Melbourne North Truck Centre Grand Opening Event

It’s official! Our Melbourne North Truck Centre is up and running and what a better way to celebrate than with a grand opening event!

After months of planning and hard work, Melbourne North Truck Centre is now running at full capacity. The dealership offers new truck sales, rental, parts and servicing, proudly serving the North of Melbourne including the Somerton and Ballarat regions.

We were pleased to mark this exciting milestone with an official Grand Opening in October, where we celebrated Melbourne North Truck Centre as our newest member of the PACCAR Family. This expansion further strengthens our dealership network, joining Hallam & Bayswater Truck Centres, CMV Truck Centre in Adelaide, and Barry Maney Group in Mount Gambier.

It was an incredible evening where we took the opportunity to showcase our new facility to the community, customers, suppliers, and staff from across our dealerships.

From the moment guests entered through the front gates, they were transformed into an industrial-style pop-up beer garden, complete with festoon lighting, rustic wine barrels, and an impressive display of trucks. The trucks on display included the DAF XG660, the Kenworth K220, Cemix’s T360A and Broadbent Transport’s T659.

As the night began, guests made their way into the workshop to find the bar serving icy cold drinks, while local acoustic duo, Superband set the tone with live music.

Everyone enjoyed catching up over a spread of mouth-watering food by Bigger Than Texas, featuring their signature beef brisket and slow-cooked lamb shoulders.

We were honoured to welcome a number of special guests from interstate for the grand opening, including CMV Group board members, management representatives from our sister dealership CMV Truck Centre, as well as members from PACCAR Australia. They joined us at Melbourne North Truck Centre to explore the new facilities and celebrate the latest addition to the ever-growing CMV Group PACCAR network.

The evening was officially opened by Marty Hinkley, Branch Manager of Melbourne North Truck Centre, who warmly welcomed guests and shared insights into the dealership’s capabilities, vision, and exciting plans for the future.

“To our customers, thank you. Your support from day one has been incredible. You’re the reason we’re here and we don’t take that for granted. We will always support you to the best of our ability and we understand how important having your vehicle on the road is for your business,” said Marty.

Following Marty’s welcome, Jonathan Crawford, Executive Director CMV Group Business Developments took the stage to reflect on CMV Group’s proud history and its longstanding partnership with PACCAR Australia.

“Our grandfather, Jim Crawford, who passed away on this day 26 years ago, played a key role in the Group’s early expansion and was instrumental in securing the Kenworth franchise in Adelaide. It’s a fitting tribute that we officially open this dealership on the anniversary of his passing” said Jonathan.

“To PACCAR and our business partners, thank you. We have been PACCAR dealers for 57 years, a partnership we are very proud of”.

Following Jonothan, we were then delighted to welcome Damien Smethurst, PACCAR Australia Managing Director to provide our customers with an overview of PACCAR Australia and how they will support Melbourne North Truck Centre to ensure the best experience for our customers now and into the future.

To close the evening Daniel Crawford, Joint Managing Director CMV Group, highlighted the strategic importance of the new dealership, in supporting customers across Melbourne’s northern regions.

“We could see a growing need for increased service capacity and accessibility for both local customers, and those travelling up and down the East Coast” said Daniel.

“Our planned investments to support these regions, include a desire to add service capacity to Ballarat and of course, a greenfield development for the long-term home of Melbourne North Truck Centre.”

As the formalities wrapped up, guests were invited to stay on and enjoy more incredible food, live music, and the chance to catch up with our team over a drink or two. They also had the opportunity to explore an impressive lineup of trucks on display inside the workshop, featuring some of the region’s finest rigs, including:

• Ausway T909
• WL & MP Fay K220
• Deol Logistics K200
• McClures Asset Management T410SAR
• Stielow Enterprises T909
• Sludgebusters DAF CF450
• Broadbent T659
•  Central Victorian Transport T410SAR
•  Nice Backyards DAF CF450 Tipper

 Over the past 12 months, our team has worked tirelessly to bring Melbourne North Truck Centre to where it is today. We’re incredibly proud of the progress we’ve made, not just in transforming the facility itself, but also in seeing the remarkable growth in our services among customers across Melbourne’s northern suburbs.

A huge thank you to all our amazing customers who took time out of their week to join us for such a special night! We’re also incredibly grateful to the customers who kindly took their trucks off the road to have them on display at the event, they looked fantastic. Finally, a big thank you to our dedicated staff for all their hard work in getting everything set up and running smoothly.

To view all the photos from the evening, please visit our Facebook album here!