Customer care

Sophia Waller is a Business Controller & Logistic Coordinator at Volvo Penta. As the winner of a Volvo internal challenge, she experienced the Volvo Ocean Race in Cape Town. She shares with us how she discovered the race as an extreme sport event and an amazing platform to strengthen relationship with our customers.
Sophia Waller

Why is Volvo involved with the Volvo Ocean Race?
It is a prestigious sport that matches our premium brand. The Volvo Ocean Race also comes with a great tradition. It is a global platform where customers can see and understand all our products in a very practical way.

How would you describe the Volvo Ocean Race?
It is much tougher than I thought! I expected the Volvo Ocean 65 boats to be more personalised, for instance, that each sailor has their own bed with family pictures around. But there are no such comforts. The 7 boats, all equipment and the conditions on board are optimized for high performance. 

Customer care

What did you learn from your time in Cape Town?
I didn’t realise how big the operation is. It’s a major sport competition going around the world for 9 months. Each time it stops in a port, like in Cape Town, there is this incredible race village that comes to life welcoming by thousands of people and corporate guests. I work in logistics and paid special attention to how important that is to the success of the race.

I also noticed how dedicated people were to take care of the brand and to ensure that all the customers have an exceptional experience.

What is it like to work at Volvo Penta?
I have the opportunity to know a lot of people within different departments because the company is quite small and therefore the decision chain is shorter. I’ve always believed that one needs to know every step of the chain to make the customer happy.