What clients are saying about us

“Gracie Davis’s recommendations saved Dangote Flour Mills (DFM) over $25,000 per tanker, freeing up capital that could be better used elsewhere.”

Tiger Brands / Dangote Flour Mills (DFM) – Tiger Brands Limited, a Top 40 JSE Limited company and South African consumer goods firm, whose footprint extends across the African continent and beyond, bought a 63% (Now 70%) stake in Dangote Flour Mills (DFM) of Nigeria in 2012. Tiger Brands bought a fairly robust DFM with a clear goal to increase its revenues and expand its reach into the Nigerian food commodities market by catalyzing and transforming the way its consumer goods were manufactured, stored and distributed in Nigeria. After a thorough supply chain analysis of its operations, DFM realized that they would need to overhaul the way they stored and distributed their consumables. DFM decided that they would overhaul a major portion of their commodities storage & distribution fleet, starting with their Storage Silos, Bulk Cargo Flour tankers, and medium to heavy-duty haulage trucks. The following are some of the main concerns DFM had about their acquisition of bulk flour cargo tankers:

• DFM needed Tankers that could handle the rigour and bad condistions of Nigerian interstate highways.

• DFM needed Tankers that would be able to drive directly to Kano from Lagos, or to Calabar from Kano, or to Ilorin from Calabar, without having to stop for refueling; particularly because of potential dangers on the road like armed robbery.

• DFM needed the Tankers to be rust-proof/anti-corrosive because of the sensitive edible contents said tankers would be transporting; especially because of a bad experience they had just had with a brand new fleet of flat-bed trailers just purchased from China, all of which had developed serious rusting issues upon arrival on Nigeria shores.

• DFM was vey clear about their intent to execute this project cost-effectively.

Gracie Davis was called in by DFM to assist in acquiring these cost-efficient top-quality bulk cargo flour tankers conditioned on resolving their above-mentioned concerns. The fleet acquisition would allow DFM to transport their consumables problem-free across Nigeria despite the many physical hurdles in their path.

After years of research over the last decade, in this field; Gracie Davis came to the determination that Chinese industrial manufacturers had evolved in terms of the quality and originality of their products. Moreover, we discovered that some of the seller financial terms governing the procurement (i.e transportation costs) of these products, if negotiated properly, would make the purchase of these products a uniquely cost-effective purchase for our African client; in this case – Dangote Flour Mills.

As mentioned in the third point above, per rusting – DFM had been spooked by the corrosion of the flatbed trailers they had just bought (also from China), and so would need further convincing and guarantees that the manufacturing partners being recommended by Gracie Davis could in fact meet all of the DFM pre-requsites mentioned above. DFM wanted to make sure that the Flour Tankers they were looking to procure would not suffer from the same fate as the Flatbed tankers.

Consequently, Gracie Davis took a couple of DFM Executives on a 7-city/7-factory quality assurance tour of China to meet with some of our trusted Chinese manufacturing partners, all of whom are – literally – leading manfacturers of top-quality industrial supply-chain equipment, both in China, and in Asia at large. All Gracie Davis partners are ISO compliant (especially the 9000 & 14000 families); our partners meet all global manufacturing standards, and produce some of the most high-quality supply-chain products in the world, but (through Gracie Davis….) at a more affordable price.

DFM Managing Executive – Chris Immelman (3^rd from right) and DFM Group Chief of Logistics – Deena
Moodliar (2^nd from right), along with Gracie Davis Director – Olawale Akinsehinwa (3^rd from left)
visiting the Beiqi FOTON Corporation in Northern Beijing, China.

After consultations with our partners, and with DFM, Gracie Davis submitted the following recommendations:

• Gracie Davis recommended that DFM procure customized Carbon-Steel tankers instead of the much more expensive 100% Stainless Steel Tankers they had been interested in.

• Gracie Davis recommended that these Carbon-Steel tankers come equipped with anti-corrosion paint, with lifetime-guarantees of 20 years (exterior) and 30 years (interior). Gracie Davis, organized an exclusive tour of Asia’s fastest growing paint sciences production company, for DFM. It is this anti-corrosion food-compliant paint that adds cost-effective value to the Carbon-Steel bulk four tankers, saving DFM $25,000 (money that could be better applied elsewhere) per tanker in the process.

• Gracie Davis recommended that these Carbon-Steel/Food-Paint tankers come with a material thickness of 5mm instead of the standard 4mm, and special mud guards for all 12 sets of tires. This because of the inherent danger of flying shrapnel, stones, concrete, untethered tar, and the like; ricocheting off the very rough and poorly conditioned (unpaved in many cases) Nigerian roads & highways…onto the body of the tankers, particularly the routes between: Lagos, Calabar, Ilorin, and Kano: DFM storage & distribution hubs.

• Gracie Davis recommended that all 12 sets of tires on these Carbon-Steel tankers come with slightly wider 12R22.5 tires instead of the standard 11.00R22.5 tires that come with most tankers, because of the poor road conditions and ease/stability when negotiating acute turnings at narrow junctions.

• Gracie Davis recommended that DFM add costum-sized (at discount rates organized by Gracie Davis) 1200L Gas/Petroleum tanks for the Truck-Head (900L Standard, 300L Spare). Most Tanker Truck Heads come equipped with 600L petroleum tanks or less. So a 1200L petroleum tank equipped Truck Head can haul the Bulk Cargo Flour Tanker through direct trips to Kano from Lagos, or to Calabar from Ilorin, without the driver ever having a need to stop to refuel, which unfortumately, is a potentially dangerous endevour on Nigerian interstate highways these days.