Looking Forward to bauma 2019

8-14th April Munich will host the largest construction machinery trade fair in the world, bauma 2019. We asked Neal Garnett, DLL Global Business Unit President, Construction, Transportation and Industrial to share his bauma experiences.

Let’s take a brief look back; what memories do you have of your first bauma?
I think this is my seventh bauma, so 2001 was my first. I remember we stayed in a beautiful lakeside village on the edge of the Alps near the Austrian border and we got a bus into Munich, which was a bit of a pain in terms of time, but beautiful scenery.

In terms of the show, DLL was launching a joint venture, with an aerial work platform manufacturer and we had two or three other relationships. Fast forward to now, we've got nearly 15 relationships that we're serving at this this show, so a much bigger presence. The other thing that I remember that struck me was just how big the show was. It’s big in terms of the number of people and it's big in terms of the number of exhibitors, but the actual physical scale of the show is big, it's kilometres across to walk. It's nothing like I've ever seen before, and I still think it's the biggest and best show in the world.

Interview with Neal Garnett

How has DLL’s presence at bauma changed over the years?
Well, as I said, we support a lot more relationships than we did. Our own business has quadrupled in size. We've always been a very international company but, looking back to 2001, we were more European in our focus and in the support of our partners. As time has gone on, we've become very global, so we have people from Australia, Latin America, North America and Asia who will be supporting our partners there, so we’re much more global in our presence. We've also got deeper and more ingrained in our relationships; we are very much at the point of sale on most of our partners stands. We're providing digital solutions to hopefully increase their sales, offering online credit approvals at the show, documentation signed sealed and delivered. So yeah, we really feel that we're in a much more organized and professional setup whereby we can help our partners.

And now a look forward: What expectations do you have for bauma 2019? 

Well, I’m just back from the AED show, which is the North American Construction dealer conference that happens every January, and pleasingly the sentiment in North America still remains strong and there is a lot of optimism. I'm aware in Europe that there are some mixed signals. Obviously, we have the challenge of Brexit, which may go a number of ways and even today I've no idea where that will end, but I think bauma tends to give a bit of a kick start to the industry and maybe a new lease of life, or in this case a continued lease of life, to a very strong market. So, on balance, I'm expecting a positive show and I really hope that our partners sell a lot of equipment.

Meet DLL’s construction financing experts at bauma to discuss your business goals and learn how tailored financing solutions for construction equipment can grow your business. Schedule a meeting today.