment.

Zip Water formerly had an ageing fleet from another supplier and a mix of owned and leased equipment. Glenn Bucknel, head of supply chain, saw the plant expansion as an opportunity to update and streamline his materials handling equipment and sought advice from Toyota Material Handling Australia (TMHA) and one other supplier.

"We adopted a model with Toyota to enable us to lease all our equipment. That gives us the latest technology and servicing at a fixed price with no surprises and gives us the flexibility to change the mix of our fleet and scale up according to business needs.

"It no longer made sense for us to invest in the outright purchasing of equipment because, with a business changing as rapidly as ours, we don't know what we're going to need in five years' time. So having the flexibility that Toyota provides was attractive. It's reassuring to know that we have a partner that can meet our needs as our business grows," he explains.

On the service front, Bucknel stresses that Zip Water wanted a partner that "clicks with our business, one we know we can trust and will take care of all our servicing details. It helps that all our Toyota equipment can be serviced in the one visit".

He adds: "It's also great to have the peace of mind that fixed servicing costs brings: we know exactly what we're paying every month. There are no surprises in terms of cost or machine performance. Downtime is a killer for us, so having the reliability of the new Toyota machines is a welcome relief."