When in 1998 some of our customers begun their process of production plants delocalization, we decided to move alongside with them in order to provide support with our expertise. This is how our international expansion process started. By creating a shared value, on the one hand we had the opportunity of using our know-how to assist our clients, on the other we evolved from provider to a strategic partner.
The stepping stone was Romania. In the city of Timisoara we opened our first branch office abroad. Being centrally located among Belgrade, Budapest and Bucharest, the city represented a particularly functional point for both the procurement of materials and the distribution of final goods when ready for consumption. Next to the freight forwarding activity, we immediately understood that our added value lied in the ability of connecting the last steps of the supply chain. This was especially clear when we started analyzing the ongoing scenarios of our customers’ activities, and to study solutions that could apply to an internationalized production cycle. Starting from this understanding, we developed our first customs consultancy division and our first logistic function in the country.
In 20 years, we opened offices in 5 different cities.
Today, Timisoara remains our Country Head Office, including both an extremely vertical customs assistance function with a proper customs point office and, after acquiring at 50% of a local provider, a freight forwarding and last-mile service point that manages operations in more than 20 Romanian Provinces. Furthermore, we provide a continuous freight forwarding road service back and forth to Budapest.
Since 1998 we are also present in Arad, a city at some 60 km from Timisoara. There, we established an important joint venture that allowed us to be particularly focused on logistics. Our local warehouse is 26.000 square meters and hosts 5 to 6 customers. Our key service here is Critical-Time delivery, that means: we are able to do last-mile delivery, 24/7 in a context in which time is the critical variable.
We then opened a sales office in Bucharest, and two more branches in 2018: Constanta and Targu-Mures.
Constanta is a key point for sea-freight: this branch, located on the western coast of the Black Sea, can provide full assistance about customs documentation and formalities, transloads operations, support for sea-freight operations.
In Targu-Mures, logistics is our focus. Inside our 10.000 square meters warehouse, we provide support for the whole range of inbound and outbound processes plus we supply end-of-line operations for our customers.
We are also developing new services tailored to specific commodities. Among these, we are sharpening our attention on a new range of services dedicated to the automotive industry. By now, the main trade-lane is between Romania and China. Both the countries buy and sell spare parts from one another. Thanks to our network, we are able to be completely flexible in freight forwarding, logistics and customs operations to serve the automotive market organizing fast airfreight deliveries and providing last-mile services in Romania.
To discover all our services and solutions in Romania contact us at db-group.ro@dbgroup.net
