Customer Study: Scania Winter, Trysil

The first time that Scania in Norway hosted a presentation of its truck models at Radisson Blu Trysil Resort in the skiing and nature paradise of Trysil, 250 km north of Oslo, 120 guests attended. In January 2016, when the event, Scania Winter, was held for the 6th consecutive year, the numbers had risen to 1,300.

The explanation is quite obviously that the annual product presentation has become such a popular and sought after event that Scania dealers simply just have to register themselves and a number of their customers.

Customer events were held over more than five weeks, as 24-hours of continuous presentations were made, Monday to Friday for about 45 customers, demonstrator-drivers and subcontractors - in all, 100 participants in each group. The programme consisted of lunch on arrival, followed by test driving of trucks from 12:00 noon to 4:30 pm and 10-pin bowling on the hotel's own lanes. The evening offered a delicious dinner at the festively arranged round tables in the large banqueting hall and an enjoyable after-party. The following day began with breakfast, followed by an information meeting and an exhibition by 14 business partners (for example, Continental tyres), before lunch and departure.

"Even as people began arriving, you could hear the "wows" from the participants when they saw the hotel. It's so incredibly beautiful, both inside and out", says Marketing Coordinator Irene Schancke from Scania, who was responsible for the event. She delights in working with the hotel, which has gone almost without a hitch over the years.

The entire hotel reflected the event

"This year, we organised the accommodation of about 2,500 guests, so we had our own checklists and dealt with the inevitable changes along the way together with the hotel. But not only that - we got a total package. The entire hotel reflected Scania From the giant trucks parked at the main entrance, to all of the details the staff at the hotel had been involved in designing: The Scania logo was visible the entire time; on the breakfast rolls and on the dessert at the banquet in the evening. The breakfast buffet included a number of specialities that were garnished with miniature versions of our trucks. We had our own beer glasses, and even the bowling alleys and video screens were adorned with Scania logos", says Irene.

During the first two weeks, about 500 of Scania's customers from the greater part of Europe, and even Egypt came along, while the last three weeks were given over to approximately 800 customers from all over Norway. "Since we'd already brought 20 trucks to Trysil, we could just as well use the whole setup to invite customers from other countries", says Schancke.

Some of the test driving was held at the Trysil Motor Club's 800-metre long motocross track, where a skid pan was one of the exercises. The remainder was held on the streets of the city where, in cooperation with the municipality, roadblocks and signs and so on, were erected.

"Such a big event, with such an important customer group, depends very much on a good and positive dialogue with the hotel. From the very outset of the event, we've been blessed with an extremely dedicated and service-minded group of people, who've worked as a team and must clearly take a significant share of the credit for turning this unprecedented event into a popular tradition."

"The basic programme shouldn't be changed, but when almost half of the participants have attended before, there still needs to be some new things here and there, from one year to the next. This year it was the chef's concoctions in particular that put the icing on the cake", says Irene Schancke.