Innovation finds a mobile home

By Shaun Inguanzo
A DANDENONG South company is leading the Australian trailer, caravan and motorhome industries with simple yet incredibly effective engineering innovations.
AL-KO International, formerly known as Gerlock Trailer and Caravan Parts, last month won the Greater Dandenong Chamber of Commerce’s Premier Regional Business Award for Innovation.
The company designs and manufactures patented and registered parts for caravans, motorhomes, boat trailers and box trailers, and supplies to large clients such as Jayco.
Managing director Sven Mannfolk said the company was leading the Australian industry in innovative ideas, particularly as consumers turned to smaller cars and demanded more lightweight caravans and trailers.
“In the past when people have travelled (with a caravan or trailer) they have had to remove the jockey wheel and store it, but we came up with a swivel function,” he said.
“You simply rotate it 90 degrees when travelling, and when you get to your location, simply swing it back and use it to manoeuvre the caravan around.”
The company has also redesigned chassis and couplings used in motorhomes and caravans to be more lightweight.
Simple yet effective, AL-KO’s ideas have been vindicated by the Australian market’s warm welcoming of its products, and Mr Mannfolk said the company had seen repeated annual growth of 14 per cent over past years.
But the award was unexpected, Mr Mannfolk said.
“We have never entered any award such as this in the past,” he said. “We tend to go about doing our business and so it was a big surprise for us to be nominated.
“And, of course, we were pleased to receive the nomination and subsequently receive the innovation award.”
After a 50-year history beginning as a South Melbourne engineering company before moving to Hallam and then Dandenong, and in 1986 being bought out by its parent company AL-KO Kober, the Dandenong-based business is already thinking about the future – and it holds more than just caravans and trailers.
“We import from other AL-KO companies some powered garden products, including ride-on lawnmowers and hedge trimmers,” Mr Mannfolk said.
“Traditionally all the products are made in Europe, but now with products being made in China, in the Australian market that will make us a lot more competitive and put us in a better position.”
AL-KO International is beginning operations in New Zealand, and is still a privately owned company, Mr Mannfolk said.