30,000 Facebook Likes Lookback

A few weeks ago, we posted a YouTube video looking back on our favourite memories in celebration of hitting 30,000 likes on Facebook- now it’s time to look at those memories in more detail!

Connor- Volvo FH V5 Before and After:

Connor from our TruckChef department chose the before and after pictures of a Volvo FH Version 5 that we kitted out with a huge range of lighting just last year. This was featured in a 'Thank Truck its Friday YouTube' video, in which Tim gave viewers a tour around the vehicle.

Vehicle lighting is something we really love here at Kuda, and we stock a large range of lighting brands and accessories. The Volvo featured many of these, including UltraLED Grill Strobe Beacons, Strands Night Guard, Strands Red Fox and Strands Red Tiger. All together, these looked fantastic, giving the truck a smart, luminous look.

Connor stated, “I always like to see the before and after's: what accessories we’ve added, and how far the trucks have come.” This was a really fun project for us, and we were so pleased with the finished product! You can check out the YouTube video here.

Bayley- Top Gear Truck:

Bayley- also from TruckChef- said that his favourite memory was when we accessorised a truck for Top Gear. Last June, we added a range of accessories to a Mercedes Actros Edition 2 to be featured in a Top Gear episode about a HGV road trip across Britain.

Outside the cab, we added one of our TreadSafe catwalks, a DVS system, and colour matched side skirts. Inside, we fitted a CabStore rear locker, a fold down TV and a TruckChef microwave. We were very fortunate to get this opportunity, especially as so many of our own brands were featured. 

Bayley said, “it was so amazing to be part of such a big project, and see it come to life on the TV”. You can watch the full episode here.

Olly- 3D Scanning and Modelling:

Our design and development engineer- Olly- unsurprisingly chose our 3D Scanning and Modelling blog post as his favourite memory. Olly was brought on board specifically to share his expertise in this area, alongside working with our new CNC Robotic equipment.

3D Scanning and modelling has allowed us to streamline our design process and bring new products to the market much faster. This investment involved a major renovation of Kuda HQ to create space for dedicated modelling areas and a CNC room. We now have an in-house CAD team, and we look forward to seeing what advances we can make with their input in the future.

Olly said, “it’s quite exciting, it’s going to help Kuda develop new products and grow as a company”. We have a full blog post about our 3D scanning and modelling journey where you can learn more!

Sam- Truck of the Month:

Sam from our CabStore department chose our popular Truck of The Month competitions as his favourite memory, and it’s not hard to see why!

For around a year and a half now, we have regularly been running these competitions across our social media, offering our followers fantastic prizes in return for fun trucking stories left in the comments, and pictures of their trucks. We get a lot of participation on these competitions, and it’s not surprising when our prizes have included Strands LED bars, Baby Shark Air Horns, and LUXMOV Smart TV’s!

Sam commented, “It’s interesting to see how people customise their individual trucks, and we also get to give praise to those who’ve done a really good job”. You can join in with our current truck of the month competition here!

Tom- Truck Shows

Tom- our Sales and Infrastructure Manager- chose our truck show exhibitions as his favourite Facebook memory. Kuda has attended a number of shows throughout the years, including TruckFest and the Commercial Vehicle Show, and we love getting out and about to showcase our products!

Even when Kuda haven’t attended a show as a company, some of our team- including Tom- often end up visiting on their own time, simply because we love seeing everything going on in the industry! This year, we will be heading to Road Transport Expo at the end of June- we hope to see as many of you there as possible!

Tom said. “Road Transport Expo is very new, so this year it’s going to be even bigger I think. We’re going to have our show stand up there, so come and say hello!” You can read our last blog post on the CV show here.

Kim- The BIG Truck Giveaway

Kim, our warehouse operative, chose the BIG Truck Giveaway: our ongoing competition where our YouTube subscribers will have the chance to win a truck!

Throughout this year, we will release 12 episodes over on YouTube, documenting our journey as we accessorise a DAF XF Super Space Cab, with our customers voting for what we add every step of the way. We recently released episode 4, and have added airhorns, a name board, side window deflectors, side skirts and a modern wrap so far!

Kim has starred in a few episodes of The BIG Truck Giveaway, helping out our Marketing Team as they try to find things in the warehouse. Kim stated, “the stuff that’s going on with it, the accessories we’re putting on- its brilliant. One lucky customer’s going to end up with that and they’re going to absolutely love it!” You can watch the latest episode of the BIG Truck Giveaway here!

Tim- Facebook Likes Milestones, and Support Through Covid

Our Commercial Director, Tim, chose some quite sentimental memories, reminiscing on the years that we hit various milestones on Facebook. In 2016, we reached 10,000 likes, and since then we have managed to triple that number. Tim stated, “I think we should be proud because it’s all organic, we’ve never paid for any likes, so thank you guys.”

Tim also highlighted the difficulties of covid, and how our customers and subscribers stuck with us even when we had to send staff to stay at home during the pandemic. Tim said, “the contact we were still able to get from you guys during this time was amazing; that relationship and that interaction that we had through covid will always stick with me.”

Ruby- Christmas Countdown

Ruby, our Marketing Assistant, chose last year’s Christmas Countdown as her favourite memory. Every year, we put together an advent calendar style countdown of some of our favourite products, but last year was extra special as we had a custom intro video made by an external creative!

The intro depicted our resident elf-on-the-shelf- Trucky - driving a truck equipped with our very own MirrorShield’s. We also had Trucky hiding in many of our videos throughout the countdown; It was a really fun series to put together, and it was so special to have an animated intro made just for us!

Ruby commented, “it was so good to see the final product, and all the videos came out really, really nice!” You can see our Christmas countdown videos here.

Millie- 2022 Lookback 

Our Marketing Manager, Millie, chose our 2022 lookback reel and complementary blog post. This lookback encapsulated everything we did, from truck transformations, to new products, to fun videos and challenges. We also documented the strides we made in technology with 3D printing, 3D scanning and modelling and CNC equipment, alongside personal milestones such as hitting 10k on TikTok. Seeing everything come together like that really showed the scope of our activities in 2022, especially regarding how much marketing content we managed to create.

Millie commented, “it’s really nice to reminisce on how much we did; it just rounded off a really good year for us.”

You can take a look at the reel here, and the blog post here.

In Conclusion: