Expanding its business into the sunshine state, Uphire prides itself on supplying reliable equipment at a competitive price with good customer service. Owner and founder Nigel McKinley discusses business, expansion plans, and why his company chose Sinoboom‘s EWPs to be at the forefront of its access equipment.
NSW-based equipment hire company Uphire has come a long way since it began its operations on April Fool’s Day 12 years ago.
Initially operating out the side of his house with a trailer and four machines, owner Nigel McKinley’s journey now sees his east coast-based business expanding into Brisbane’s market and with plans of moving into Newcastle.
“Around the time I started Uphire, I’d broken up with a business partner who decided to try and take everything that we had built together,” he says.
Endeavouring to work through the challenges of starting his own business, Nigel cited Uphire’s customer-centric approach as the main reason for success and why his company has stayed so stable.
“We made sure we employed good staff around us, because good staff means good customer service,” he says. “Additionally, fostering a positive relationship across every level of the supply chain has meant that people who’ve dealt with us have remained loyal over the past 10 years.”
And it’s not just external relationships that Uphire emphasises either. One of the key driving principles at the NSW-based hire company is clear, consistent communication. For Nigel, that includes making sure that managers and staff are all on the same page when it comes to understanding what the company is trying to achieve on a weekly basis.
“Clear communication is essential and at the core of everything that we do,” he says. “For us, it’s not just about having lunch with suppliers: we communicate with our customers and our staff just as frequently so that we’re not missing anything as to how we can improve our service.”
Operating in tandem with a business ethos of clear communication and customer centricity is providing good, solid, dependable products. In Nigel’s own words, this is “why we chose to give Chinese manufacturer Sinoboom a chance at becoming a supplier partner to Uphire.”
“The Queensland branch is predominantly made up of Sinoboom’s products,” he says. “Where other manufacturers couldn’t supply, Sinoboom did – which, I think, surprised a lot of the other manufacturers in Australia.”
Talking of his 25+ year relationship with Sinoboom’s General Manager Mitch Ely, Nigel spoke of his internal assurance that, despite any challenges that may be thrown Uphire’s way, his relationship with Mitch and therefore Sinoboom would ensure that support would always be there.
“We initially looked at Sinoboom during COVID-19 because all the supply chains had shortened up elsewhere, so we needed to get outside of our comfort zone back then,” he says. “We found the Sinoboom product, we went to the factory to see how they built their machines, we checked them out thoroughly, and ultimately we were very happy with what we saw.”
Now operating with over 200 machines from Sinoboom, the Chinese manufacturer is at the forefront of Uphire’s expansion into the Brisbane market. Founded in 2008 in Changsha, Sinoboom focuses on providing a wide range of access solutions and its products can be found in Europe, Southeast Asia, Africa, and the Americas.
The company possesses a detailed product line featuring a self-propelled telescopic boom, articulating boom, scissor, spider and truck-mounted boom lifts and vertical mast lifts with a range of operating platforms – all offering working heights between 6-48 metres. Uphire has witnessed this kind of performance and efficiency firsthand; as Nigel says, since acquiring the machines, they’ve “really been hitting the mark”.
“We’re really eager to see how these machines perform over the next few years,” he says. “We’ve invested a large amount of resources into expanding our fleet with Sinoboom, and the quality there is evident – so we can’t wait to see how they perform in the field.”
Another big selling point for Nigel is Sinoboom’s responsiveness when it comes to picking up the phone and answering any service-related calls, an issue he labels a “big thing” that Uphire “needs”.
“A lot of manufacturers experience the same issues,” he says, “but actually getting someone on the other end of the line to talk us through the issue is not a regular occurrence. Getting someone to the machine if the troubleshooting fails in a timely manner is so important to hire companies; if machines are down, we don’t get return on investment.”
“With Sinoboom, we’ve never had that issue,” he continues. “They’ve always answered the phone if we’ve had difficulties and ensured that we receive the necessary service required when things go wrong.”
As Nigel also points out, platforming the level of quality that is apparent in Sinoboom’s machines is equally as important as platforming the company’s servicing capabilities. Despite Sinoboom’s products thriving in the environments they encounter, negative stigmas persist because of its country of origin.
In light of their reputations, however, Nigel believes that Chinese companies are “really putting pressure” on the Australian market – a view that’s widely held across the lifting industry, such as crane dealers Empire Cranes, Ronco and D&D Diesel highlighting the quality coming from East-Asia in past editions of Cranes and Lifting.
“There’s been such a lack of stock coming from the traditional access platform manufacturers into Australia, and the Chinese manufacturers have seized their opportunity with both hands,” says Nigel.
“A lot of people are giving companies like Sinoboom a real chance because these machines are so competitively priced, are well stocked, and perform well.”
Elaborating further, Nigel uses the example of the Hyundai car brand: manufacturing that he says was frowned upon when it first entered the Australian market, but over time has steadily improved to become a high-quality product. With Sinoboom, he notes, it’s no different.
“These brands now are not what they were 15 years ago; today, they’re built much stronger than that,” he says. “East-Asian companies have learned a lot in the past 10 years, and the quality of their machines now are much better.”
“The team at Sinoboom listens to what the people using its products say about its machines, and the team implements those lessons to provide a product that really stands up in today’s market.”
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