How it started…
Two years ago, we undertook a national roadshow with our armoured Land Rover Defender demonstrator model. It was the first Defender we had armoured, and being cognisant of the sales success of the Defender and being the only JLR South Africa approved armourer, we were under pressure to develop a solution that offered our levels of ballistic integrity and quality finishes, while ensuring vehicle functionality and dynamics were unaffected. Sounds like a tall order but these are the three cornerstones of our approach to vehicle armouring.
Biting the bullet, so to speak, we purchased our own Defender and set about developing a solution that we could take to market. Such is the strength of our ability to innovate and overcome challenges that it didn’t take long for us to make it work, and work well. A brief chat with JLR SA about how to market our new product followed and the idea of a national roadshow was born. Effectively, our plan was to demonstrate the vehicle to JLR dealers around the country and provide a somewhat basic experience of how well ballistic glass works. Suffice to say we can’t randomly fire bullets at our vehicles on dealership floors, but we came up with something that proved the point and provided a memorable experience.
We did have a secondary objective behind the roadshow, which spoke to the ethos of why we do what we do. We are not prophets of doom but rather champions of living an unrestricted life in our beautiful country by providing a solution that goes a long way to keeping you safe every day. We wanted to show that not only does our armouring have no effect on everyday life other than keeping you safe, but it was also an opportunity to showcase all that South Africa has to offer and highlight that our diversity as a nation and a destination is what makes us unique in the world.
The roadshow was a massive success, not to mention a great deal of fun. A bad day exploring South Africa beats any good day in the office… The success of the initiative contributed to the fact that the Defender now makes up almost 50% of our production annually. We sold our demo to a customer that is still enjoying it, then pondered our next project. As far as development projects are concerned, we introduced a number of new products in the two years that followed, but none that we felt were as prolific as the Defender to put some real marketing muscle behind as we had done before.
And then Toyota revealed the 5th Generation Land Cruiser Prado or Land Cruiser 250 as it is sometimes referred to. Even more alluring was the revelation that this would be the base for the upcoming Lexus GX550. This got our attention. South Africa by en large is Toyota Land Cruiser heaven and has historically been a popular range of vehicles for us to armour. Having the Land Cruiser 300 as a base for the new model gave us confidence, as we had at that stage already armoured more than 30 examples. In our world this meant development lead time would be minimal. After seeing the vehicle in the flesh at NAMPO in 2024, we agreed that this was the way to go and was worthy of the investment of our time and resources. Relentlessly we tried every dealer in South Africa hoping for a cancelled order, an ordering error or some pixie dust to bless us with some luck. Two weeks later we took delivery of our black TX model. We were happy with the entry spec as the head up display would have been lost on the ballistic windscreen, and the other bits and pieces included in the VX-R weren’t going to make any difference in us demonstrating our armouring solution.
We didn’t set about armouring it straight away. We say that our B4 packages have a negligible effect on vehicle dynamics and performance, but we prefer to prove it first. The first 5000kms of ownership were spent unarmoured to give us a real feeling of what the Prado is like to live with and have a real-world comparison once armoured. Shortcut to the answer- after 20 000kms of driving I cannot tell the difference before and after. Even fuel consumption has been unaffected…
How it’s going…
A roadshow to Toyota dealers is quite a different undertaking than one with JLR dealers. If we had to visit each and every dorp in South Africa we would probably spend a year on the road, which is rather impractical while still trying to take care of family, business and so on. So, we had to be selective about where to go, picking the hotspots both for crime stats and Land Cruiser 250/300 ownership. It’s important to note at this point what we are trying to achieve with the dealers with this initiative.
There is a massive amount of misinformation about armoured cars out there, not just in how they are made but equally about who buys them. The old notion that it’s the exclusive territory of gangsters and politicians (sometimes not mutually exclusive individuals) is absolute rubbish for a start. Our clientele are private individuals and families looking to protect themselves from violent crime, period. Our aim is to give them the basic knowledge of the differences in ballistic levels, how the vehicles are made and what to do when receiving an enquiry. We receive more enquiries from dealers than ever before, simply because that is how the market has grown, and more individuals are seeing that it’s a worthwhile investment. The wrong information or the incorrect handling of a client query can have devastating results, so it’s vital they know at what point they need to get us involved.
Pivotally important is getting them to understand that we are not expecting that every Land Cruiser customer will want to armour their car, however an armoured car owner now has the Land Cruiser Prado on their shortlist. Showing them a built example in the flesh gives them the confidence to put the customers mind at ease that they have made a good choice. Everyone wins.
We set about making our route plans and started contacting the dealers to confirm dates and time slots. Bear in mind that a Toyota dealership is a rather busy place. The sales volumes are immense and our experience in the motor industry reminds us just how much ‘admin’ is involved in the day to day of running a dealership. The number of boxes to tick, compliances to meet and hurdles to jump is immense. Some bloke from Joburg wanting to show you his fancy Prado for 45 minutes barely puts you on the edge of your seat… We persevered and hit the road, utterly determined to open minds and at the same time spread some positivity about South Africa.
The Prado does it all…
The roadshow kicked off as far away from a Toyota dealer as you could imagine. Friends from TheCarScene- an online channel that reviews all things motoring roped us into one of their ill-thought challenges. They bought the cheapest running VW in the country for R13 000 with the intention of taking it up Sani Pass and onto VW CampFest in Bela Bela. Our job was as the recovery vehicle should the ‘Voks’ fail on its mission. Which it did. Miserably. 80% of their ascent up the pass was spent hooked up to a towrope that the Prado was yanking. We didn’t really have any doubt that this would happen as we had been up the pass two years prior in our Defender. A two-wheel drive with a bit of ground clearance and a careful driving approach will get you up the pass, but a 1.3 carb engine at that altitude will not… Especially not when you have added loads of weight with unnecessary ‘off-roading essentials’ such as a portable braai mounted on the boot lid. I kid you not. The Prado did however suffer a puncture on the pass, which resulted in a comical episode of getting the spare on when the standard Toyota jack broke before we could even get it under the car. That’s a story for another day.
The following day presented its own challenge of driving through the breadth of Lesotho to get back to Johannesburg by 2 PM for an important meeting. We had spent a day longer with the Voks than we had planned so the pressure was on. Lesotho is an interesting place to drive. The first 200kms away from Sani Top had some of the best roads you could ever wish to drive on. Loads of twists, turns and switchbacks with the Mountain Kingdom as a backdrop is the equivalent of motoring Nirvana to any petrolhead. The occasional scattering of falling rocks and wayward donkeys meant you had to stay aware, but the Prado impressed with its road holding and power up the hills.
It’s a far more sure -footed thing to drive than its predecessor. The old Prado in the corners resembled a drunk uncle taking to the dance floor at a wedding… While it’s an improvement, it is still a box on ladder chassis design and does not provide the dynamic prowess of a monocoque chassis. Suffice to say we pushed the envelope of what it should be able to do on a smooth tar surface, before the asphalt landscape changed and the Prado came into its own. Once off this main road of motoring heaven, the B-roads of Lesotho are worse than any pothole-riddled stretch of tarmac on offer in South Africa. Eventually you get tired of trying to dodge the potholes, eroded tar and mounds of mud and just drive straight through them. There was little choice with the time deadline looming ever closer. This is where the love for a Land Cruiser starts to make sense. It doesn’t take long before your lasting impression is one of a machine that is relentless and tough beyond words.
We have been doing our best to abuse our Prado and throw everything at it that we can. If it’s going to break or fail, we want that to happen with us and not with one of our clients so that we know what needs to be addressed in production. We are still waiting for it to fail, rattle or falter in any way. These things are built not to die, and pleasingly our process of armouring it has done nothing to dilute that promise.
Fancy check-ins, disappointment and maximum effort.
We took a strategic decision earlier this year to reaffirm our position as the leader in luxury vehicle armouring. On any given day, our workshop could be mistaken for a premium and exotic vehicle dealer, such is the calibre of machinery that we convert into mobile fortresses. This is an important statement for us to make as this is the space that we know better than anyone else and we choose to play to our strengths. There has been a barrage of overnight entries into the armouring industry with many thinking this is a quick path to an easy buck. It’s simply not the case. As far as passenger vehicle armouring goes, we only recognise one other organisation as a true competitor, in that we would sit in one of their vehicles and be shot at in confidence. For the most part we have a good working relationship and often refer business to each other. There is a silent understanding that they do what they do, and we do what we do. Sure, there are some overlaps, but we both believe there is enough business for us both and we stand by what our respective offering is
In simple marketing logic, it makes sense to align with brands in the luxury sector to expand our footprint and visibility in the sector. Some of our alignments are silent and discreet, as is preferred by our type of clientele, and others enjoy the limelight. One of those partnerships is with Embassy Direct and The Safari Guys. They came on board with the roadshow arranging our accommodation with their applicable partners in the locations we visited. We were quite blown away with what they came up with which tied in with our intention of making an impression on the luxury market. From a stay in a historical lighthouse, opulent luxury in the Mother City, to an incredible wine farm experience to mention but a few- we were delighted, wined and dined like royalty. Much like our customers are accustomed to…
Our experience with the Toyota dealers got off to a rocky start. We encountered a fair amount of apprehensiveness in one particular region where a large motor dealer holding company owns most of the Toyota dealers. It took a few visits to these dealers to get to the bottom of the story and what we found out is that they had armoured a fleet of double cabs with a particular armourer that offered ‘the best price’. Doors falling off, airbags exploding at random and drivetrain faults were amongst the myriad of complaints on every single vehicle. While not the fault of the Toyota dealer, the armouring company concerned show little interest in resolving these issues and left the dealer group stranded trying to fix a mess that was not theirs. That resulted in a blanket call to never get involved in armouring again.
We could stand on our head and whistle dixie, they were not going to listen to me and my story because of how badly they had been burned. It didn’t help when I retorted that they should have come to us and placed quality over price. That is the sad reality though. The consumer perception is sometimes that all vehicle armour is the same, so if one option is more expensive than the other, the company is just profiteering. That’s just not the case. It’s expensive because there is no way to do it as best as possible and still be ‘cheap’. The highest quality materials are expensive, and the process takes time, which has a massive labour cost. A quick visit to our premises will show you where the money goes. Our offices and factory are modest. None of us drive sports cars and we cannot afford to waste money on billboards. We have a small, but dedicated and competent team whose only objective is to build the best armoured car in the world, period. What the client pays us; he gets back in his own vehicle with no shortcuts.
Luckily our dealer experience wasn’t all bad. It was a revelation to see the differences in corporate culture and attitude between the different area and ownership of the various dealers. One in three dealers we have visited so far have had a really positive attitude about us being there and understood what we were trying to achieve. Those are the dealers that got the most out of the experience and in some cases have already sent us quote requests. We do pay rebates to dealers that introduce customers to us, so this positive attitude opens some welcome additional revenue in an environment where dealer margins are already tight.
We have to highlight one dealership in particular- Halfway Toyota Shelly Beach. They used the opportunity to create a bespoke afternoon out with their fleet clients, all on the last day of their retail month. They included a presentation on Kinto, which is Toyota’s in-house leasing option, brought along the local ward councillor responsible for community safety and all the heads of their clients in the security industry. Even the local newspaper joined in. The demonstration was a massive success and ended our week in the region on a high note, reassured that despite the setbacks we were on the right path with this initiative.
The roadshow is on a short break until June while the members of the media are given the opportunity to sample the Prado. Regular updates on the roadshow can be found on all our social media channels.
