Esbjerg, a hub for automobile imports

Every five days, a 328 ft ro-ro carrier calls at Esbjerg, sending more than 750 new Renault and Dacia cars onto the Danish market. The cars are made ready for distribution in Esbjerg and then loaded onto lorries that will take them to 75 dealerships all over Denmark.

This marks the opening of a new, high-frequency route to Esbjerg with two carriers running shuttle service between Esbjerg and Zeebrügge in Belgium.

The venture is backed by Copenhagen-based line agency Esteph, Belgium shipping company Euro Marine Logistics (EML) and stevedoring and terminal company Scandinavian Auto Logistics. The seed to the new partnership was sown in autumn 2013 when Niels Winther & Co. acquired Esteph of Copenhagen.

Esbjerg beating out Malmoe

Dating back more than 115 years, Esteph is one of Denmark's oldest shipbrokers, among other things acting as agents of EML, a leader in short sea shipping of motor vehicles.

This was exactly what appealed to Niels Winther & Co., explains Michael Lodberg Jensen, partner and COO of Niels Winther & Co. and now director of Esteph.

“We saw a potential in bringing Esbjerg and EML together, because we knew that EML has very strong ties to Renault and Nissan. We also knew that Renault was considering whether they wanted to import their cars via Esbjerg or Malmoe in Sweden. When we acquired Esteph in September, Renault decided to opt for Esbjerg,” says Mr Lodberg Jensen.

The third partner, Scandinavian Auto Logistics (SAL), is in charge of stevedoring, pre-delivery inspections (PDI), terminal services and distribution. Backed by last year's expansion of its Esbjerg terminal to 65,000 sqm in total and 24-hour terminal services, SAL has ample capacity for growth.

What kind of synergies do you expect to achieve from Esteph, Niels Winther & Co. and SAL working together in Esbjerg?

“One of the upsides to our partnership is that, between us, we cover the entire transport chain and are able to deliver an end-to-end solution. We have a close relationship with the car manufacturers and importers, and our services cover all transport, terminal and PDI aspects. This is what makes our market position unique. No other port in Denmark is able to offer a similar end-to-end solution.”

More automobile brands to join

Mr Lodberg Jensen emphasizes that Esbjerg was chosen ahead of Malmoe because of the combination of the partners' specific competencies and the port's excellent geographic location.

“We deliver the product our customers demand, and we are competitive. But our product offering is obviously supported by the location and facilities of the Port of Esbjerg. The Port of Esbjerg offers excellent logistics, in terms of ro-ro carrier calls from Zeebrügge as well as onward distribution of the cars in Denmark. No one aspect of the partnership's competencies could stand alone – it's the combination that makes us unique.”

The ambition is to get even more automobile companies to ship their cars through the Port of Esbjerg, and Esteph and SAL are currently negotiating with other manufacturers. They have already signed a contract with Nissan starting on 1 June that will bring 8,000 Nissan cars to Esbjerg each year.

“We are planning to attract even more cars to Esbjerg. We now have the line, the base and the high frequency to facilitate further growth. We aim to grow our market share in Denmark from the current level of around 20 per cent to 35-40 per cent. We are confident that we have the capacity to handle this volume,” says Mr Lodberg Jensen.

Gateway to Scandinavia

The business plans also go beyond the Danish market; the ultimate goal is to establish the Port of Esbjerg as an automobile transport gateway to the rest of Scandinavia. We're already well on our way to achieving this goal, explains Mr Lodberg Jensen. Being agents of the Italian carrier Grimaldi, Niels Winther & Co. has a strong lead to Fiat, paving the way for additional synergies:

“Based on our portfolio of other automobile brands, we have succeeded in creating a transhipment hub – a transit port for the carriage of goods. From the end of April, we will be transiting Fiat to Norway via Esbjerg, which means that Fiat cars manufactured in Italy and Turkey will be off-loaded in Esbjerg and shipped to Norway via another route,” he says, adding:

“Going forward, we will be increasing our focus on transhipment carriage services at Esbjerg. Our goal is to become a transit port for automobile imports to both Norway and Sweden.”

Facts: Automobile imports offering great potential

• The new route has six monthly departures and is operated by the two ro-ro vessels “City of Paris” and “City of Rome”, each with a capacity to carry 750 cars.
• In addition to new cars, EML also carries other types of goods suitable for ro-ro carriage.
• Niels Winther & Co. and Esteph have a total of 30 employees in Esbjerg and Copenhagen.