Vähälä-yhtiöt
Number one in intermodal transportation
Vähälä-yhtiöt is a group of companies offering logistics
and hauling services, and specialising in parcel freight. It has become known
in Finland especially as the developer of combined transportation. The companies
aim is indeed to get all road transportation onto rails whenever possible. In
any case the transferability is affected by several matters for instance timetables
and environmental factors."To begin with, our objective was to transfer all
unnecessary traffic off the crowded highways and to get our drivers home for the
night. We have already been working in co-operation with the State Railways of
Finland for about ten years," says managing director Jukka Vähälä.
"We drive articulated vehicles up to 52 metres onto trains. And the train
takes the vehicles and their loads on schedule," deputy managing director
Mikko Vähälä adds.
The drivers often spend more time in the terminals than on the motorways.
Advocate for sensible outsourcing
The company's Managing Director Pertti Kuha states one of his company's tangible
goals to be to help businesses of about 10-50 employees regardless of their sector
to outsource their logistics sensibly. "The clients should focus their energy
on what they can do best, and most often it is not logistics. Outsourcing logistics
makes sense just as outsourcing the company accounting. An outside expert has
the best know-how, best contacts and best views on development," says Managing
Director Kuha.
If total outsourcing is at first too much, Logsu can offer a less comprehensive
option: "The company's logistics services can be tailored to include some
that are done in-house and some by outside experts. This can be done regardless
of whether the services concerned are customer deliveries or warehousing. It is
not necessary for small businesses to employ their own logistics expert, especially
when for example production logistics services can be offered cost effectively
in project form.
Logistics centred thinking among engineers is a competitive advantage
Logsu regards logistics as a competitive factor, not as the unavoidable cost it is perceived to be by many businesses. Traditionally, companies have concentrated on getting the product through the production line as quickly as possible and on making a product satisfactory to the customer. Finally, they have used transportation services to transport the product to the customer. The order-delivery chain has not been managed as one entity, Kuha analyses many companies' logistics thinking. He himself professes to be a reflective logistics engineer.
"A logistics engineering company fits in the Oulu region like a glove. A logistics engineer is familiar with logistics, engineering and has an understanding of the entire business sector and is a specialist in many often critically important areas. A lack of understanding of the entire sector is maybe the most common problem with logistics in here," Kuha describes the sector.
"Of course the competition in the area will get tougher once the University
and the Polytechnic begin gradually to teach logistics. However, we are lucky
to have a few years' head start," says Pertti Kuha. He himself is involved
in the training of new specialist, using the five-r-principle: the right quantity
of the right product to the right place at the right time for the right price.
Combined transportation is an around-the-clock, around-the-year activity..
The top management are proud of their staff
"We the employees are required to have sensitive ears. One must continuously question things in order to be able to respond with enthusiasm and flexibility to the constant changes that take place in the field. When you work for us, thinking is allowed even though there is a healthy degree of discipline applied," Jukka Vähälä describes the company's policy.
Rationalised operation
Vähälä-yhtiöt companies are part of the international Schenker chain. This enables international assignments to be readily handled. The sphere of responsibilities of the Vähälä-yhtiöt companies covers Northern Finland and Central Finland of the national Kiitolinja service. Vähälä-yhtiöt companies have logistics centres in Oulu and Jyväskylä. Both the base and the terminal traffic are directed to them. The goods are sorted, combined, packaged when necessary or stored, and forwarded. The companies have outsourced their material management increasingly to logistics professionals.
The switch over to a flexible production structure has meant that peaks in transportation are levelled at the week level. Special attention has been attached to the standard of quality at Vähälä-yhtiöt companies. "We always stand by our commitments to customers and fulfil the promises we make, be it a matter of timetables, environmental matters or special requirements," is how managing director Jukka Vähälä defines his quality thinking.
Deputy managing director Mikko Vähälä and managing director Jukka
Vähälä are in charge of one Northern Finland's foremost companies
in the field of logistics.
Future prospects
Oritkari in Oulu has evolved into a conglomeration of logistics, and this is where Vähälä-yhtiöt companies are also based. "It's great that people in Oulu have been so farsighted and shown pioneer spirit in concentrating the various transportation modes and infrastructure in the same area. Oulu is a highly competitive area because the land, sea and rail terminals are located there, side by side. Neither is the airport far away. This location is ideal for the Vähälä-yhtiöt companies. Heavy traffic does not out a strain on the difficult traffic conditions of the town centre. Unnecessary driving and traffic jams are avoided. And further connections and refining of the material flow are easily taken care of," is Mikko Vähälä's analysis of the location-related benefits enjoyed by the companies.
Logisforum's role as seen by the heads of the Vähälä-yhtiöt companies are those of creator of contacts and serving as a discussion forum. They see it as a place enabling co-operation between the various modes of transportation and a place where matters of common interest can be discussed. However, they also wish to warn of lines of thinking in which public money might become involved in entrepreneurship. It would only lead to unhealthy developments in this field of human endeavour.
The future of Vähälä-yhtiöt companies appears to be positively challenging, the same as today. "Combined transportation will be developed in the future as well. Hopefully, this development will also go in the direction of sea transportation in which the relics related to social policy have slightly slowed down its ability to respond to changes in the market demand. We envisage more and more customers continuing to expand the outsourcing of their materials management," managing director Jukka Vähälä concludes his views regarding the immediate future.
Additional Information:
Vähälä-yhtiöt
tel. +358 10 520 7800
fax + 358 10 520 7802
Oritkarintie 1
FIN-90400 Oulu, Finland
www.vahala.com
