Latest / Best of Business / Don Braid: Mainfreight CEO on the company's 20 percent profit drop

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Don Braid: Mainfreight CEO on the company's 20 percent profit drop · Best of Business

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• 0:12
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  Speaker 2: It's another tough six months for Main Freight. The logistics
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  Speaker 2: business has posted a net profit after tax of ninety
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  Speaker 2: three million dollars for the half year. That's down eighteen
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  Speaker 2: and a half percent, and the company's operations and the
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  Speaker 2: Americas have performed poorly, making a loss of two point
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  Speaker 2: three million dollars. Don Braid is Main Freight's group managing director.
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  Speaker 2: Hey Don, Hi, Heather, how are you very well? Thank you?
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  Speaker 2: So what are the challenges you've been facing here?
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  Speaker 3: Oh? All sorts. You know, we had had a tough
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  Speaker 3: start to the year in the first quarter, and that
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  Speaker 3: result that we've produced for the half year is actually
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  Speaker 3: better than what we saw in the first quarter that
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  Speaker 3: we announced at the AGM. So it's improving and we
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  Speaker 3: certainly feel a lot more buoyant about what's in front
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  Speaker 3: of us and an amount of market share gains, customers
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  Speaker 3: sending more with us around the world, so we feel
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  Speaker 3: a bit more positive as we head into the second
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  Speaker 3: six months.
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  Speaker 2: So do you think things are going to get better
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  Speaker 2: from here? You seeing signs of that here we are.
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  Speaker 3: Definitely with established customers sending more, spending more with us,
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  Speaker 3: and market share gains of of our own violation where
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  Speaker 3: we're winning business across the network.
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  Speaker 2: What do you think is going on with our attitude
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  Speaker 2: towards tariff so we largely ignoring it?
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  Speaker 3: Well, my advice I had the opportunity to be in
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  Speaker 3: the US in the last three weeks, and my advice
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  Speaker 3: to some of those people New Zealandy exporters who were
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  Speaker 3: complaining about the fifteen percent, wanting it to be ten percent,
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  Speaker 3: the reality is it's fifteen Get on with it, increase
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  Speaker 3: your pricing accordingly, and that's the game you're going to
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  Speaker 3: have to play.
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  Speaker 2: Have they followed your advice?
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  Speaker 3: I'm not sure. I'm not sure there should be well
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  Speaker 3: advised to do that either, and I'm not sure it's
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  Speaker 3: that easy. But I do think that we are overly
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  Speaker 3: fixated on it and it is the way the world
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  Speaker 3: these days, so accept it.
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  Speaker 2: And that hoarding that was going on don at the
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  Speaker 2: start ahead of the tariff's kicking in, where people were
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  Speaker 2: sending just a whole bunch out warehousing. It has that
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  Speaker 2: now ended.
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  Speaker 3: And there's still plenty of stock around, but certainly. I
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  Speaker 3: think what's happened overall is the nervousness of the tariff situation.
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  Speaker 3: There's some sort of sensibility to whatever the tariffs are
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  Speaker 3: going to be. Even this last session that they've had
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  Speaker 3: with China, they've settled on a set of tariffs for
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  Speaker 3: the next twelve months. That's giving people some confidence. So
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  Speaker 3: they're getting on and doing business.
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  Speaker 2: Isn't a now. I mean, because you operate in various
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  Speaker 2: parts of the world, it gives you a really great
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  Speaker 2: view of what is going on in our economy. What
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  Speaker 2: are you seeing here in New Zealand? How are we going?
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  Speaker 3: It's better and it's got better in certainly the last
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  Speaker 3: couple of months, and you know, the dark depths of
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  Speaker 3: winter have this definitely disappeared behind us, and we're seeing
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  Speaker 3: our customers feeling more positive and sending more fre it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, that makes a big difference. Now, do you have
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  Speaker 2: a view on the debate about the Ports of Auckland
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  Speaker 2: hiking the fees?
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  Speaker 3: Well? I do. Whether I want to share that with you,
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  Speaker 3: I'm not sure. But what I would urge the Ports
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  Speaker 3: of Auckland to do is that this will be further
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  Speaker 3: imposts on exporters and importers. However, I urge them to
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  Speaker 3: think about a multimodal approach rather than just a trucking approach,
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  Speaker 3: and I think they're far too geared towards moving freight
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  Speaker 3: on trucks rather than actually using rail off the port
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  Speaker 3: and onto the port.
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  Speaker 2: Interesting don't always get to talk to you. Thank you
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  Speaker 2: so much for your time, mate. That's Don Braid, Main
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  Speaker 2: Freight Group Managing Director.
• 3:59
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