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Rui Moreira (Porlogis Managing Director) in interview to Insight (MBS Group magazine) talks about Porlogis actual business and the “new logistics centre”
MBS Insight: Mr. Moreira, how has the economic situation developed in Portugal in recent years?
Rui Moreira: The economic situation in Portugal has recovered markedly after the great recession of 2008, especially since the budget figures were at a dramatically low level. To make matters worse, the number of unemployed rose to more than 700,000. After the recession Portugal turned to a more courageous strategy to improve the poor economic situation. Ultimately, this resulted in a positive and stable economic situation again. GDP rose by 0.9% in 2014 and by up to 1.5% in 2015.
As we know, Portugal - a country of intensive exports - had one of the biggest productions of low-cost products for Europe. The last few years have somewhat influenced the traditional export products, such as footwear and textiles, as well as ceramics, tiles, cork and wood materials and as a result, the massive low cost production has been changing into more quality and added value products. Exports then rose by again 3.6% in 2014 and by 5.1% in 2015. The trend this year is also positive, but with a lower rate of growth.
In recent years, also imports have fallen. The difficult economic situation forced the Portuguese government to take serious measures, such as to make savings in salaries or to reduce investment. The measures are now starting to bear fruit, with the result that the import rate is slowly raising again.
These years have not been easy for business at Porlogis. Without the major imports, we lost some logistics business and our warehousing activities. The imbalance between import and export resulted in a great deal of expenditure in exporting goods from Portugal and, at the same time, ensured that no goods could be regularly imported. This led to production cost rises and lower margins.
MBS Insight: Did the economically difficult years influence Porlogis's business? How did you manage to get through these years and actually grow?
Rui Moreira: Yes, indeed, the difficult years did influence our business. We were forced to adapt to the circumstances and to develop alternative business strategies to compensate the lower import volumes with exports. With the help of services specially tailored to our clients we managed to satisfy the needs of the markets. To give just one successful example: we travel the whole world on behalf of producers for our wine business. This business requires a great deal of expertise and experience from our people. The business volume helped us to compensate for lost margins and to maintain the good name of the Portuguese wine industry. Last March, the biggest and most important wine fair trade in the world was held in Düsseldorf –Prowein. Together with MBS Logistics, Porlogis took care of the entire logistical concept for approx. 300 wine producers.
Moreover, our overseas, air and sea transport divisions and the WCA network have developed further and have grown continuously in the last few years.
Since we were founded in 2002 we – together with MBS – have always earned positive results and achieved rising figures.
MBS Insight: Economic growth has increased recently, and Porlogis too is currently investing in the future. Can you tell us anything about that?
Rui Moreira: That is right. Our management has always kept an eye on the future of the company and its business. We firmly believe in our motivated and professional team. Our colleagues are our most precious and strongest asset. Our employees are the key factor in our success. Together with our partners we are building up a successful business and a competitive network.
Porlogis’s corporate strategy sets great store by a free, trustworthy and committed company with a strong name on the market. As part of our business policy, we developed our own ISO 9001 quality management system and are measuring the satisfaction of our clients on the basis of yearly surveys.
Porlogis has been represented in the Portuguese Association of Freight Forwarders for 10 years, as vice president and as a member of the financial council. In addition, Porlogis has been awarded the PME LIDER and the PME Excelência. These are state management awards for financial and economic efficiency.
Recently, Porlogis biggest project lays on new building acquisition, in order to optimize work conditions for our employees and quality in the provision of services to our clients.
MBS Insight: What do you hope to achieve with the new building? Where should the focus lie?
Rui Moreira: The new Porlogis Logistics Center (PLC) is currently being built. This is a very important step for achieving our goals. The focus is on a sustainable future with low and controlled fixed costs to generate more business.
The site measures a total of 6,000m². The offices will take up 350m2 and the warehouse 2,000m2. There will be 5 loading ramps and other flexible loading stations that allow up to 10 loading units at the same time.
In our opinion, the location of the new PLC is ideal: it is near the existing warehouse, about 1km from Porto airport and approx. 5km from Leixões port. The building work started in April 2016 and will probably be complete by the end of the year.
MBS Insight: What are your goals for Porlogis for the future?
Rui Moreira: Three guidelines for a successful path in the future were decided at the last shareholders’ meeting.
- We are relying on an economically successful basis and, resulting from this, the ability to generate positive results.
- We are relying on self-financing so that we can implement our own investments.
- And we are relying on project planning to be able to have a positive influence of future goals.
I believe that the steps and experience of our past justify our faith in a successful future for Porlogis.
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