When Gav assigned yours truly the editorial for the EDM this week, I started contemplating the potential list of topics, making a couple of scratchy notes, and then stopped myself in my note-making tracks. “This is your first editorial of the year,” I thought, “and here you are writing down a list of issues and grizzles. Shouldn’t you always start the ‘day’ with gratitude?”

The year got off to a great start for me thanks to the Bombay and Kamo Truck shows. I was lucky enough to attend both and what better way to demonstrate the resilience and dedication road transport people have to their industry and communities than a rousing show! And what rousing shows they were.

On the back of the most difficult commercial year the country has experienced in more than a decade, the cost for operators to attend either event was significant, and in many cases put an already-stressed kitty under a little more pressure. But to not attend is not who we are as the trucking industry. They turned up in droves.

Close to 600-odd trucks attended the combined two shows and both were seething with families and people from all walks of life enjoying the positivity both events radiated into their communities. I love seeing the transport industry people proudly wearing their brand’s shirt and setting up little picnic areas in front of the fleet where visitors are able to meet and chat with them.

Wandering around Kamo Touch-a-Truck I needed a little shade for a bit and sat on a seat and chatted with Janice, a Kamo local. “We love it. We’re not trucking people, there are no truck drivers in our family, yet this is the event my moko loves coming to. Every year they all want to come up from Auckland and stay and see the trucks. They see the trucks on the road all year but can’t get close, touch them, sit in them, talk to the drivers. They talk about it all year after we’ve been.”

Wow … how cool is that? We need to ask ourselves some questions about how we’ve allowed our industry to become so alien to so many, and how we let that happen.

Dunedin had its show the day before Kamo, and as I sit here it’s Nelson Kids ‘N Rigs tomorrow, (8 Feb), so the excitement is brewing once more.

Pundits have said the first half of 2025 might continue to be a little sticky in terms of economic lift-off and so it’s great we‘ve been given a string of high-profile truck shows and events in the first half of the year to keep motivation and enthusiasm front of mind, and allow us to deliver a stirring and positive message within our communities. Bombay, Kamo, Dunedin, Nelson, TMC Trucking Industry, Tui, Wheels at Wanaka … our New Year message is far from over!

And here at New Zealand Trucking we’re not being tardy about putting our best foot forward also, and soon will have something to really get excited about on the truck show scene.

It’s road transport that will carry this country out of the economic doldrums and I’m so proud we’re doing our bit across the country! To the rest of New Zealand … Get going! We’re ready and forward facing!

All the best,

Dave McCoid
Editorial Director