Our Story
Roadque is established in 1996 serving as an agent for Trailco in Vereeniging, Gauteng and distributed main trailer components including Axles, Couplers, Jockey Wheels and Springs. In 1999, Roadque in partner-ship with AL-KO, distributed products in Gauteng. As they wholesaled a bigger variety of trailer products, Roadque moved to bigger premises situated in Kilnerpark in 2001.
From 2005 onwards, Roadque manufactured and import products and supplied to the Automotive market clients: Iveco, Nissan Freight and many more. Today Roadque consists of 60 staff members serving the trailer, caravan and automotive market. They moved to more bigger premises situated in Silverton, Pretoria with a factory, warehouse and retail shop. Roadque has today grown into a proudly South African business and factory that manufactures trailer, caravan and 4×4 components, and much more. Roadque widend their product range to caravan and camping equipment, 4X4 accessories, as well as outdoor gear. They even specialise in lasering and sheet metal services.
About Roadque
Roadque’s Managing Director Francois Coetzee was a partner in a law firm at the time and this was a sideline business. Little did Coetzee know that the business would grow into a major manufac-turer of outdoor and lifestyle products and components, have a large showroom and retail outlet. Around the year 2000, Coetzee saw a gap in the market for new components in the trailer and caravan markets, and he started importing products from China and elsewhere around the world. Business boomed, and he soon realised that he could actually manufacture many of the products locally, instead of importing them.
Buy South African! “I am a South African, period, and it is my conviction to support local wherever I can. Besides importing product from China can tie up a huge amount of money because you have to import container loads of product or components, far in excess that is needed in the short term for the local market. This in turn would result in extra storage space requirements, product on the floor for many months and very little recourse if the product was not what you ordered or the product was faulty.”
“This convinced me to manufacture locally. I believe in supporting the South African market and will buy all the components I use in my products that I don’t manufacture from the local industry. For example I will get certain of my castings from Besaans foundry in Pretoria West and others from Dycer Foundry, which is around the corner from me. If more companies support local industry it will create the possibility that these local companies will employ more staff, thus alleviating many of the social ills that have gone wrong with our country over the last 10 years. “If everybody thinks more local, South Africa will be a better place.”
About Roadque Manufacturing
Roadque’s first venture into manufacturing began in 2001 when Coetzee purchased a press brake and he started producing components for trailers and caravans. Coetzee was then able to acquire 30 Caxton presses – from 5 ton to 200 ton – that were destined to end up at a scrap dealer. Through perseverance Coetzee got most of these machines reconditioned and producing components for him. They are still all very much in working condition on the production floor.
Through the years Roadque has added other equipment and today tthe company has five CNC lathes, two Wire EDM machines, a Safan and MVD press brake, a Flow waterjet cutter, a guillotine, as well as some conventional machines and welding equipment. “My business is unique in that we have the manufacturing side that is supplying a number of our own products to the retail shop. This can be anything from braked and unbraked axles, couplers, rims, to jockey wheels and lifting legs, winches, bearings and other components such as hubs, spring bolts, drop-side and long-leaf hinges.”
But at the same time the retail shop will have many other products on sale that are related to the outdoor and leisure lifestyle market, which we do not manufac-ture but outsource. This could be anything from chevrons, mudguards, light brackets, license disc holders, LED lights to cooking utensils and pots to refrigerators and braais. On top of this you can order a custom axle, for example, and we will make it to your specifications.
We are also proud to say that 90% of our products that we sell in the shop are now manufactured locally by ourselves or a supplier. We have over 100 of our own products in the shop. Unfortunately some products we still cannot get locally and have to import. However, going forward Roadque aims to produce everything that is needed to build a trailer or caravan, as well as other components that are not available in the usual outdoor shops.