dt magazine 11

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16 PRIVATE LABEL 24 ATTRACT ENTIRELY NEW CUSTOMER SEGMENT 26 FOR THE LOVE OF WOOD Your 30 minutes team building guide NO. 11 · AUTUMN 2011 ‘dirt’ phone Win the ultimate tough Being on ourselves is necessary 14 10 4 28 Take me home Running out of an I tell myself that the item is catastrophic is temporary A-class pain

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DT Magazine is Wolseley's Nordic employee magazine, published three times a year, and read by staff in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland. The magazine serves multiple purposes but the most important objective is to contribute to a strong sales culture. If you want to know more about the magazine, feel free to contact Patrick May at 0045 3115 4477

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Page 1: Dt magazine 11

16 Private LabeL 24 attract entireLy new customer segment 26 For the Love oF wood

your 30 minutes team building guide

no. 11 · autumn 2011

‘dirt’phone

Win theultimate

toughBeing

on ourselves is necessary

14

10

4

28

Take me

home

Running out of an

I tell myself that the

item is catastrophic

is temporary

A-class

pain

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10Inside100% pure passion

Why do We stick with our banks? Our car me-chanics? What makes us go back to the same hairdresser, year in year out? Why do we return to the same dentist again and again? Even when we know there is a cheaper dentist near-by?

More often than not, the reason is to do with personal relation-ships. We experienced good service, a mem-ber of staff spent time with us, someone un-derstood our require-ments and made an ef-fort to solve our needs. Or maybe they just lis-tened and showed gen-uine interest. We feel this person knows who we are and understands us. We have a relation-ship with this person, which makes doing busi-ness with them so much easier. The same is true for our

business. Whether you are STARK K&M in Co-penhagen and starting a new sewage depart-ment and have to ac-quire new customers or whether you sit around the table with a suppli-er who’s anxious to get his new product into our branches - it’s all about relationships. Customer services are the living proof of this fact. Ac-cording to the survey re-sults, Neumann has the most satisfied custom-ers. Their secret? It’s not their products or their prices that makes the difference. It’s their lo-cal approach, their local attention and their local relationship.

happy reading

People’s business

Be tough on yourself! (or your customer will)

hardTalk

Product availability is paramountOur customers might be fantastic trades-men but they are not necessarily good planners. We have to be.

Private Label

Ideas@workThe recipe for attracting an entirely new customer segment.

For the love of wood: Carpentry

dT QuizWin the ultimate ‘dirt’ phone.

4

814

1624

2628

Three colleagues share their passions. Read their story and get inspired.

Improve the quality of

your life

Charlotte Gullach BüttrichChief Editor for DT Magazine

editorial responsibility: DT Group/Charlotte Gullach Büttrich Journalistic production and project management: Radical Communications/Patrick May design and layout: Appetizer/Simon Johnsen Photography: Das Buro Print: Trykcentret

coLoPhon

20useFuL numbers

You can write to Charlotte at [email protected]

Feel free to share your ideas and comments - both positive and critical.Just because you run four times

a week, doesn’t mean that you’re healthy.

DT Group +45 39559700Wolseley +44 118 929 8700Starkki +358 93 541 3000STARK +45 89343434

Beijer +46 752411000 Neumann +47 55549800Silvan +45 87308730Cheapy +46 431443540

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happy people are a blessing for business!

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DT Magazine // happiness

SeLF-PRoCLaImed Chief Happiness Of-ficer Alexander Kje-rulf, supports this claim. “Rock solid pri-oritisation, tracking time, structured cal-endars and realistic to do lists all support productivity. But the number one booster, which is an under-estimated factor, is happiness at work. That rocks!”

“Happy people have more and bet-ter relationships at work”, Alexander ex-plains. “They work better together with their colleagues, their customers are more satisfied and as a result, they sell more.” It is impossi-ble to be constantly happy but that does not mean that you cannot influence your happiness. You can be your very own Chief Happiness Of-ficer. “It is all about acknowledging that you actively can take responsibility for

happiness at your workplace.”

“a great place to start is to

notice when a colleague does a good job. BUT don’t stop there. Let them know! Tell them you are impressed by the way they handled that particular situa-tion. If you’re not used to paying com-pliments, it might feel awkward at first. But I promise, you will get used to it. No need to overdo it either. Tell and move on. No big deal. Keep on practising. At some point it will feel perfectly natural.”

“do some-thing un-selfish for

your colleague. Like bringing them a cup of coffee when you are getting some. Bring cake, for no reason whatso-ever. Ask your col-league how his or her

Happy people! Let’s face it - they are twice as much fun as their unhappy counterparts. Happy people are more creative. It is even claimed that happy people are more productive.

weekend or holiday was. Ask them how they are doing. It means a lot when you take an active inter-est. It will rock the at-mosphere at work. Don’t forget the grumpy colleague in the corner. He might be the person in greatest need of at-tention.”

“Provide world-class ser-

vice. a better ser-vice than your customer actually expects. It makes you feel great. Dare to come with a smart reply. Dare to give your customers an experience. Give your customers extra ad-vice even though they did not ask for it. There’s a lot of work-place happiness to gain here. It’s a matter of repeatedly doing this until it becomes an integrated part of your job. It will make your job so much more fun. Instantly.”

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And we Are ... but it requires continuous at-tention and the ability to look at oursleves from the view-point of our toughest judges : our customers.

Be tough onyourself! (or your customer will)

every dAy thousands of customers interact with us. They visit our branch-es, telephone, browse our web stores or meet with our sales teams. Regardless of where or when we meet our customers, we have to be fit for the fight.

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DT Magazine // Spot on

Be tough onyourself!

“BReak youR hab-its. Park your car at a different spot. Avoid the entrance you usually use.” This advice comes from Michael Weiss (35), who’s been shop consultant in STARK (he’s product man-ager now) and who has trained people in getting their branch-es into top shape and sales ready. “A stuffed garbage bin, no trolleys within im-mediate reach, worn down banners and the like - make for a poor first impres-sion. It doesn’t ap-peal to the custom-er’s spending mood.”

According to Mi-chael, bad routines are the worst mis-takes and we have to avoid them at any price. “We have a tendency to grow blind spots. We don’t always see the mess because we get used to it. It’s impor-tant to break bad habits and intro-duce good routines.” To help us see our

branches from our customers’ point of view, we use mys-tery shoppers. “We accept no excuses”, says Jens Nielsen (46), responsible for mystery shopping in STARK. “Neither do our customers. They don’t care wheth-er it’s almost five and you’re on your way out. They want good service, even when they enter the branch at five min-utes to five.”

mystery shopping reveals weak pointsMystery shoppers are external consult-ants hired by STARK to visit branches anonymously in the guise of custom-ers. “We use seven parameters to car-ry out the assess-ment,” Jens explains. “How is the custom-er greeted when en-tering the branch, how easy is it to find the right consult-ant, does the sales consultant enquire about my project

and so on. These are parameters we know are important to our customers. After each visit the mys-tery shopper rates all seven parameters and submits a re-port. The objective is to help branches to continuously improve their performance.”

Our competitors also get visits from our mystery shop-pers. “This helps us to get an idea on how we are do-ing compared to our competitors,” Jens says. “We score con-siderably better on most parameters. Where we can im-prove is the way we start a dialogue with our customers and we can become bet-ter at making sure the customer can find the right sales consultant.”

In STARK Fred-eriksberg we meet with branch man-ager Lasse Fred-eriksen. “Keeping a tidy and neat shop

is a part of your job working in a shop”, he says. “No matter how busy you are, the branches have to be in impeccable shape. What’s more, you have to have time to interact with custom-ers. The results from the last customer survey were disap-pointing. Both staff and product availabil-ity scored poorly in Frederiksberg. We’re doing what we can. It’s getting better but we’re not there yet. We ask a lot from ourselves but work-ing for STARK means working for number one. On a personal level, I don’t want to work for number two. The fact that we do better than our com-petitors should defi-nitely not be an ex-cuse to sit back and take it easy.”

Work-ing for STARK is working for num-ber one

michael WeissstarK

More on next page

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Continued

Being a part of a real chain is an ad-vantage

Prioritising people is key to our success In Starkki Herttoniemi (a suburb of Helsinki) branch manager Kristian Eklund (30) knows 100% what makes the difference: “The people.”

BeFoRe he joined Starkki six years ago, he worked for the competitor - K-rauta. “I know their strengths but also their weaknesses,” Kristian says. “Their stores are bigger. Our branches have a more traditional look and feel compared to theirs. Make no mistake, a television show recently com-pared customer ser-vice between Starkki

branches and K-rau-ta. We beat them hands down.”

“In Starkki we pri-oritise people. Our competitors employ a lot of part tim-ers and students. The average age of our staff working on the shop floor is 40 years. We are good at keeping staff. As a consequence, our staff is extreme-ly experienced and knowledgeable. On top of that, we of-

fer relevant cours-es and training to ensure that people continuously devel-op. As a result, when customers enter our branch, they meet skilled staff who provide immaculate service. That is why our customers are loyal. They cannot get that kind of ser-vice anywhere else.”

Kristian (30) is the youngest branch manager in Starkki. But having worked

for seven years for the competition, he has the necessary self confidence. “It might be that our competitors are big-ger and have more items in their as-sortment, but they try to be everything to everybody. Our assortment is care-fully chosen and managed amazingly well around our cus-tomer groups: pro-fessional and DIY constructors. We never run out of an item so our custom-ers never visit us in vain. Another im-portant advantage we have is that we are a part of a real chain. Our custom-ers can pick up their supplies in other branches if it’s more convenient for them. Our competitors can’t offer these kind of services.”

kristian eklundstarKKi

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WWW.SILvan.dk is among the top 20 most visited web-sites in Denmark. On average, the site at-tracts an astonish-ing 20,000 visitors every day. Around 7,000 visitors find their way to Silvans’ E-shop every day. In the on-line store they can choose from an ever growing selection of items and have them de-livered right to their door. To date, the site is responsible for 5-10% of Silvans’ turnover. It takes an exceptional SEO (Search Engine Op-timisation) strategy to generate this kind of traffic. SEO opti-mises websites so they are easily found by search engines like Google and get a better ranking.

The ambition for Silvans’ shop doesn’t stop here. The goal is that any item that you can buy in the physi-cal shop can also be purchased online. To ensure that Sil-vans’ E-shop is op-timised, Silvan tests how users navigate

the website. For ex-ample, as a result of these tests Silvan is launching a bet-ter search engine to make it easier for visitors to find the information and the products they are looking for. Sil-van also improved the way products, information, videos etc., are linked to-gether, so when a visitor searches a certain product, the relevant instruc-tion videos will be shown. Another Sil-vans’ E-shop novel-ty is vouchers: when a customer has a complaint, instead of cash compensa-tion, the customer can get a voucher to be used in the web-shop.

e-shop optimisation

DT Magazine // Spot on

Beijer Byggmaterial expects to go live with an E-com-merce site mid 2012

rejuvenating warehouses “Our warehouses desperately need a makeover”, the marketing manager of Beijer Byggmaterial, Fredrik Ringdahl, says.

“aBouT 75% of our rev-enue is generated here. Yet the lighting could be better, price tagging is a bit old fashioned. Basically, the interior hasn’t really changed in the past 25 years. Fortunately, this will all change now.” Two con-cept advisors have visit-ed all of the 63 branches in September and Oc-tober. Based upon their documentation which includes pictures as well as written comments, the managerial team will decide what and how to prioritise.

“This rejuvenation has been on its way for a while,” Fredrik says. “Three years - and I am thrilled that we are pri-oritising the warehouses now. The two concept advisors we recruited have different back-

grounds. Per Bergquist, who has visited the branches in the south, has a sales background and comes from Bei-jer Byggmaterial. Sophie Andersson, who visit-ed the branches in the north, comes from out-side Beijer Byggmaterial and has comprehensive experience with retail concepts. If all goes as planned, we expect to go live with a pilot al-ready in the beginning of 2012. We will try the new retail concepts in 10 se-lected warehouses to see how they work. On the basis of the pilot re-sults, we will make plans for how to rejuvenate the other 53 branches. Beijer Byggmaterial has great growth potential and this makeover is definitely going to con-tribute positively.”

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In an enterprise with more than 8,300 em-

ployees and 440 branches, the top

management may seem very distant.

With HardTalk, you get close to top man-

agement, because here we put you

in contact with DT Group’s most senior

manager.

Steen Weirsøe answers you and

your colleagues questions, however searching they are.

does an idea like the whistle blowing pro-gramme work at all in nordic culture?Obviously, when you’re a part of a large organisation, every once in a while you are confronted with initiatives that might seem a bit awkward in relation to your own working culture. The whistle blowing programme is such and initiative. In essence, I think it is a really good idea to remind our-selves that we have a moral and ethical responsibility when we’re doing our jobs. Having said that, the principle behind the whistle blowing programme in the Nordic countries is somewhat obsolete, as we have a culture where things are dis-cussed more out in the open. We have a culture of going to our managers if we witness something strange or illegal. We

have a culture also of strong unions that help us with ethical issues. And fortu-nately, we are confi-dent that our man-agers listen and take the necessary action where appropriate.

It’s busier than ever before and we face with new require-ments all of the time, I find it difficult to pri-oritise. What can I do?Talk to your branch manager. An inherent part of our business is customer service, which should be your number one priority at all times. You can’t use general answer in your daily job, I un-derstand that. But since customers vis-it our local branches and not our head-quarters in Gladsaxe in Denmark, it is im-possible for me to be more specific. How to prioritise to live up to the customer’s demandfor excel-

lent service there-fore should be deter-mined locally, by your branch manager.

are we going to sell private label sanitary products from Ce? As you may know, we’re working close-ly together with the Central European businesses in Aus-tria, Switzerland, The Netherlands and Luxembourg. Their primary cus-tomers are plumbers and that makes the way they are organ-ised and how they do business differ-ent from what we do in the Nordic coun-tries. We’re exchang-ing ideas and expe-riences and learning from each other. The businesses in CE for example, have cop-ied the STARK cus-tomer survey and introduced this to their own customers. It’s true that they in Austria have private label products within

DT Magazine // hardTalk

hardTalkwith Steen Weirsøe

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the sanitary catego-ry. You have to be a strong player on the market to introduce your own brand be-cause you have to explain to customers why they have to buy your product and why it is priced the way it is. We don’t have that kind of po-sition within sani-tary in the Nordic countries and there-fore we mostly stick to the well-known brands.

What areas do you see are our growth areas?It’s hard to highlight one specific area. Three years ago the market collapsed in all of the Nordic countries. Sweden was the first to re-cover. Then came Finland, followed by Norway. The Danish market was the last market to recover but there are many signs that the cri-sis is over. We have a growth strategy. We can see progress

but it is hard to say whether the market is growing or wheth-er we are taking market share from our competitors. At the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter where the progress comes from. Accord-ing to the account-ing principles Wolse-ley applies, most of us are employed in business units that are categorised as growth engines. This means that we are able to invest in growth. We are con-stantly

looking for good bolt - on acquisition op-portunities and we have been close a few times lately. But the price has to be right. We don’t want growth at any price.

What would you like to ask Steen? Send your question to [email protected] – Don’t mince your words as you will remain totally anonymous.

we cAn Be Proud. The crisis has been hard on all of us. It looks like we have seen the worst and business is picking up again. We came through and the fact that we are strong and well equipped to grow again, is because of the quality of our people. We have excellent leaders and managers who have been able to recruit and keep the right people. But we have to be ready to react if the mar-kets are changing.

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DT Magazine // nine to five

What makes your heart beat faster? Sends your adrenaline soaring to olympic heights? Three colleagues share their pas-

sions. Read their story and get inspired.

purepassion

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“IT IS PuRe magic,” Poul Kim describes his time-consuming passion: gliding. And time consuming it is indeed. “Every week-end, every holiday - as long as the weath-er allows it, I go up.” It takes determina-tion to become a glid-er pilot. Depending on your ability, it usually takes 80 starts be-fore you’re allowed to fly solo. And Poul was extremely determined: due to a sight condi-tion, it took him ten years before he had his first solo flight. “A flight I still remember as if it were yesterday. It was a rainy day and due to the conditions I was the only one that went up. But it was my first solo flight and I didn’t care less about

the weather.” “The fascination

started 28 years ago. One of my school-mates’ family flew and after trying it my-self two, three times, I was totally hooked.” In fact, immediate-ly after he got his li-cense Poul started to glide competitively. He is a three-times Danish champion! He has also competed twice at the European and the World Cham-pionships. “If every-thing goes according to plan, I will partici-pate in the next world

championship in the US as well,” Poul says.

He doesn’t own a glider himself but bor-rows his club’s glid-er. “It does the job perfectly well and it keeps the costs with-in limits.” His mem-bership costs DKK 600 a month and eve-ry flight costs an ad-ditional DKK 30. With ten flights a month, his monthly budg-et is approximately DKK 1,000. “Gliding is more than a hob-by, it is a lifestyle. My 14-year old son has also started to fly.

Flying together with him makes me par-ticularly proud. Be-ing up at 300 meters, challenging the laws of nature - gliding up to a distance of 600 km - it’s an amazing feeling.” A feeling that around 2,000 Dan-ish gliding enthusi-asts share. “Most of my friends, surprise, surprise, are gliding friends. Colleagues at STARK show inter-est and I have prom-ised to take up some of them up at some point.”

Paul kim Larsen47StaRKCopenhagen10 yearsLogistics

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Superman? It’s Poul kim Larsen!

It’s not a hobby, it’s a lifestyle

More on next page

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mIkaeL SPendS a fair share of his spare time nurturing his big passion: building and flying radio-controlled planes. On top of that, he helps ambitious new rookies in his club ‘Oskarshamnseskad-ern’ become model plane pilots. “My first encounter with model planes was when I was 13. One of the oldest clubs in Sweden made it possible for young-sters like myself to be introduced to ra-dio-controlled planes.

Now, 17 years later, I spend approximate-ly 50 hours and DKK 5,000 a month on my hobby. And I am not the only one,” Mikael adds smiling. “My club has approximately 50 members. In the whole of Sweden, there’s around 6,000 enthu-siasts who share my passion.”

“I build my own planes and one of the challenges is to find out if what I build ac-tually works in real life. When it does, it gives me a real kick. I

also enjoy being out-side with my planes.It allows me to relax and get into a differ-ent gear. For the same reason, I’ve no ambi-tion to enter competi-tions. It would take a lot of extra time and probably would not be as relaxing.” In the summer, the model pilots can be found at the airport in Os-karshamn. During the winter, they find shel-ter in the local sports hall where they fly with electric planes. All in all Mikael has ten planes.

His favourite? “A Mus-tang P51.”

Mikael has no chil-dren so far but both his family and col-leagues show an inter-est in his hobby and are supportive. “Once a year the club organ-ises an open day with a lot of activities for people that are inter-ested. Here my family is a great help,” Mikael says. “Certain clubs re-quire a certificate. My club doesn’t. I would advise people who are just starting to stick to starter planes. They are easier to steer. If you crash one or two ex-pensive planes at the very start, you can eas-ily get discouraged. That would be a shame. The new trend within model plane flying is that, thanks to a set of smart goggles and a camera in the plane, you can follow where you are flying. It feels like you are actually fly-ing the plane yourself. This might be a good training for people who are afraid of flying.

mikael Carlrud30CheapyOskarshamn6 yearsDeputy shop manager

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almost like flying the plane yourself

I get a kick out of making them fly

purepassion

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“you BuRn around 10,000 calories - equivalent to 1.5 kg of fat,” Tommy Buus Madsen says. “To compensate you eat and drink constant-ly during the race. In the period right before an Iron Man, you also need to adjust your diet and ensure you consume a massive amount of proteins and carbs.” Tommy has been running mar-athons since 2000 (10 in all) and has always been fascinated by this extreme discipline - called Iron Man for a reason. It wasn’t until 2009 though, that he actually participated in an Iron Man event.

“The swimming (3.8 km) is rather un-

pleasant as you’re in the water with a lot of people at the same time. Then there’s the cycling - 180 km. That’s what kills me every time. An Iron Man is not only a physical challenge; it’s a mental chal-lenge too. Your body is trained and if you find the right rhythm, it functions like a lo-comotive. At some point you’re emp-ty - but you might be only halfway. You will experience pain. Massive pain. That’s where you have to

dig deep inside your-self. I have conversa-tions with myself. I tell myself that the pain will pass. As soon as we get to run (42.2 km) I am in my com-fort zone again. What I like about it is that you challenge your limits,” Tommy says.

Tommy trains around eight hours a week. Close to an Iron Man, he increases this to twenty hours. He has two daughters aged six and seven. “Whenever possible, I include them in my training. In the win-ter for example, I pull their slide. They love it. I myself am not a gear freak. I think I spent approximately

DKK 15,000 on a used bike, some good run-ning shoes and cloth-ing. You can easily tri-ple that amount but it is not necessary. It’s not about the gear. If you want to do this, just do it. So far I have done three Iron Man events. All three in Flensborg. I finished in around twelve hours. I am happy with that. With the train-ing programme I have, it is important that I like my own compa-ny,” Tommy says and smiles. “Iron Man has helped me to be more relaxed. It helps me in my job too. My stress level is almost non-existent. Not bad, eh?”

Tommy Buus madsen38Silvanaarhus7 yearsLogistics

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I tell myself the pain is only temporary

The cycling kills me

every time

DT Magazine // nine to five

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DT Magazine // Backstage

SeRvInG a vari-ety of construction companies working on different projects and therefore hav-ing totally different needs when it comes to supplies, makes having the right in-ventory somewhat of a tricky task. In

essence, there’s two parameters we have to get right: we need the right products at the right place - and we need to stock them in the right quantity.

The a-team“Fifty percent of our turnover comes from

500 items”, says Kari. “We call these products the A-class items. They are the best-selling prod-ucts and we cannot afford to run out of them. They are the products our cus-tomers come for and they are rela-tively easy to plan.

Space is the prob-lem. We could easily order larger quanti-ties at once and we would still sell the lot but we don’t have the space. There-fore we have to or-der these products more frequently. In order to ensure ex-cellent availability for

“our customers might be fantastic tradesmen but they are not necessarily good planners,” says Ka-ri Wahlman, sourcing director for Starkki. “This is a problem for a lot of companies, especially smaller

construction companies. They might discover three times in a day that they actually lack something and

they have to go shopping - again.

The worst thing that could happen is when they visit our shop we don’t have the supplies they so desper-ately need. That means that they have to waste val-uable time driving around, finding another shop that

can help them.”

Pssst, I tell you what you should sell

availabilityProduct

is paramount

kari Wahlmanstarkki

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all of the other items in our range, we are introducing a com-puter system which helps us to replenish these items to our branches. There’s a pilot starting in Sil-van and Cheapy in October 2011 and if all goes as planned, Starkki and Beijer Byggmaterial will also start using the system.”

Then there’s all of the other 15,000 or so products. “Regardless what branch you visit, you will always find the A items,” explains Michael Weiss, prod-uct manager at STARK. “To a large extend, the manag-ers of the individual branches will deter-mine the availability of other products. If your branch is locat-ed close to an area where there are a lot of summerhouses, your inventory will be somewhat dif-ferent compared to a branch in a large city. What is impor-tant here is that

we keep a dynam-ic inventory. Prod-ucts that don’t sell take up shelf space that could be used for products that do sell. As a gen-eral rule, we get rid of products that do not sell within six months. We send them back to the supplier and either get back our money back or we’re com-pensated in prod-ucts that do sell. We replace the product either with a new item that we expect to sell or we get in more of the exist-ing products that we know sell.”

We rely on our own knowledgeIntroducing a new product requires re-sources in terms of space, training and promotion. Suppli-ers love to tempt us with their products. Being a part of DT Group means there’s a large number of branches they po-tentially can sell to at once. “We don’t take any product,” Kari says. “Of course we listen to our sup-pliers. Often they can tell us how their product sells in other markets, which can be a good indica-tor of how the prod-uct might perform in Starkki. We also monitor what our competitors are do-ing. If they have new products that are doing really well, we might consider in-

troducing them as well. But more im-portant than this is our our knowledge and experience. We know customers like no-one else. We vis-it them on the con-struction sites where they work. They en-ter our shops on a daily basis. We know their needs - often even before they know it. And we lis-ten.”

“We’re great at this,” Michael says. “And getting bet-ter all the time. De-cisions about what products to take in are made based up-on both statistical data and the experi-ences of our branch staff who meet the customer on a daily basis. In the end, the customer decides what products we sell.”

Knowing that companies have difficulties in planning supplies, especially smaller con-struction companies, we develop support-ive services. Starkki for example, is planning a mobile solution where customers can ac-cess the inventory from their cell phones, see what is in stock and order directly.

Planning support

Any item that does not sell in a period of six months, will most likely not sell in the next six months either. STARK prefers using precious shelf space in their branches for items that do sell. The six months rule does not apply to seasonable items, for example winter boots. Evidently, they are hard to sell during the summer.

no six months rule for winter boots

michael WeissstarK

Regard-less what branch you visit, you will always find the A items

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Private Label is an important part of our strategy and these pages will give you an insight into new additions and give you inspiration and hard-core knowledge about the Private Label products we sell in our stores. the continuing development of these products and brands helps ensure a healthy economy in the group. Product ranges and brands may vary from division to division.

PRIvaTe LaBeL and Di-rect Sourcing (the latter is often, but not always, involved in Private Label) play an important role in this strategy and we will be focussing even more on Private Label in the future so our sales in this area will increase.

Great results for 2010-11At the end of the Wolse-ley financial year on the 31 July, we could final-ly see the results of our work with Private Label sales. Everyone involved, not least the sales staff in our branches, is to be

congratulatedon exceeding our budg-et for European Heavy-side by approximately €13 million with all but one Business Unit show-ing better-than-budget results!

new targets for Pri-vate Label salesThis spring, new Private Label sales targets for the Strategy Plan period were agreed on by the Business Units.

Some improvements will come from new prod-ucts and expanding ex-isting Private Label rang-es but all of the seven key initiatives mentioned

DT Magazine // Private Label

Stuart kilpatrickBrand manager, Dt Group

about Private Label

Recently, European Heavy-side Sourcing has devised seven key initiatives that will help us grow our businesses in Europe and ensure that we get as much synergy as pos-sible from being part of one of the largest organisations of our kind in Europe. The sev-en sourcing initiatives are de-scribed here.

Private Label

– one of our seven key initiatives

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about Private Label

below will contribute to the growth in Private La-bel and Direct Sourcing. The seven initiatives are not exclusively directed at Private Label but ad-dress all aspects of Eu-ropean Sourcing as a whole. In particular, the advantages for Private Label and direct Sourc-ing will be:

1ConsolidationPooling volume, putting us in a

much better position when discussing terms with suppliers and get-ting us even better deals on Private Label and di-rectly sourced products.

2Best Practice & BenchmarkingLearning from the

Business Units that have successes with their Pri-vate Label ranges. There is no point in reinvent-ing the wheel or problem solving when one of your colleagues already has a working solution.

3direct SourcingGoing directly to the source, be it

in Europe, Asia or South America, resulting in bet-ter prices and terms for our Private Label prod-ucts and improving our gross margin.

4Private LabelOur ability to de-velop Private La-

bel brands greatly im-proves our ability to source directly.

5Category managementLaying down a

strategy for each prod-uct category including the percentage of sales which should be Private Label, creating a better offer for our customers.

6vendor relationsBetter vendor re-

lations, both with brand-ed suppliers and with Private Label suppliers (which could of course be one and the same), will give us obvious improve-ments.

7Focus on tar-gets and kPIs (key Perfor-

mance Indicators) in the Business unitsEnsuring Business Units stay focused on the Eu-ropean Sourcing KPIs as well as their own KPIs to help us reach our goals.

our branch staff make or break our success!Everyone involved, from the top down, influenc-es the Private Label pro-ject but probably the most important part of the project is in the inter-face with the customer in the branches and this is where our branch staff play a crucial role.

In particular, they are to be congratulated on our success in the last financial year and with their continuing support, I am sure we will meet our targets.

new Tool market in Silvan and Cheapy

WhILe you are reading this mag-azine, Silvan and Cheapy stores are implementing a completely new concept for their ever-popular tool markets which, un-til now, have been supplied by Millar-co, a Danish whole-saler. The product managers in Sil-van and Cheapy have been work-ing on this project for about a year, choosing and eval-uating the hun-dreds of products that make up the tool market and actually improving the overall qual-ity of the tools while improving our gross margin.

The Private La-bel department has been involved in developing the concept which also includes packag-

ing and shelf units, the latter also be-ing manufactured by our tool supplier in China.

One of the inno-vations developed for the market is the way in which the tools are deliv-ered to the stores. We focused heav-ily on saving time in the stores and making the job eas-ier for the staff, so all of the tools are delivered in shelf-ready card-board boxes. Each box has a label at-tached to the front with a photo of the tool and a brief de-scription and simply replaces the empty box on the shelf. A sticker in the box allows staff to fix the correct price on the front.

Very quick and very easy and we make more money!

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new kitchen and bathrooms in Beijer Byggmaterial and neumannbygg

BeIjeR ByGGmaTeRIaL recently introduced a new range of high-quality kitch-en and bathroom cabinets,

all positively received in the stores involved. According to Product Manager Carina Manns in Beijer Byggmate-rial, it has been such a suc-

Brighthigh-quality rangeThe Bright brand is used for all of our electrical equip-ment, e.g. light bulbs, bat-teries, cables, lamps, venti-lators and electric radiators. Bright products are high-quality products.

We know the quality is excellent because all of our electrical products are test-ed by external companies. Because we source directly, the sales price is generally lower than branded prod-ucts.

BatteriesTests have shown that al-

though branded batteries may last a little longer, their high price makes Private Label or non-label batteries a better investment.

Crash course in light bulbsThe left graph shows the colour distribution of sun-light with its millions of col-ours. Compare this to a low-energy light bulb or strip lighting or to a fluorescent light (right graph), which on-ly has a fraction of the col-ours and you understand why we feel that low-ener-gy bulbs give off a flat and “boring” light. Note the col-

Continuing our series about our Private Label brands, we look at two of the newer brands

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DT Magazine // Private Label

aCCRange and quality:ACC stands for Home Ac-cessories and is used for furniture, storage, venetian blinds and carpets. Quality is comparable to IKEA.

Silvan has just intro-duced a test range of ACC brand rugs in their branch-es. This has been followed up with instore material and

a small leaflet informing customers about the qual-ity of ACC rugs and how to take care of them.

Continuing our series about our Private Label brands, we look at two of the newer brands

cess that the branches who were not a part of the ini-tial roll-out have been call-ing her to try and speed up the implementation. In week

40, 54 Beijer Byggmaterial branches were ready with Nabis Kitchen and bath-room showrooms and a na-tionwide TV campaign has

been launched. Neumannbygg in Norway are also in the process of implementing the same Na-bis range in their stores.

our spike in the yellow and orange wavelengths on the right-hand graph – this is in-tentional because this low-energy bulb can be sold as having a “warm” light - but it’s still terrible at rendering colours!

The best bulbs for near-daylight colours are the old-fashioned incandescent bulbs, which have recently been banned in the EU be-cause of their high energy consumption. The next best bulbs are halogen bulbs, fol-lowed closely by LEDs (im-proving constantly).

You should advise cus-tomers to use low-energy bulbs in non-living spaces like hallways and to NEVER use low-energy bulbs in the kitchen because they will make your food look less appetising.

And use halogen or LED bulbs in living rooms, kitch-ens and bedrooms for the best colour rendition.

Dt maGaZInE 19

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lifeDT Magazine // happiness

TheRe aRe so many myths and be-liefs about health and well-being that it almost has a reli-gious status. Break-ing these myths, getting people to change their bad habits, adopt a

healthy lifestyle is what it is all about. Health projects in both Silvan and STARK pave the way.

Last year Silvan engaged in a health project - inspir-ing staff to adopt a healthy lifestyle. This year, it’s STARKs’

Just because you run four times a week, doesn’t

mean you’re healthy. And while we’re at it, health is a

lot more than a bowl of muesli and a bunch of carrots.

There. We said it.

improve the quality of your

ChanGe youR

LIFeSTyLe

Gitte henriksensilvan grenaa

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turn. “The problem is not motivation, it’s really ignorance we’re up against,” says Birgitte Espen-hein, external project consultant involved in both the Silvan and STARK projects. “Before we started, we interviewed peo-ple and asked them whether they con-sidered themselves healthy. What sur-prised us when we saw the results was that many people have a narrow per-ception of health and well-being. Sleeping behaviour, happiness, ener-gy level - all impor-tant stuff that really makes a difference - is not something we naturally relate to when we discuss health issues. But we should.”

knowing about each oth-er’s compe-tenciesThe project in STARK dif-fers somewhat from Silvans’. “In Silvan we focused on prevention in relation to health and at-tritional work. At STARK the focus

will be 50% health and 50% working en-vironment,” Birgitte explains. “Staff in STARK face profes-sional customers re-quiring specific as-sistance. As a result, a lot of the people employed at STARK are specialists. The distance between staff therefore, is larger. By working hands-on with com-munication, getting people to under-stand each other’s competencies better - we aim to create a better atmosphere in the branches. We are organising vari-ous theme camps where staff from the eight participat-ing branches learn about health, food, knowledge sharing, working together and other relevant topics.”

“We exPeCTed that we might witness a positive change in the sick leave statistics,” says Morten Elbro, HR Director in Sil-van. “But that didn’t hap-pen. Maybe we will see an effect in the longer term. It is however not the most important is-sue. Sick leave in Silvan was low to start with. What is important is that the focus on health has inspired a lot of people to change their bad hab-its.”

“We wish the very best for our staff,” Morten says. “Also health wise. But you can’t force people to adopt a healthy lifestyle. There-fore participating in the health project was vol-untary. In all, nine stores participated. We got a good number of success stories. Quite a few col-leagues lost weight. One colleague lost a stag-gering 30 kilo’s. The real eye-opener though, has been that a healthy life-style is more than a pair

of sneakers and eating apples. It’s just as much about when you eat, how you breathe, how you perceive things and so on. That is what makes this project so wildly ex-citing.”

“Personally I learned how to keep my blood sugar constant dur-ing the day,” Morten ex-plains. “I start with a good breakfast and eat small snacks during the day - making sure my en-ergy level doesn’t drop. My evening meals are not as large as they used to be. I have more energy. I also changed the way I breathed. My stress lev-el has decreased signifi-cantly and I’m no long-er irritable. I am not the only one who started eating breakfast. Be-fore we started the pro-ject, a staggering 29% of all Silvan staff said that they didn’t eat breakfast. We did a new survey af-ter the finish of the pro-ject and now it’s only 8% that say they do not eat breakfast.”

what silvan got out of it

More on next page

Birgitte espenheinconsultant

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a yeaR aGo, we talked to Gitte Hen-riksen from Silvan about the health revolution that hit the store in Grenå. The official part of the health project stopped in March this year and we were curious as to how staff in Grenå were holding up.

“Pretty good. Our weight club is re-duced from eight participants to sev-

en and even though it was hard to pick up the good spir-it after the summer holiday, we managed and are right back on track again. We found out that keep-ing the weight is harder than loosing it,” Gitte says, laugh-ing out loud.

“The really posi-tive thing to take from the project is the lasting effect from replacing bad habits with good

habits. For example, how we lift things here in the shop. Eating habits also changed dramati-cally. I for example, no longer eat white bread. What’s more, we take these good habits home with us. We learned so much during the project. Not only about food and sports but al-so about breathing technics, the con-nection between body and mind and

about how to in-crease your own en-ergy level. My col-leagues are still committed to the health club. We have a company badmin-ton club now. We have people run-ning, quitting smok-ing and we arrange excursions outside working time where we meet and are ac-tive. Right now for example, we’re plan-ning a kayak trip.”

Back to (healthy) grenå

Aalborg Greenland Aarhus (Vesterbro)

Vejle

Odense Tømmergård

Holbæk Frederikssund Horsens

stArK’s eight

DT Magazine // happiness

All topics are di-rectly or indirectly related to their job. Knowing and learn-ing to respect each other’’s competen-cies of course has a direct link. It is some-thing that we time and again discover we can get better at, so we are able to send our customers to the right person the first time around. But make no mistake - a healthy lifestyle is just as important. It gives you more energy and more re-sources - also in your job. “What is im-

portant here, some-thing we learned from the experiences from Silvan, is that you have to real-ise that small steps can have a huge im-pact,” Birgitte says. “You don’t have to start training for a marathon. Cut down on the sugar in your coffee. Keep your sugar balance even during the entire day so you also still have energy when you come home. Set small objectives and maintain your moti-vation by discussing health at your job. Last but not least, celebrate your victo-ries. Both large and small.”

Continued

These are the eight branches that participate in the project:

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DT Magazine // news

STaRk is serious about winning mar-ket share from com-petitors in 2011 and 2012 and is leaving no stone unturned. The latest weapon in the battle for market

share is the tour trail-er. The eye-catching trailer is refurbished and comes with ex-cellent and relevant deals for professional customers and a mo-tivated sales team.

Tour trailer for professionals

Dt maGaZInE 23

neumann is ex-panding its network of branches with a new branch in Bergen - bringing the total number of Neumann branches to 14. The new branch, Neumann Midtun, has both a

warehouse (4,650 sqm) and an 5,000 sqm outdoor area. The branch has a central location and is easy to reach. It will strength-en Neumanns’ posi-tion in Bergen consid-erably.

neumann no. 14

Why noT visit our customers instead of them visiting us? That was the basic-thought when the idea for the construc-tion train was born. A small teamwithin Beijer Byggmaterial worked hard on the idea since January this year. The Beijer Byggmaterial con-struction train train started riding the 12th of september, it included 14 carriages hosting 44 suppliers,

visited 12 different cities and attracted approximately 4.000 customers and an award winning chef-taking care of the culinary part of the program - over a pe-riod of three weeks. An event in a train like this was a first timer in Sweden and it created a tremen-dous positive buzz in the industry. The final aftermath needs yet to be done but when asked more than 90% of the custom-

ers visiting the train would tell about the train to colleagues and advice them to come.

Suppliers are thrilled as well. On the first day, one specific supplier for example, managed to sell for half a mil-lion Swedish kro-ners. Furthermore the train attracted the attention of the lo-cal media, newspa-pers as well as radio. An extra bonus was the dramatically re-duced CO2 emission (4 tons) compared to traditionally or-ganized events (44 tons). When the train will run again is hard to say but our guess is ... definitely next year.

Construction Train 384 meters of customer seduction

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the recipe for attracting an entirely

‘you Can what you want’ and Lars Sø-rensen proves it. Last year, together with branch man-ager Hans-Henrik Otessen, he visited the branches in Ve-jle and Aarhus to learn about sewage the STARK way. Af-ter this road trip they were convinced and in January they were ready to take a bold step. “At the time, the branch wasn’t doing particular well and it was quite a

gamble to invest in an entirely new prod-uct category,” Lars says. “I have a back-ground in sewage - I know the products and I know the entre-preneurs in the mar-ket quite well - so it was more or less a qualified gamble.”

“We allocated 1,000 sqm and in-vested approximate-ly half a million in in-ventory. We’re talking big products. Some of the pipes take a lot of space. I am not saying that you

couldn’t do it with less but we decided that we wanted to be the largest sup-plier in Copenhagen. The supplies you need from day one, because entrepre-neurs specialised in sewage are used to their suppliers hav-ing stock. When they call you at six in the afternoon, they ex-pect their supplies to be on the site way before eight the next morning. If you can’t deliver under these circumstances, you

won’t get their busi-ness.”

It’s not particular-ly easy to fight your way into a new mar-ket where competi-tion is established. But STARK K&M City had three things go-ing for them: a vi-sionary director, a committed and well -connected external sales rep and last but not least the name STARK and what it represents. “Evident-ly you have to match the prices your com-petitors provide. On

It was quite a gamble to invest in an en-tirely new product category

operation blazing gunsStaRKadding sewage products to the existing product categoryDKK 1.7 million revenue in august, entirely new customer segment

Project file:

Business unit:Idea:

Result:

DT Magazine // Ideas@work

ideas@work is Dt magazine’s non-exclusive white board where we

share ideas from all of the divisions. the quality of the

idea does not depend on whether your office is the

boardroom or the cabin of a truck. the idea doesn’t

have to be rocket science either. On the contrary, we

love practical, applicable ideas that can be easily cop-

ied by others.

new customer segment

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top of that, we de-liver a unique ser-vice. Our customers have the cell num-bers from the team dedicated to sewage in STARK K&M. When they call, they talk to a knowledgeable colleague and they can order right away AND they can get a confirmation on that order right away as well. Here we have an edge compared to our competitors who have to check in with distribution hubs elsewhere and

get back. And my tel-ephone is open from six in the morning to five in the after-noon!”.

Another very im-portant parameter that one should not underestimate is the convenience for cus-tomers to have eve-rything they need under one roof. “This is the real beauty of sewage. It put us in-to contact with a to-tally new customer segment we did not have before. They don’t only order sew-

age products. They happily shop for all our other items as well. We don’t know the exact numbers but we have an idea that it is 50/50. Last month we sold for DKK 1.7 million in sewage supplies. My guess is that these customers ordered other supplies for approximately the same amount.”

Success is tangi-ble, also in this fan-tastic case. “Our am-bition was to sell for 12 million a year. The

first months were slow but now we’re breaking the sales record month over month. We have had success with land-ing some large ac-counts. This doesn’t necessarily give us the best margins but it gives us the neces-sary prestige to land smaller and medi-um-sized companies as well. We’re eight months on the way and already now cus-tomers are referring us to colleagues. That is amazing.”

If you cannot deliver under these circum-stances, you won’t get their business

Space 500 sqm and up

Inventory You always have to have supplies in stock

Product know-how, prices and you need to know the customers – because it is all about relationships

advice Get a hard hitter from your competitor

A rock solid belief, hard work and a little bit of patience

getting stArted you need:

name: Lars sørensen

age: 40 Business unit: starK K&m city (copenhagen)

Seniority: 12 yrs Function: sales

Dt maGaZInE 25

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DT Magazine // The story of

WhILe In aSIa, ancient Japanese workers showed their skill in carpen-try through the build-ings they construct-ed. These buildings date back to the 7th century and some of them are still standing today. That makes carpentry one of the oldest profes-sions.

Carpentry evolved as tools evolved, with skills becoming more fine-tuned and carpentry became a trade of renown. Many historical and

Carpentry dates back to the early days of man using crude tools. Ancient Greeks showed

their skills in carpentry through the temples that they built to worship their gods and

goddesses.

carpentryFor the love

of wood

what’s in a word?

the word “carpenter” is the English rendering of an old French word “carpentier”, which in turn, was derived

from the ancient Latin “car-pentrius”, or “maker of a

carriage”.

the royal oneHugh Herland was a 14th century

medieval English carpenter. He was the chief carpenter to King Richard II.

One of his best known pieces is the hammer-beam roof at Westminster

Hall, regarded as one of the greatest carpentry achievements of the time.

Kingrichardii

Dt maGaZInE26

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contemporary car-penters are consid-ered artisans, sur-passing functional skill levels to create wooden works of unique beauty.

Throughout the development of cul-tures around the world, carpenters have been an es-sential factor in the success or failure of each budding com-munity. Learning through experience, carpenters histori-cally took on an ap-prentice, either a son or other young man, to pass on their

the guilds Carpenter guilds started in the

twelfth century. there were three kinds of members in the guild: mas-ters, journeymen and apprentices. the master was a carpenter with

considerable experience and knowl-edge who took on an apprentice and trained him. the apprentice trained and lived with the master. He was provided with food, clothing and

shelter but worked without pay.

the biblical ones among the worlds’ most famous car-

penters we find Jesus and noah - who was responsible for building the ark. What we don’t know is whether noah actually existed or whether he’s a fic-tional figure. neither do we know if Je-

sus ever hammered a nail in a piece of wood.

the brave oneHarry mcnish aka Chippy was the carpenter on

Sir Ernest Shackleton’s Imperial trans-antarctic Expedition of 1914–1917. He was responsible for

much of the work that ensured the crew’s surviv-al after their ship, the Endurance, was destroyed when it became trapped in pack ice. He modified

the small boat, James Caird, that allowed Shackleton and five men (including mcnish)

to make a voyage of hundreds of miles to fetch help for the rest of the crew.

knowledge of car-pentry.

Carpentry has been handed down from one generation to the next,becoming

a trade that grew under this tradition of ap-prenticeship. and eventual advancement

to journeyman sta-tus.

The carpenter is a craftsman who plies his trade in-doors and out – rain or shine, summer or winter – and reaps the benefits of oper-ating under adverse and perfect condi-tions. Flexible, quick minded, nimble with tools, possessing an organic knowledge of wood and a sculp-tor’s eye, carpenters have changed lit-tle since their begin-nings.

viking craft Scandinavia has always been a perfect loca-tion for craftsmen working in wood. the soft woods of northern Scandinavia and the hard woods of Denmark and south Sweden pro-vided an inexhaustible source of raw mate-

rial for the carpenter’s craft. In the Viking age, wood was used for homes, for ships,

for barns and other buildings, as well as for farming implements and household

objects, and many other uses.

sir ernest shackleton

Jesus

female absenceCarpentry is almost always done by men. With 98.5% of car-penters being male, it is the fourth most male-dominated occupation in the uSa.

Dt maGaZInE 27

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YOu

Mu

ST P

AY T

Ax O

N T

hE

PRiz

E

and the winner is ...The happy winner of the last quiz: henna Pulju (32), sales assistant in Starkki in Oulu. She’s been with Starkki for 11 years. “i cannot believe i won,” a happy henna says. Well henna, you DiD and congratulations. One iPhone is heading your direction.

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1how large a percent-age are Beijer Byg-gmaterials’ warehouses responsible for?

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2What is a mystery shopper?

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3how many calories does Tommy Buus madsen typically burn during an Iron man event?

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4What is the origin and original meaning of ‘carpenter’

a It comes from Greek, meaning the one who uses a hammer

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C It comes from Latin and it means maker of a carriage

5how many a-class items do we have in our assort-ment?

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