2021 a difficult, static or growth year?

2021 was a year of significant growth for our company and consolidation, especially in the Italian market thanks to the integrated, turnkey Industry 4.0 solution.

Forecast for 2022? Will it be strong recovery as indicated by the government?

The year 2022, a year of good prospects especially for the end of the pandemic, opened with the Russian-Ukrainian crisis, which increased the problems related to energy and raw material costs, thickening the clouds on the initial good prospects.

Raw materials. Are you experiencing difficulties in procurement? Are they causing price increases?

The difficulty in finding raw materials is a problem that has affected many Italian and European companies throughout 2021 and is continuing in this 2022.

Energy and rising costs: how much have they affected your prices and how much could they affect you?

Upward price adjustments were inevitable. Although the synergy with the Polin Group has enabled us to mitigate and contain them, these difficulties have also had an impact on delivery times, which have lengthened. We realised that it is necessary to maintain continuous contact with our customers in order to minimise inconvenience and render a service that meets their demands.

What impact will energy costs and supply difficulties have on the Italian market?

Energy costs, which have practically doubled, unfortunately have an impact on company costs. Fortunately, in the last two years, company energy efficiency policies have been implemented that have allowed us not to significantly affect our price list.

Certainly the problems are too widespread and affect all sectors. It will have to be the unity of purpose between suppliers and customers that will help the country to be more competitive and alleviate the inconveniences.

Which products in your range can help the bodyshop reduce energy and cycle costs?

Combustible: Our workhorse in the fight to reduce energy costs is still our VA320M air stream burner, which can run on either natural gas or LPG, and which can be found in all our spray booths and preparation areas as original equipment, and which we also offer as a retrofit solution for any existing booth, in the tried and tested DRYTECH version. The use of this technology results in shorter processing times due to the reduction of the time required to reach temperature, and its stability during all processing phases.
Electricity: Our systems are also equipped with BA series inverters, which enable a reduction in electricity consumption thanks to the elimination of cueing at motor start-up and the 3 ventilation modes available for the operator to choose from. In addition, the SLOW-MO device allows switching from high to low speed automatically if the spraying activity is not in progress.

Practical advice to bodyshops for more careful cost management

The practical advice is to take the time to identify all waste that occurs in the performance of your business, not only in terms of consumables, but especially in terms of time. A careful analysis of activity management time will allow you to identify where it would be appropriate to intervene, both in terms of organisation and equipment, in order to obtain useful benefits for reducing processing costs.