ForkForce Australia has acquired the joint Munquip and Munlift forklift companies based in south-east QLD.
The multi-million dollar deal sees more than 100 – mostly Hyster and Yale –hire fleet forklifts and over 700 customer contracts transfer across to ForkForce’s new and used inventory and nationwide database.
Munquip Pty Ltd was established in Brisbane back in 1987 while Munlift Pty Ltd started in nearby Toowoomba in 1982 under owner-operator Mr Leo De Munnik.
Mr De Munnik finally decided the time was right to sell his two successful businesses to ForkForce after more than 40 years in the forklift industry.
“Age catches up with everyone at some point, and running a forklift business takes a lot of time and energy when you’re looking to start scaling back,” Mr De Munnik said.
“Letting go is pretty difficult too but ForkForce is a great fit – good people, good business model, a lot of experience in the industry, high standards and a heavy customer focus.”
“One of my priorities was finding a company that would keep my customers happy after building up this list over the last quarter of a century. I didn’t want a firm that was too small and under-resourced to service the businesses properly or too big and impersonal to care, or too rigid with their pricing and policies.”
ForkForce was extremely pleased to get the opportunity to acquire Munquip and Munlift and expand into the fast-growing Toowoomba market said their Managing Director Steve Cunliffe.
“We’ve been around since 1999 and it’s taken us years to organically grow our business to where it is now. Acquiring Munquip and Munlift not only boosts our fleet to about 500 forklifts and walkie stackers in one swoop, but it also gives us a massive in-road into servicing a lot more Toowoomba and Brisbane customers on the back of a well-respected name,” Mr Cunliffe said.
“Both organisations had a lot of synergies – we’re both wholly Australian-owned and operated independent dealers with similar customers and suppliers, and we offer a genuine price alternative to the big guns for quality new forklift and used forklift sales and hire. And like Munquip and Munlift we’re fiercely competitive in the 4,000kg – 16,000kg lift capacity range.”
The transition should prove smooth-going with Leo, his daughter Rina and their Brisbane and Toowoomba service staff staying on with the new owners, and their Toowoomba office becoming another ForkForce regional office linked to their major new Darra Head Office.
