Highland Spring placed the order for 30 Still forklifts after a highly competitive tender process. Along with five electric warehouse trucks Highland Spring have taken delivery of a fleet of award winning RX 70 IC counterbalance forklifts, which are powered by the latest hybrid drive technology. The innovative design of the STILL RX 70 and use of hybrid technology means that the truck uses considerably less fuel and also produces fewer harmful emissions which all goes towards improving green credentials and reducing the carbon footprint for Highland Spring.
The Highland Spring fleet of RX 70’s features Individual programmability (Fleet Manger), which is standard throughout the entire range of STILL forklifts and which will also allow the trucks to perform at optimum efficiency regardless of the application or task.
The forklift trucks are mainly gas powered, although the order also includes 5 electric warehouse forklifts, which in total will be used to handle up to one and a half million litres of bottled water each day.
Daniel Muir, Customer Supply and Logistics Manager at Highland Spring, said:
At Highland Spring we are constantly looking for ways to reduce our carbon footprint and the Still forklift trucks met our high standards. The bottled water industry has come under fire for not being green but we always strive to do the best for the environment. Our water source is in the Ochil Hills, where the land has been kept free from pesticides and pollution for over 20 years, enabling us to become the first British brand of natural mineral water to achieve organic status for our catchment area. We rely on this water being pure and of high quality so it is only right that we nurture the environment.
He added:
Our warehouse can hold 12,000 pallets of water and up to 2,000 are shipped each day. The plant is very busy so the reliability of trucks was essential. Other factors we looked at were strong customer service, driver acceptance and health and safety.
This Still RX 70 fleet comes with the innovative Fleet Manager technology add on, offering a full recording system that helps improve Health & Safety and further reduces costs. Fleet Manager is quite a new concept for the forklift industry and was developed by STILL to enable large organisations to monitor and control activity of the machinery. The key card system controls which drivers can use each truck and programs the equipment with personal driving preferences. It also records details of accidents should they occur and overall offers a comprehensive record of forklift utilisation, which for a large organisation such as Highland Spring, is essential. A number of Gwent Mechanical Handling customers are using Fleet Manager in order to give them full control of their forklift fleet and monitor forklift activity. The feedback has been extremely positive.
